Managing Microsoft Hybrid Clouds

Table of Contents

Managing Microsoft Hybrid Clouds

Credits

About the Author

About the Reviewers

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Preface

What this book covers

What you need for this book

Who this book is for

Conventions

Reader feedback

Customer support

Errata

Piracy

Questions

1. An Introduction to Cloud Computing

The way electricity became a utility

The essential characteristics of cloud

Service delivery models

Cloud deployment models

Benefits of public cloud

Barriers for the adoption of the public cloud

Challenges of hybrid cloud

Cattle versus pets

Using cloud successfully

Cloud exit plan

Hybrid cloud to the rescue

Introducing Microsoft Cloud OS

Microsoft hybrid cloud use cases

Summary

2. An Introduction to Microsoft Cloud Solutions

Cloud first

Windows Server 2012

Microsoft System Center 2012

System Center Configuration Manager

System Center Virtual Machine Manager

System Center Service Manager

System Center Orchestrator

System Center Operations Manager

System Center App Controller

System Center Data Protection Manager

Windows Azure Pack

Microsoft StorSimple

Microsoft SQL Server 2014

Microsoft Azure

Microsoft Azure Services

Stateless versus stateful virtual machines

Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Services

Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines

Microsoft Azure Storage

Azure Virtual Network

Microsoft Azure Directory Services

Azure Preview

Best effort versus reliable clouds

Microsoft Azure is a best effort cloud

Dedicated versus private virtual clouds

Use case scenarios for Microsoft Azure

Test and development

Temporary processing power

Cloud bursting

Windows Server and Data Protection Manager cloud backup

SQL Server cloud backup

StorSimple seamless backup

SQL Server cloud replica

DFS cloud replica

Disaster recovery

On-premises and cloud feature misalignment

Microsoft Azure security

Microsoft support on Azure

T-shirt virtual machines versus tailor-made virtual machines

Microsoft Azure cost model

Microsoft Azure service-level agreement

Microsoft software support

Other vendor software support

Microsoft software license mobility

Bring your own application license

Trying Microsoft Azure

Summary

3. Understanding the Microsoft Azure Architecture

A look under the hood of Microsoft Azure

Data centers and regions

Zones

Servers used in Azure

Hypervisor used in Azure

The Fabric Controller

Red Dog Front End

Fault domains

Availability set

Update domain

Affinity group

Microsoft Azure Storage

Storing blobs, pages, and queues

Storage account

Disks

Disk caching

Containers

Images

Copy of blob storage

Blob lease

Protection of data

Securing data

Storage protocol

Costs of storage

Azure storage tooling

Networking

Azure networking under the hood

Load balancers

Cloud services

IP addressing of virtual machines

Virtual network

Site-to-site VPN

Azure ExpressRoute

Virtual machine network interface

Endpoints

Summary

4. Building an Infrastructure on Microsoft Azure

Getting started with Microsoft Azure

The new Azure Management Portal

Creating a virtual machine

Understanding the restrictions of Microsoft Azure

Determining the naming convention for Azure components

Explaining Azure subscriptions

Azure Resource Groups

Adjusting the subscription name

Microsoft Azure accounts

Understanding Azure directories

Windows Azure Active Directory Premium

Determining the Azure subscription to use

Adding more administrators to a subscription

Deciding the most appropriate Azure region for placement

Creating an affinity group

Creating a storage account

Creating Azure networks

Creating a virtual network

Understanding virtual network gateways

Creating a local network

Using your own DNS servers

Deleting a virtual network

Creating a Cloud Service

Deleting a Cloud Service

Creating a virtual machine

Virtual machine extensions

VM access extensions

Configuration extensions

Security extensions

Deploying Linux images using VM Depot

Using the Azure Management Portal to deploy VM Depot images

Naming convention for VHD files

Understanding IP addresses

Virtual IP

Dynamic IP

Assign a static IP address to a virtual machine

Assign a static public IP address to a virtual machine

Using Reserved IP addresses for a Cloud Service

Managing network traffic to virtual machines

Managing Network Security Groups

Managing endpoints

Testing virtual machine endpoints

Setting DNS server configuration

Deployment and configuration using Puppet

Service healing

Installing additional software

Creating a VHD to upload installation files

Uploading files to Microsoft Azure

Connecting the VHD to a virtual machine

Summary

5. Connecting to Microsoft Azure

