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  • Part 2&ndash;Load Testing In The Cloud

    - by Tarun Arora
    Welcome to Part 2, In Part 1 we discussed the advantages of creating a Test Rig in the cloud, the Azure edge and the Test Rig Topology we want to get to. In Part 2, Let’s start by understanding the components of Azure we’ll be making use of followed by manually putting them together to create the test rig, so… let’s get down dirty start setting up the Test Rig.  What Components of Azure will I be using for building the Test Rig in the Cloud? To run the Test Agents we’ll make use of Windows Azure Compute and to enable communication between Test Controller and Test Agents we’ll make use of Windows Azure Connect.  Azure Connect The Test Controller is on premise and the Test Agents are in the cloud (How will they talk?). To enable communication between the two, we’ll make use of Windows Azure Connect. With Windows Azure Connect, you can use a simple user interface to configure IPsec protected connections between computers or virtual machines (VMs) in your organization’s network, and roles running in Windows Azure. With this you can now join Windows Azure role instances to your domain, so that you can use your existing methods for domain authentication, name resolution, or other domain-wide maintenance actions. For more details refer to an overview of Windows Azure connect. A very useful video explaining everything you wanted to know about Windows Azure connect.  Azure Compute Windows Azure compute provides developers a platform to host and manage applications in Microsoft’s data centres across the globe. A Windows Azure application is built from one or more components called ‘roles.’ Roles come in three different types: Web role, Worker role, and Virtual Machine (VM) role, we’ll be using the Worker role to set up the Test Agents. A very nice blog post discussing the difference between the 3 role types. Developers are free to use the .NET framework or other software that runs on Windows with the Worker role or Web role. Developers can also create applications using languages such as PHP and Java. More on Windows Azure Compute. Each Windows Azure compute instance represents a virtual server... Virtual Machine Size CPU Cores Memory Cost Per Hour Extra Small Shared 768 MB $0.04 Small 1 1.75 GB $0.12 Medium 2 3.50 GB $0.24 Large 4 7.00 GB $0.48 Extra Large 8 14.00 GB $0.96   You might want to review the Windows Azure Pricing FAQ. Let’s Get Started building the Test Rig… Configuration Machine Role Comments VM – 1 Domain Controller for Playpit.com On Premise VM – 2 TFS, Test Controller On Premise VM – 3 Test Agent Cloud   In this blog post I would assume that you have the domain, Team Foundation Server and Test Controller Installed and set up already. If not, please refer to the TFS 2010 Installation Guide and this walkthrough on MSDN to set up your Test Controller. You can also download a preconfigured TFS 2010 VM from Brian Keller's blog, Brian also has some great hands on Labs on TFS 2010 that you may want to explore. I. Lets start building VM – 3: The Test Agent Download the Windows Azure SDK and Tools Open Visual Studio and create a new Windows Azure Project using the Cloud Template                   Choose the Worker Role for reasons explained in the earlier post         The WorkerRole.cs implements the Run() and OnStart() methods, no code changes required. You should be able to compile the project and run it in the compute emulator (The compute emulator should have been installed as part of the Windows Azure Toolkit) on your local machine.                   We will only be making changes to WindowsAzureProject, open ServiceDefinition.csdef. Ensure that the vmsize is small (remember the cost chart above). Import the “Connect” module. I am importing the Connect module because I need to join the Worker role VM to the Playpit domain. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceDefinition name="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceDefinition"> <WorkerRole name="WorkerRole1" vmsize="Small"> <Imports> <Import moduleName="Diagnostics" /> <Import moduleName="Connect"/> </Imports> </WorkerRole> </ServiceDefinition> Go to the ServiceConfiguration.Cloud.cscfg and note that settings with key ‘Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.%%%%’ have been added to the configuration file. This is because you decided to import the connect module. See the config below. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceConfiguration serviceName="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration" osFamily="1" osVersion="*"> <Role name="WorkerRole1"> <Instances count="1" /> <ConfigurationSettings> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Diagnostics.ConnectionString" value="UseDevelopmentStorage=true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.ActivationToken" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Refresh" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.WaitForConnectivity" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Upgrade" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.EnableDomainJoin" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainFQDN" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainControllerFQDN" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainAccountName" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainPassword" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainOU" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Administrators" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainSiteName" value="" /> </ConfigurationSettings> </Role> </ServiceConfiguration>             Let’s go step by step and understand all the highlighted parameters and where you can find the values for them.       osFamily – By default this is set to 1 (Windows Server 2008 SP2). Change this to 2 if you want the Windows Server 2008 R2 operating system. The Advantage of using osFamily = “2” is that you get Powershell 2.0 rather than Powershell 1.0. In Powershell 2.0 you could simply use “powershell -ExecutionPolicy Unrestricted ./myscript.ps1” and it will work while in Powershell 1.0 you will have to change the registry key by including the following in your command file “reg add HKLM\Software\Microsoft\PowerShell\1\ShellIds\Microsoft.PowerShell /v ExecutionPolicy /d Unrestricted /f” before you can execute any power shell. The other reason you might want to move to os2 is if you wanted IIS 7.5.       Activation Token – To enable communication between the on premise machine and the Windows Azure Worker role VM both need to have the same token. Log on to Windows Azure Management Portal, click on Connect, click on Get Activation Token, this should give you the activation token, copy the activation token to the clipboard and paste it in the configuration file. Note – Later in the blog I’ll be showing you how to install connect on the on premise machine.                       EnableDomainJoin – Set the value to true, ofcourse we want to join the on windows azure worker role VM to the domain.       DomainFQDN, DomainControllerFQDN, DomainAccountName, DomainPassword, DomainOU, Administrators – This information is specific to your domain. I have extracted this information from the ‘service manager’ and ‘Active Directory Users and Computers’. Also, i created a new Domain-OU namely ‘CloudInstances’ so all my cloud instances joined to my domain show up here, this is optional. You can encrypt the DomainPassword – refer to the instructions here. Or hold fire, I’ll be covering that when i come to certificates and encryption in the coming section.       Now once you have filled all this information up, the configuration file should look something like below, <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceConfiguration serviceName="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration" osFamily="2" osVersion="*"> <Role name="WorkerRole1"> <Instances count="1" /> <ConfigurationSettings> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Diagnostics.ConnectionString" value="UseDevelopmentStorage=true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.ActivationToken" value="45f55fea-f194-4fbc-b36e-25604faac784" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Refresh" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.WaitForConnectivity" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Upgrade" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.EnableDomainJoin" value="true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainFQDN" value="play.pit.com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainControllerFQDN" value="WIN-KUDQMQFGQOL.play.pit.com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainAccountName" value="playpit\Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainPassword" value="************************" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainOU" value="OU=CloudInstances, DC=Play, DC=Pit, DC=com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Administrators" value="Playpit\Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainSiteName" value="" /> </ConfigurationSettings> </Role> </ServiceConfiguration> Next we will be enabling the Remote Desktop module in to the ServiceDefinition.csdef, we could make changes manually or allow a beautiful wizard to help us make changes. I prefer the second option. So right click on the Windows Azure project and choose Publish       Now once you get the publish wizard, if you haven’t already you would be asked to import your Windows Azure subscription, this is simply the Msdn subscription activation key xml. Once you have done click Next to go to the Settings page and check ‘Enable Remote Desktop for all roles’.       As soon as you do that you get another pop up asking you the details for the user that you would be logging in with (make sure you enter a reasonable expiry date, you do not want the user account to expire today). Notice the more information tag at the bottom, click that to get access to the certificate section. See screen shot below.       From the drop down select the option to create a new certificate        In the pop up window enter the friendly name for your certificate. In my case I entered ‘WAC – Test Rig’ and click ok. This will create a new certificate for you. Click on the view button to see the certificate details. Do you see the Thumbprint, this is the value that will go in the config file (very important). Now click on the Copy to File button to copy the certificate, we will need to import the certificate to the windows Azure Management portal later. So, make sure you save it a safe location.                                Click Finish and enter details of the user you would like to create with permissions for remote desktop access, once you have entered the details on the ‘Remote desktop configuration’ screen click on Ok. From the Publish Windows Azure Wizard screen press Cancel. Cancel because we don’t want to publish the role just yet and Yes because we want to save all the changes in the config file.       Now if you go to the ServiceDefinition.csdef file you will see that the RemoteAccess and RemoteForwarder roles have been imported for you. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceDefinition name="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceDefinition"> <WorkerRole name="WorkerRole1" vmsize="Small"> <Imports> <Import moduleName="Diagnostics" /> <Import moduleName="Connect" /> <Import moduleName="RemoteAccess" /> <Import moduleName="RemoteForwarder" /> </Imports> </WorkerRole> </ServiceDefinition> Now go to the ServiceConfiguration.Cloud.cscfg file and you see a whole bunch for setting “Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.%%%” values added for you. <?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> <ServiceConfiguration serviceName="WindowsAzureProject2" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration" osFamily="2" osVersion="*"> <Role name="WorkerRole1"> <Instances count="1" /> <ConfigurationSettings> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Diagnostics.ConnectionString" value="UseDevelopmentStorage=true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.ActivationToken" value="45f55fea-f194-4fbc-b36e-25604faac784" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Refresh" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.WaitForConnectivity" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Upgrade" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.EnableDomainJoin" value="true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainFQDN" value="play.pit.com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainControllerFQDN" value="WIN-KUDQMQFGQOL.play.pit.com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainAccountName" value="playpit\Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainPassword" value="************************" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainOU" value="OU=CloudInstances, DC=Play, DC=Pit, DC=com" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.Administrators" value="Playpit\Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.Connect.DomainSiteName" value="" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.Enabled" value="true" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.AccountUsername" value="Administrator" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.AccountEncryptedPassword" value="MIIBnQYJKoZIhvcNAQcDoIIBjjCCAYoCAQAxggFOMIIBSgIBADAyMB4xHDAaBgNVBAMME1dpbmRvd 