Connection options

Azure ExpressRoute

Connecting to Azure using a point-to-site VPN

Creating a virtual network

Creating certificates

Installing the client certificate and downloading the VPN client

Support on Microsoft Azure

Set up Multi-factor Authentication in Microsoft Azure Management Portal

Configuring Multi-factor Authentication using a phone

Enable a user for Multi-factor Authentication

Enabling IP Whitelist

Multi-factor apps

Introduction to System Center App Controller

Prerequisites

Using App Controller

User roles in App Controller

Connecting App Controller to Virtual Machine Manager

Connecting App Controller to Microsoft Azure

Using IIS to create self-signed certificates

Uploading the certificate to Microsoft Azure

Configure App Controller to connect to Microsoft Azure

Authenticating a user to use Microsoft Azure

Using App Controller

Deploying a virtual machine using App Controller

Uploading files to Microsoft Azure

Installing the Windows PowerShell module for App Controller

Installing the Windows PowerShell module for App Controller

Summary

6. Managing the Microsoft Hybrid Cloud

Understanding Azure Active Directory

Authentication models in Azure AD

Connecting an on-premises Active Directory to Microsoft Azure

Synchronizing an on-premises AD with Azure Active Directory

Synchronizing partially

Deleting a domain

Adding an AD account as a co-administrator

Importing and exporting data

Managing Azure disks and images

Creating an image from a virtual machine

Converting dynamically expanding disks to a fixed size VHD

Managing disks and VHD files

Disks and VHDs

Azure TRIM support

Monitoring Microsoft Azure

Microsoft Health Dashboard

Monitoring using System Center Operations Manager

Monitoring via open source tools

Shutting down virtual machines

Monitoring Azure and on-premises infrastructures

Mobile management of Microsoft Azure

Tips and tricks

How to reset the IP configuration of a virtual machine

Checking the usage of Azure resources

Automation

Managing Azure using PowerShell

Installation of the PowerShell module

Managing Azure using command-line tools

Microsoft Azure Automation

Managing Azure using REST API

Exploring the service management API

Introducing System Center Orchestrator

Licensing and license mobility

License mobility for Microsoft software

Licenses tied to physical sockets

Billing and cost management

Understanding the CSV

Summary

7. High Availability, Protection, and Recovery using Microsoft Azure

High availability in Microsoft Azure

Microsoft Failover Clustering support

Load balancing

Third-party load balancers

Geo-replication of data

Zone Redundant Storage

Snapshots of the Microsoft Azure disk

Introduction to geo-replication

Disaster recovery using Azure Site Recovery

Using Azure as a secondary data center for disaster recovery

Requirements

Configuring Azure Site Recovery

Installing a replica Active Directory controller in Azure

Using Microsoft Azure as a backup target

Step 1 – enabling Azure Vault

Step 2 – creating a certificate

Step 3 – downloading and installing the Azure Backup agent

Step 4 – creating a backup schedule

Recovery of virtual machines

Using Microsoft StorSimple

Restoring individual files

Disaster recovery using Microsoft StorSimple

Backing up and restoring Azure virtual machines

Summary

8. Migrating to Microsoft Azure

Premigration checks

License mobility

Migration options

Offline conversion

Migrating a Hyper-V virtual machine to Microsoft Azure

Moving a virtual machine from Azure to on-premises

Converting a VMware vSphere virtual machine to Microsoft Azure

Migration using Migration Accelerator for Azure

Components of Migration Accelerator

Installing Migration Accelerator

Using Migration Accelerator

Migrating with Double-Take Move

Converting an Amazon EC2 virtual machine to Microsoft Azure

Migrating using Disk2VHD and PowerShell scripts

Using Windows Azure Migrator

Migrating Azure deployments between data centers and subscriptions

Summary

9. Summary and a Look into the Near Future

The road ahead

A. Configuration Maximums

Subscription limits

Virtual machine limits

Storage limits

Networking limits

Index

Managing Microsoft Hybrid Clouds

Managing Microsoft Hybrid Clouds

Copyright © 2015 Packt Publishing

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First published: March 2015

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Credits

Author

Marcel van den Berg

Reviewers

V. K. Cody Bumgardner

Xander Oortgiesen

Dr. Rajeev Papneja

Bert Wolters

David Xie

Commissioning Editor

Antony Lowe

Acquisition Editor

James Jones

Content Development Editor

Anand Singh

Technical Editor

Faisal Siddiqui

Copy Editors

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Project Coordinator