3MgQXp1cmUgVG9vbHMCEGa+B46voeO5T305N7TSG9QwDQYJKoZIhvcNAQEBBQAEggEABg4ol5Xol66Ip6QKLbAPWdmD4ae ADZ7aKj6fg4D+ATr0DXBllZHG5Umwf+84Sj2nsPeCyrg3ZDQuxrfhSbdnJwuChKV6ukXdGjX0hlowJu/4dfH4jTJC7sBWS AKaEFU7CxvqYEAL1Hf9VPL5fW6HZVmq1z+qmm4ecGKSTOJ20Fptb463wcXgR8CWGa+1w9xqJ7UmmfGeGeCHQ4QGW0IDSBU6ccg vzF2ug8/FY60K1vrWaCYOhKkxD3YBs8U9X/kOB0yQm2Git0d5tFlIPCBT2AC57bgsAYncXfHvPesI0qs7VZyghk8LVa9g5IqaM Cp6cQ7rmY/dLsKBMkDcdBHuCTAzBgkqhkiG9w0BBwEwFAYIKoZIhvcNAwcECDRVifSXbA43gBApNrp40L1VTVZ1iGag+3O1" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.AccountExpiration" value="2012-11-27T23:59:59.0000000+00:00" /> <Setting name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteForwarder.Enabled" value="true" /> </ConfigurationSettings> <Certificates> <Certificate name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Plugins.RemoteAccess.PasswordEncryption" thumbprint="AA23016CF0BDFC344400B5B82706B608B92E4217" thumbprintAlgorithm="sha1" /> </Certificates> </Role> </ServiceConfiguration>          Okay let’s look at them one at a time,       Enabled - Yes, we would like to enable Remote Access.       AccountUserName – This is the user name you entered while you were on the publish windows azure role screen, as detailed above.       AccountEncrytedPassword – Try and decode that, the certificate is used to encrypt the password you specified for the user account. Remember earlier i said, either use the instructions or wait and i’ll be showing you encryption, now the user account i am using for rdp has the same password as my domain password, so i can simply copy the value of the AccountEncryptedPassword to the DomainPassword as well.       AccountExpiration – This is the expiration as you specified in the wizard earlier, make sure your account does not expire today.       Remote Forwarder – Check out the documentation, below is how I understand it, -- One role in an application that implements a remote desktop connection must import the RemoteForwarder module. The two modules work together to enable the remote desktop connections to role instances. -- If you have multiple roles defined in the service model, it does not matter which role you add the RemoteForwarder module to, but you must add it to only one of the role definitions.       Certificate – Remember the certificate thumbprint from the wizard, the on premise machine and windows azure role machine that need to speak to each other must have the same thumbprint. More on that when we install Windows Azure connect Endpoints on the on premise machine. As i said earlier, in this blog post, I’ll be showing you the manual process so i won’t be scripting any star up tasks to install the test agent or register the test agent with the TFS Server. I’ll be showing you all this cool stuff in the next blog post, that’s because it’s important to understand the manual side of it, it becomes easier for you to troubleshoot in case something fails. Having said that, the changes we have made are sufficient to spin up the Windows Azure Worker Role aka Test Agent VM, have it connected with the play.pit.com domain and have remote access enabled on it. Before we deploy the Test Agent VM we need to set up Windows Azure Connect on the TFS Server. II. Windows Azure Connect: Setting up Connect on VM – 2 i.e. TFS & Test Controller Glad you made it so far, now to enable communication between the on premise TFS/Test Controller and Azure-ed Test Agent we need to enable communication. We have set up the Azure connect module in the Test Agent configuration, now the connect end points need to be enabled on the on premise machines, let’s have a look at how we can do this. Log on to VM – 2 running the TFS Server and Test Controller Log on to the Windows Azure Management Portal and click on Virtual Network Click on Virtual Network, if you already have a subscription you should see the below screen shot, if not, you would be asked to complete the subscription first        Click on Install Local Endpoints from the top left on the panel and you get a url appended with a token id in it, remember the token i showed you earlier, in theory the token you get here should match the token you added to the Test Agent config file.        Copy the url to the clip board and paste it in IE explorer (important, the installation at present only works out of IE and you need to have cookies enabled in order to complete the installation). As stated in the pop up, you can NOT download and run the software later, you need to run it as is, since it contains a token. Once the installation completes you should see the Windows Azure connect icon in the system tray.                         Right click the Azure Connect icon, choose Diagnostics and refer to this link for diagnostic detail terminology. NOTE – Unfortunately I could not see the Windows Azure connect icon in the system tray, a bit of binging with Google revealed that the azure connect icon is only shown when the ‘Windows Azure Connect Endpoint’ Service is started. So go to services.msc and make sure that the service is started, if not start it, unfortunately again, the service did not start for me on a manual start and i realised that one of the dependant services was disabled, you can look at the service dependencies and start them and then start windows azure connect. Bottom line, you need to start Windows Azure connect service before you can proceed. Please refer here on MSDN for more on Troubleshooting Windows Azure connect. (Follow the next step as well)   Now go back to the Windows Azure Management Portal and from Groups and Roles create a new group, lets call it ‘Test Rig’. Make sure you add the VM – 2 (the TFS Server VM where you just installed the endpoint).       Now if you go back to the Azure Connect icon in the system tray and click ‘Refresh Policy’ you will notice that the disconnected status of the icon should change to ready for connection. III. Importing Certificate in to Windows Azure Management Portal But before that you need to import the certificate you created in Step I in to the Windows Azure Management Portal. Log on to the Windows Azure Management Portal and click on ‘Hosted Services, Storage Accounts & CDN’ and then ‘Management Certificates’ followed by Add Certificates as shown in the screen shot below        Browse to the location where you saved the certificate earlier, remember… Refer to Step I in case you forgot.        Now you should be able to see the imported certificate here, make sure the thumbprint of the certificate matches the one you inserted in the config files        IV. Publish Windows Azure Worker Role aka Test Agent Having completed I, II and III, you are ready to publish the Test Agent VM – 3 to the cloud. Go to Visual Studio and right click the Windows Azure project and select Publish. Verify the infomration in the wizard, from the advanced settings tab, you can also enabled capture of intellitrace or profiling information.         