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Proofreaders

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Maria Gould

Paul Hindle

Indexer

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Production Coordinator

Manu Joseph

Cover Work

Manu Joseph

About the Author

Marcel van den Berg is an experienced IT professional with 25 years of experience. He is well known in both the VMware and Hyper-V community for his sharing of knowledge, mainly via his blog. He currently works as a consultant for PQR in the Netherlands, deploying many Microsoft solutions such as Microsoft Azure, Windows Server, Hyper-V, System Center, and StorSimple.

His career started in 1990 as a system administrator for Unix systems. As his career progressed, he was later responsible for managing Windows NT to infrastructures based on Windows Server 2008. About 6 years ago, Marcel focused on server virtualization and moved to the role of a consultant. Marcel designed and built numerous infrastructures based on VMware and Hyper-V for midsized and large organizations. He has experience in working with numerous VDI, SBC, backup, and disaster recovery solutions.

Cloud computing is one of the most exciting shifts we have ever seen in how we use IT. Marcel is really keen to understand new developments in cloud computing, especially on Infrastructure as a Service. In his current job, he has designed several infrastructures hosted on Microsoft Azure. By reading this book, you will learn from his experiences and save hours of work by preventing common mistakes.

He shares a lot of his knowledge on his website, http://up2v.nl. Marcel was awarded VMware vExpert for the help he has been giving the community since 2011.

You can follow Marcel on Twitter at @marcelvandenber.

I'd like to thank my family for allowing me to spend so much time on writing this book and being away from them. They have been a great help to make my dream come true. Writing a book is a true challenge and it took me many many hours to write and adjust this book to keep it up to date. Thanks Katja, I love you!

Also, I am grateful to the reviewers of this book. Without them, this book would not have been so good.

About the Reviewers

V. K. Cody Bumgardner has been in the IT industry for over 20 years. In this time, he has worked in technical, managerial, and sales roles in the areas of IT architecture, software development, networking, research, systems, and security.

Over the last several years, he has focused on researching, implementing, and speaking about cloud computing and computational economics. He is also currently pursuing a PhD in computer science at the University of Kentucky (UK), focusing on computational economics of cloud computing.

He currently serves as the Chief Technology Architect (CTA) and research computing service owner of a large public land-grant university. He is responsible for technology architectures supporting over 40,000 users in academic, research, and health care (academic) divisions.

He is also the author of OpenStack in Action, Manning Publishing.

Xander Oortgiesen has been working in different roles and functions and is currently working for Switch IT Solutions (www.switch.nl) in the Netherlands. Xander also works for his own IT consultancy company called Lorlon (www.lorlon.nl). Before working as a business consultant, he was active in the field as a technical consultant specialized in Microsoft Server, Cloud/Office 365, System Center Technologies, Storage, Virtualization Technologies (Hyper-V, VMware, XenServer), and Citrix.

Xander is a Citrix CCEE, RES RCP, VMware VCP/VCDA, MCSE NT4—2012 R2, and several Microsoft Specialties (Exchange, Hyper-V, System Center, and so on).

You can follow him on his blog (www.vWorld.nl) or contact him via Twitter (@vworlddotnl) or e-mail ().

Vision, purpose, relentless passion for technology, and life of spirituality—that's what Dr. Rajeev Papneja brings to the table, combined with over 18 years of extensive systems and software experience on an international scale, including more than 9 years of senior management experience in the United States. Prior to affiliating with bodHOST, in collaboration with his global partners, he founded a firm called Artilligence Inc., a well-respected name in Northeast America as a one-stop service center for all IT services ranging from turnkey software development to supplemental staffing. Employees sometimes refer to him as a COO with a heart, because in the cut-throat war zone of corporate America, he refuses to compromise his humility, simplicity, sincerity, truthfulness, and loyalty to his co-workers. Dr. Papneja also serves as a COO at ESDS Software Solution Pvt. Ltd, a leading organization in the space of managed hosting and data center services.