Click Next and Click Publish! From the view menu bar select the Windows Azure Activity Log window.       Now you should be able to see the deployment progress in real time.             In the Windows Azure Management Portal, you should also be able to see the progress of creation of a new Worker Role.       Once the deployment is complete you should be able to RDP (go to run prompt type mstsc and in the pop up the machine name) in to the Test Agent Worker Role VM from the Playpit network using the domain admin user account. In case you are unable to log in to the Test Agent using the domain admin user account it means the process of joining the Test Agent to the domain has failed! But the good news is, because you imported the connect module, you can connect to the Test Agent machine using Windows Azure Management Portal and troubleshoot the reason for failure, you will be able to log in with the user name and password you specified in the config file for the keys ‘RemoteAccess.AccountUsername, RemoteAccess.EncryptedPassword (just that enter the password unencrypted)’, fix it or manually join the machine to the domain. Once you have managed to Join the Test Agent VM to the Domain move to the next step.      So, log in to the Test Agent Worker Role VM with the Playpit Domain Administrator and verify that you can log in, the machine is connected to the domain and the connect service is successfully running. If yes, give your self a pat on the back, you are 80% mission accomplished!         Go to the Windows Azure Management Portal and click on Virtual Network, click on Groups and Roles and click on Test Rig, click Edit Group, the edit the Test Rig group you created earlier. In the Connect to section, click on Add to select the worker role you have just deployed. Also, check the ‘Allow connections between endpoints in the group’ with this you will enable to communication between test controller and test agents and test agents/test agents. Click Save.      Now, you are ready to deploy the Test Agent software on the Worker Role Test Agent VM and configure it to work with the Test Controller. V. Configuring VM – 3: Installing Test Agent and Associating Test Agent to Controller Log in to the Worker Role Test Agent VM that you have just successfully deployed, make sure you log in with the domain administrator account. Download the All Agents software from MSDN, ‘en_visual_studio_agents_2010_x86_x64_dvd_509679.iso’, extract the iso and navigate to where you have extracted the iso. In my case, i have extracted the iso to “C:\Resources\Temp\VsAgentSetup”. Open the Test Agent folder and double click on setup.exe. Once you have installed the Test Agent you should reach the configuration window. If you face any issues installing TFS Test Agent on the VM, refer to the walkthrough on MSDN.       Once you have successfully installed the Test Agent software you will need to configure the test agent. Right click the test agent configuration tool and run as a different user. i.e. an Administrator. This is really to run the configuration wizard with elevated privileges (you might have UAC block something's otherwise).        In the run options, you can select ‘service’ you do not need to run the agent as interactive un less you are running coded UI tests. I have specified the domain administrator to connect to the TFS Test Controller. In real life, i would never do that, i would create a separate test user service account for this purpose. But for the blog post, we are using the most powerful user so that any policies or restrictions don’t block you.        Click the Apply Settings button and you should be all green! If not, the summary usually gives helpful error messages that you can resolve and proceed. As per my experience, you may run in to either a permission or a firewall blocking communication issue.        And now the moment of truth! Go to VM –2 open up Visual Studio and from the Test Menu select Manage Test Controller       Mission Accomplished! You should be able to see the Test Agent that you have just configured here,         VI. Creating and Running Load Tests on your brand new Azure-ed Test Rig I have various blog posts on Performance Testing with Visual Studio Ultimate, you can follow the links and videos below, Blog Posts: - Part 1 – Performance Testing using Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate - Part 2 – Performance Testing using Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate - Part 3 – Performance Testing using Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate Videos: - Test Tools Configuration & Settings in Visual Studio - Why & How to Record Web Performance Tests in Visual Studio Ultimate - Goal Driven Load Testing using Visual Studio Ultimate Now that you have created your load tests, there is one last change you need to make before you can run the tests on your Azure Test Rig, create a new Test settings file, and change the Test Execution method to ‘Remote Execution’ and select the test controller you have configured the Worker Role Test Agent against in our case VM – 2 So, go on, fire off a test run and see the results of the test being executed on the Azur-ed Test Rig. Review and What’s next? A quick recap of the benefits of running the Test Rig in the cloud and what i will be covering in the next blog post AND I would love to hear your feedback! Advantages Utilizing the power of Azure compute to run a heavy virtual user load. Benefiting from the Azure flexibility, destroy Test Agents when not in use, takes < 25 minutes to spin up a new Test Agent. Most important test Network Latency, (network latency and speed of connection are two different things – usually network latency is very hard to test), by placing the Test Agents in Microsoft Data centres around the globe, one can actually test the lag in transferring the bytes not because of a slow connection but because the page has been requested from the other side of the globe. Next Steps The process of spinning up the Test Agents in windows Azure is not 100% automated. I am working on the Worker process and power shell scripts to make the role deployment, unattended install of test agent software and registration of the test agent to the test controller automated. In the next blog post I will show you how to make the complete process unattended and automated. Remember to subscribe to http://feeds.feedburner.com/TarunArora. Hope you enjoyed this post, I would love to hear your feedback! If you have any recommendations on things that I should consider or any questions or feedback, feel free to leave a comment. See you in Part III.   Share this post : CodeProject

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  • How to improve Windows Aero desktop performance?

    - by Click Ok
    Sincerely I don't understand why in Windows Experience ratings, the "Game Graphics" in my pc is 5.0 and "Graphic Elements" (windows aero desktop performance) is 3.9. How it is possible? My VGA is nice for games but bad for Windows Desktop? What I can do to improve windows aero desktop performance?

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  • Upgrade only one version of XP to Windows 8 on a dual boot computer

    - by Shane
    I have a computer running Windows XP Pro 32-bit and 64-bit in dual boot. I need to retain Windows XP 32-bit Pro, as I have expensive software that will only run on that specific version. I want to upgrade my 64-bit installation of XP to Windows 8 without losing the 32-bit installation. If I simply use the ISO to upgrade from within my XP 64-bit installation, will I retain dual boot for both XP 32-bit and Windows 8?

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  • windows 8 network cant connect to other computers

    - by Sickest
    we just setup a windows 7 ultimate file server, and all the other computers on the network, found the server expect the windows 8 computer. computers on the network: vista, win 7 ultimate, mac os, win 8 (problem) I setup a homegroup on the win 7 server pc, but the windows 8 computer can't find the homegroup, nor can it connect to the server by typing its network ext //server-pc i've tried to turn on all the windows 8 sharing to discovery ON, on Private and Public and all Networks, and got nothing. should be noted that the computer is using norton firewall/AV, im not sure if that's a factor

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  • Configuring external SMTP server on Azure VM - messages staying in queue

    - by Steph Locke
    I have an external SMTP provider: auth.smtp.1and1.co.uk I am trying to send SQL Server Reporting Services emails via this on an Windows 2012 Azure VM. It is configured sufficiently correctly for emails to be generated, but I've not configured something or mis-configured something as the emails then stay in the queue. Setup details Configured SMTP Virtual Server General: IP Address: Fixed value Access: Access Control: Authentication: ticked Anonymous access Access: Connection Control: All except the list below (which is empty) Access: relay restrictions: Only the list below (which contains 127.0.0.1), ticked 'allow all..' option Delivery: Outbound Security...:Basic Authentication with username and password completed, ticked TLS encryption Delivery: Outbound connections...:TCP port=587 Delivery: Advanced: FQDN=ServerName, smarthost=auth.smtp.1and1.co.uk I then set the following SSRS rsreportserver.config values: <SMTPServer>100.92.192.3</SMTPServer> <SendUsing>2</SendUsing> <SMTPServerPickupDirectory> c:\inetpub\mailroot\pickup </SMTPServerPickupDirectory> <From>[email protected]</From> Tried so far 1) turning the smtp service off and on again (just in case) 2) run SMTPDiag with no errors (also no emails) 3) tried turning off the firewall for the ports (and more generally to see if it made a difference) 4) tried generation from powershell which resulted with message in queue 5) added 25 and 857 as endpoint 6) perused the event log and found some warnings that appear to be about the recipient Message delivery to the remote domain 'gmail.com' failed for the following reason: Unable to bind to the destination server in DNS. Message delivery to the host '212.227.15.179' failed while delivering to the remote domain 'gmail.com' for the following reason: The remote server did not respond to a connection attempt. 7) tried pinging but this appears to be blocked on azure 8) tried more powershell sending on different domains variants (localhost, boxname, internal ip used in smtp properties, 127.0.0.1) - none resulting in success 9) tried adding a remote domain - no change Could anyone recommend what step 10 should be in fixing this issue please?

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  • Debugging deployed azure app

    - by gonzohunter
    Is it possible to attach to a deployed Azure app? I would like to be able to step through the code so that I can see what values are being set in a request to one of my web role actions. I have looked around and the only examples seem to be of debugging when the azure app is running on the local machine.

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  • After update, suddenly lost ability to access Windows Server 2008 R2 shares from Windows XP clients

    - by Knute Knudsen
    Today I lost the ability to see my Windows Server 2008 R2 shares from any of my 3 Windows XP machines in my small office. The 5 Win7 machines haven't been affected (they are still able to browse/access the 2008 server), but none of my WinXP machines can access the 2008R2 server anymore. Yesterday (and for the previous year) everything was working fine. I do not have a domain setup. I can still access Win7 shares from WinXP clients. Browsing the server logs, I see that the following update was installed last night: > Installation Ready: The following updates are downloaded and ready for > installation. This computer is currently scheduled to install these > updates on ?Thursday, ?November ?15, ?2012 at 3:00 AM: > - Security Update for Windows Server 2008 R2 x64 Edition (KB2761226) > - Security Update for Microsoft .NET Framework 3.5.1 on Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 SP1 for x64-based Systems (KB2729452) > - Windows Malicious Software Removal Tool x64 - November 2012 (KB890830) > - Cumulative Security Update for Internet Explorer 9 for Windows Server 2008 R2 x64 Edition (KB2761451) It seems likely that something was changed in last night's update, but so far I haven't seen anything on microsoft.com to prove it. I did hear that XP is reaching the end of the road soon. Any ideas?

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  • Everyone can access my Windows 7 Homegroup file shares - Even Windows XP computers

    - by Adrian Grigore
    I have 3 computers in my network, two running Windows 7 and one running Windows XP. I've set up a homegroup on both Windows 7 computers. Also, all computers are in the same Workgroup. The problem is that one of the Windows 7 computers makes all shares accessible to the entire Workgroup instead of just sharing to the Homegroup as it should be. I created the file share in Windows 7 via right-click in the explorer, then click on "Share For" - "Homegroup (Read/Write)" (translated from German, so the actual wording may be different). Also, when I look at the file sharing properties of that folder, Windows Explorer informs me that Users must have a valid account and password for this Computer to access drive shares. Unfortunately this is not true. Being in the same Workgroup is enough to get access. Homegroup restrictions work as expected on my other Windows 7 computer. When trying to browse those shares from the XP computer, I get a dialog asking for a login and password. What might cause homegroup restrictions to fail and how can I fix this?

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  • Error loading operating system: format Windows 7 to Windows XP Service Pack 3

    - by Blerta
    I saw that there are other questions like mine here. But O also saw that some problems where solved with fixmbr from a Windows 7 recovery console, but that didn't work for me. I bought my laptop with Vista installed and later reformated and used Windows 7. During formatting with Windows 7 I had some problems with my hard drive and found out it was dead so I bought a new one. I wanted to reformat with Windows XP,because Windows 7 is consuming more RAM that it is able handle and I wanted to use it for other programs. So I formatted with Windows XP Service Pack 3 but after first reboot a message appeared: "Error loading operating system" Reading here, I assumed that maybe I had installed it on the wrong partition and maybe having two OS now, so I used fixmbr but it is still not starting up. Anyway I am sure that is not the case of two operating systems. Is there any chance that when the computer designed to work with Vista you would face problems with Windows XP? Like not recognizing a hard drive?

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  • Error loading operating system: format Windows 7 to Windows XP Service Pack 3

    - by Blerta
    I saw that there are other questions like mine here. But O also saw that some problems where solved with fixmbr from a Windows 7 recovery console, but that didn't work for me. I bought my laptop with Vista installed and later reformated and used Windows 7. During formatting with Windows 7 I had some problems with my hard drive and found out it was dead so I bought a new one. I wanted to reformat with Windows XP,because Windows 7 is consuming more RAM that it is able handle and I wanted to use it for other programs. So I formatted with Windows XP Service Pack 3 but after first reboot a message appeared: "Error loading operating system" Reading here, I assumed that maybe I had installed it on the wrong partition and maybe having two OS now, so I used fixmbr but it is still not starting up. Anyway I am sure that is not the case of two operating systems. Is there any chance that when the computer designed to work with Vista you would face problems with Windows XP? Like not recognizing a hard drive?

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  • Accessing host LVM partition from Windows XP through Virt.manager 0.8.5 / Qemu / KVM

    - by Nico de Smidt
    Hi, requested use case is having a Windows XP SP3 guest running in 64bit Ubuntu. (Linux pcs 2.6.35-22-server #35-Ubuntu SMP Sat Oct 16 22:02:33 UTC 2010 x86_64 GNU/Linux) I want this guest to access an LVM LV on the Ubuntu disk. I've setup the following LVM config: --- Logical volume --- LV Name /dev/storage/sdc1 VG Name storage LV UUID Zg5IMC-OlqB-prL5-fgg4-3A9A-OgKP-oZ0QkJ LV Write Access read/write LV Status available # open 0 LV Size 1.01 GiB Current LE 259 Segments 1 Allocation inherit Read ahead sectors auto - currently set to 256 Block device 251:3 -- 1) I've setup a storage pool for /dev/storage 2) I've mkfs.vfat /dev/storage/sdc1 3) and made a virtual IDE disk in the virt-manager setup for the guest. Target device: IDE Disk 2 Source path: /dev/storage/sdc1 -- Now when running XP (guest) Windows sees a new disk in Disk Manager and want's to install a partition on it, since it believes the drive is empty. After formatting from within Windows I can put data on the new disk volume. -- Back in Ubuntu however I cannot access this this any more since it created a partition within an LVM Logical Volume. Running fdisk -l shows the following: root@pcs:/media# fdisk -l /dev/storage/sdc1 Disk /dev/storage/sdc1: 1086 MB, 1086324736 bytes 32 heads, 63 sectors/track, 1052 cylinders Units = cylinders of 2016 * 512 = 1032192 bytes Sector size (logical/physical): 512 bytes / 512 bytes I/O size (minimum/optimal): 512 bytes / 512 bytes Disk identifier: 0x8d72e4f4 Device Boot Start End Blocks Id System /dev/storage/sdc1p1 1 1050 1058368+ c W95 FAT32 (LBA) -- which seems fine to me, but when trying to mount /dev/storage/sdc1p1 I get the following error: mount /dev/storage/sdc1p1 /media/xp mount: special device /dev/storage/sdc1p1 does not exist which makes sense since in lvdisplay sdc1p1 does not exist Main question: I want to mount the vfat partition in both Ubuntu and XP What am I missing here????? regards, and thanks for your consideration. Nico

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  • Problems linking to social networks in Windows 8

    - by Andrew Cooper
    I've upgraded my laptop to Windows 8 (from Windows 7) and I'm having problems with getting information to show in the People and Messaging apps. I've linked my Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn accounts to my Live Id, and on Windows 7 I was able to see my Friends' facebook activity in Windows Live Messenger. In the Windows 8 People app I can see all my contacts from Facebook, Twitter and LinkedIn, and I can see the on-line status of at least my Facebook contacts. I can also see the profiles details of each contact, but I don't get anything in the "What's New" view. The Messaging app is just blank. I assume I should be able to send messages to my contacts, but I can't see any way to do it. Am I missing something?

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  • What extra permission settings were added in Windows Server 2003 over Windows Server 2000?

    - by Jon Seigel
    We have a domain controller currently running Windows Server 2000, and we're in the process of upgrading some of our workstations to Windows 7. The problem is that users are getting access denied messages to things they should be able to do, even trivial things like deleting shortcuts from the desktop. The users run at less than administrative levels, which we want to maintain. We think this is caused by Windows 7 having extra security permission settings that are getting defaulted to denied, because the new settings wouldn't actually exist in the Windows 2000 profiles. The reason I'm asking about Windows 2003 Server is because we have an available license of that, and not to 2008 (which would likely solve the problem completely, but costs $). So what I'd like to find out is if the permission settings in 2003 will be sufficient for our needs to justify upgrading the domain controller to 2003.

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  • NET START command not passing parameters in Windows Server 2008

    - by Amanbbk
    My application calls a Stored Procedure, through the stored procedure I am calling a Windows Service using the NET START command as follows: SELECT @Cmd = 'Net Start ServiceName /"' + @param1 + '" /"' + @param2 + '"' Now the parameters passed here are not reaching the OnStart method. These values are blank. Protected Overrides Sub OnStart(ByVal args() As String) Try service1= New Service service1.param2 = args(1) service1.param1 = args(0) Here I get args(0) as the name of service instead of the value that is passed, and args(1) is blank. Although the args.Getlength(0) returns 2. The service starts successfully, it invokes the executable, but the parameters are not there. What can be the reason? Administrative access might be required in NET START command? Has the syntax changed for NET START command in Windows Server 2008? Windows Services do not accept parameters in Windows Server 2008? The same thing is running fine on Windows Server 2003.

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  • Storage disk format to use to be utilised by all OS

    - by ClothSword
    Aiming to have a large internal HDD to store files, and several OSes on separate disks. They all need to read and write to one storage drive. Ubuntu (13.04+) Mac OSX (10.8+) Windows (7+) What format should the drive be? Would like to avoid buying third party software, here's what I have discerned so far: NTFS - Can't be written to by Mac without buying third party software? ext3 - Windows can't read, third party software in development. Mac has OSXFUSE HFS+ - Buy third party and/or faff around to get working on windows exFAT - Cross platform, but breaks MS patents?

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  • Symantect (Veritas) Storage Foundation for Windows [closed]

    - by SvrGuy
    Does anyone out their have rough (I don't need exact) pricing for Symantec (used to be Veritas) Storage Foundation for Windows? Its for Windows Server 2008 R2. Ideally, I would love to know the cost of Storange Foundation For Windows, and also the price of the options (like VRR, HA etc. ) if you happen to know them. Getting the information out of a reseller is like pulling teeth. They want to meet with us and discuss our needs etc. My needs are just to know whether its $100, $500, $1,000 or $10,000 per server in small qtys (i.e. less than 20 licences). Arghh. Anyone know the rough prices?

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  • SQL Azure Pricing

    - by kaleidoscope
    Microsoft’s pricing for SQL Server in the cloud, SQLAzure has been announced: $9.99   per month for 0 – 1GB $99.99 per month up to 10GB. There’s currently a 10GB maximum size cap for SQLAzure. For larger data storage needs, you’ll need to break the databases into smaller sizes. Scaling SQL Azure Applications If you think you’re going to need 100GB in the near term, it probably makes sense to break your application up into multiple separate databases from the get-go (10 x $9.99 = $99.99 anyway) and just make really sure none of the individual databases exceed 10GB. Beep Beep, Back That Database Up The bandwidth costs for SQL Azure are $.15 per GB of outbound bandwidth.  Assuming that you don’t compress the data before you pull it out of the cloud, that means daily backups of a 1GB database will add another $4.50 per month, and a 10GB database will add another $45/month.  Daily backups will cost about half of what your monthly service charges cost. It’s not completely clear from the press release, but if Microsoft follows Amazon’s pricing model, bandwidth between the Microsoft cloud services will not incur a cost.  That would mean it might make sense to spin up an Windows Azure computing application for $.12 per hour, use that application to compress your SQL Azure database, and then send the compressed data off to Azure storage for backup.  That would eliminate the data in/out costs, and minimize the Azure storage costs ($.15/GB).  Database administrators would back up their SQL Azure data to Azure Storage, keep a history of backups there, and restore them to SQL Azure faster when needed. Of course, there’s no native backup support in SQL Azure, and it’s not clear whether Windows Azure will include tools like SQL Server Integration Services. More details can be found at http://www.brentozar.com/archive/2009/07/sql-azure-pricing-10-for-1gb-100-for-10gb/   Anish, S

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  • Is Linear Tape File System (LTFS) Best For Transportable Storage?

    - by rickramsey
    Those of us in tape storage engineering take a lot of pride in what we do, but understand that tape is the right answer to a storage problem only some of the time. And, unfortunately for a storage medium with such a long history, it has built up a few preconceived notions that are no longer valid. When I hear customers debate whether to implement tape vs. disk, one of the common strikes against tape is its perceived lack of usability. If you could go back a few generations of corporate acquisitions, you would discover that StorageTek engineers recognized this problem and started developing a solution where a tape drive could look just like a memory stick to a user. The goal was to not have to care about where files were on the cartridge, but to simply see the list of files that were on the tape, and click on them to open them up. Eventually, our friends in tape over at IBM built upon our work at StorageTek and Sun Microsystems and released the Linear Tape File System (LTFS) feature for the current LTO5 generation of tape drives as an open specification. LTFS is really a wonderful feature and we’re proud to have taken part in its beginnings and, as you’ll soon read, its future. Today we offer LTFS-Open Edition, which is free for you to use in your in Oracle Enterprise Linux 5.5 environment - not only on your LTO5 drives, but also on your Oracle StorageTek T10000C drives. You can download it free from Oracle and try it out. LTFS does exactly what its forefathers imagined. Now you can see immediately which files are on a cartridge. LTFS does this by splitting a cartridge into two partitions. The first holds all of the necessary metadata to create a directory structure for you to easily view the contents of the cartridge. The second partition holds all of the files themselves. When tape media is loaded onto a drive, a complete file system image is presented to the user. Adding files to a cartridge can be as simple as a drag-and-drop just as you do today on your laptop when transferring files from your hard drive to a thumb drive or with standard POSIX file operations. You may be thinking all of this sounds nice, but asking, “when will I actually use it?” As I mentioned at the beginning, tape is not the right solution all of the time. However, if you ever need to physically move data between locations, tape storage with LTFS should be your most cost-effective and reliable answer. I will give you a few use cases examples of when LTFS can be utilized. Media and Entertainment (M&E), Oil and Gas (O&G), and other industries have a strong need for their storage to be transportable. For example, an O&G company hunting for new oil deposits in remote locations takes very large underground seismic images which need to be shipped back to a central data center. M&E operations conduct similar activities when shooting video for productions. M&E companies also often transfers files to third-parties for editing and other activities. These companies have three highly flawed options for transporting data: electronic transfer, disk storage transport, or tape storage transport. The first option, electronic transfer, is impractical because of the expense of the bandwidth required to transfer multi-terabyte files reliably and efficiently. If there’s one place that has bandwidth, it’s your local post office so many companies revert to physically shipping storage media. Typically, M&E companies rely on transporting disk storage between sites even though it, too, is expensive. Tape storage should be the preferred format because as IDC points out, “Tape is more suitable for physical transportation of large amounts of data as it is less vulnerable to mechanical damage during transportation compared with disk" (See note 1, below). However, tape storage has not been used in the past because of the restrictions created by proprietary formats. A tape may only be readable if both the sender and receiver have the same proprietary application used to write the file. In addition, the workflows may be slowed by the need to read the entire tape cartridge during recall. LTFS solves both of these problems, clearing the way for tape to become the standard platform for transferring large files. LTFS is open and, as long as you’ve downloaded the free reader from our website or that of anyone in the LTO consortium, you can read the data. So if a movie studio ships a scene to a third-party partner to add, for example, sounds effects or a music score, it doesn’t have to care what technology the third-party has. If it’s written back to an LTFS-formatted tape cartridge, it can be read. Some tape vendors like to claim LTFS is a “standard,” but beauty is in the eye of the beholder. It’s a specification at this point, not a standard. That said, we’re already seeing application vendors create functionality to write in an LTFS format based on the specification. And it’s my belief that both customers and the tape storage industry will see the most benefit if we all follow the same path. As such, we have volunteered to lead the way in making LTFS a standard first with the Storage Network Industry Association (SNIA), and eventually through to standard bodies such as American National Standards Institute (ANSI). Expect to hear good news soon about our efforts. So, if storage transportability is one of your requirements, I recommend giving LTFS a look. It makes tape much more user-friendly and it’s free, which allows tape to maintain all of its cost advantages over disk! Note 1 - IDC Report. April, 2011. “IDC’s Archival Storage Solutions Taxonomy, 2011” - Brian Zents Website Newsletter Facebook Twitter

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  • Moving physical windows 7 to Hyper - V on windows 2008 r2

    - by ekamtaj
    Hey Guys, I have a Windows 7 on a PC, but I want to install Windows 2008 R2 on the computer. I also want to keep Windows 7 on as a VM. Can I use disk2vhd? http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/ee656415.aspx Can I create a windows & full backup and restore it on Hyper-V? Please let me know what will work best and if you have any other suggestions.

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  • Windows 7 replacement of Vista's Windows Meeting Space

    - by Jason Pearce
    Microsoft Vista came with a free collaboration tool called Windows Meeting Space, which is not included in Windows 7 Enterprise nor can I find a stand alone link to download. Is there a similar tool included in Windows 7 that I'm missing or a replacement Microsoft product (perhaps Microsoft SharedView) that you would recommend? Ideally a tool that is compatabile with our existing Vista Windows Meeting Space users.

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  • Windows 8 Pro Upgrade but no previous version of Windows installed

    - by Vineet Bhatia
    I have a license for Windows 7 but don't have it currently installed anywhere. I bought the Windows 8 Pro Upgrade. Do I need to install Windows 7 and then upgrade or is there a easier way to install Windows 8 Pro Upgrade? When I try to activate I am getting an error Code: 0xC004F061. Description: The software licensing service determined that the specified product key can only be used for upgrading, not for clean installations.

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  • Windows Movie Maker 2012 No Sound issue with Windows 8.1

    - by zzlalani
    I've windows 8.1 pro Build 9600 x64 installed, I have recently installed Windows Movie Maker 2012 (Latest) via Windows Live Essential, Now when I run Movie Maker it disable Movie Maker sound as well as all windows sound and keeps it mute until I close Movie Maker, as per their suggestion Huge Problems With Movie Maker Sound I have also updated my audio drivers, I'm using Dell Inspiron 15R 5520, and I have this audio device/driver Conexant HD CX20672-21Z Audio Driver with Version 8.54.37.0,A03 Last Updated 12/20/2013 I need to edit and create a video by this weekend and this is the only tool I know how to use,

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  • Smss.exe - setting any core affinity breaks rdp on Windows 7 / Windows Server 2012

    - by Hetman
    I have tried to set core affinity of smss.exe to not run on one critical core on Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008r2. It turns out that simply setting the core affinity to anything (even the full mask that smss.exe already has) seems to work but prevents users from rdp'ing into the machine until it is restarted. The users already logged in may continue to use their sessions. This behaviour does not occur on Windows 8/Windows Server 2012. Does anyone know why it is happening?

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