A believer in a borderless new economy, his business focus is truly global, and that is what he achieved his doctorate in. His longest tenure was with Pfizer Pharmaceuticals, the largest drug manufacturer in the world with its current headquarters in New York, where he spent more than 7 years providing enterprise-class technology solutions and setting up financial processes.

Inspite of obtaining a master's degree in computer science at the age of 20, his zeal for education did not stop. Along with his professional career in the United States, he pursued his PhD in business administration, the highest honors he achieved at the age of 27. He has worked as a senior consultant at major corporations such as United Parcel Services, Ernst & Young, Dun & Bradstreet to name a few, before becoming an entrepreneur.

When he is not at work, he is usually serving the community and seeking spirituality. He believes in the future, loves his extended family of colleagues and associates, and has faith in his organization's ability to be a Fortune 100 company in his lifetime.

I would like to thank Mr. Probal Dasgupta (CEO, bodHOST) and Mr. Piyush Somani (CEO, ESDS Software Solutions Pvt Ltd) for giving me a perfect platform to use my skills to the best of my abilities and always being there for me as mentors and friends. I would like to thank my colleagues who encouraged me to go ahead with the initiative of reviewing and last but not least, my family and friends who sacrificed my daily association with them, many a time, for this project to get completed on time.

Bert Wolters is a Dutch senior technical consultant on Microsoft on-premises and cloud infrastructures. He started his professional life in the Dutch military, but around 1999, found his talents in IT, helping out the platoon and unit leaders with small IT issues in the field. By the time he started on his first Microsoft certification in 2005, he had found his new vocation in life.

His ability to look at all sides of a story (an issue, problem, and implementation) was formed by the wide variety of jobs he had. Having a background in the business side of IT as well as an incident and change manager, and in the field as an engineer and consultant, helps him deliver the most comprehensive solutions driven by businesses, technology, or business case.

Since 2010, he has specialized further in system management for Microsoft infrastructures and is still riding Microsoft's wave of innovation, looking forward to and experimenting with every single new feature of Microsoft Azure. Because of this focus, he decided to resign from the Dutch Powershell User Group (DuPSUg) when asked to take part in the System Center User Group in the Netherlands (SCUG_NL).

He currently advises companies on how to get the most out of System Center Suite and shares his knowledge on Microsoft's hybrid cloud, Hyper-V, Microsoft Azure, and StorSimple.

I would like to thank my girlfriend and daughters for putting up with all of my efforts to gain and share knowledge. I also thank Marcel van den Berg for accepting me in his team of reviewers.

I would also like to thank all of the people who inspired me over the years; people such as Marco Timmermans, Ernst Rijk, and Alex de Jong who were the first MCTs I encountered and are gravely responsible for my Microsoft addiction. My fellow members of the SCUG_NL community for accepting me in their midst; and Aidan Finn and Marc van Eijk for providing me with their seemingly unending knowledge and passion for technology. Someone who I can't thank enough for giving me insights into myself is Monique Kerssens, who trained me to become an MCT. Without learning from these people, in technology and socially, there is not a chance I could be doing what I'm doing today. It's because of them and others that I may not have listed here that every single day I get out of bed feeling compelled to give my best in my work.

David Xie spent 6 years as a software developer working mainly with Python and PHP, and he's familiar with OpenStack, Linux and web development.

He has worked at IBM for 3 years as a Python developer for OpenStack and currently works at ThoughtWorks bridging operations and software development.

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Preface

Microsoft Azure offers many new scenarios for providing applications, data, and infrastructure services. In this book, you will learn how to manage the infrastructure services offered by Azure and how to extend your on-premises infrastructure to the cloud.

What this book covers

Chapter 1, An Introduction to Cloud Computing,introduces the concepts of cloud computing and compares cloud to the usage of electricity as a utility.

Chapter 2, An Introduction to Microsoft Cloud Solutions, provides an overview of the Microsoft solutions that are used to build a hybrid cloud.

Chapter 3, Understanding the Microsoft Azure Architecture, explains the Azure components that are used to offer the Azure services. This chapter provides a look under the hood of Azure to understand how things work.

Chapter 4, Building an Infrastructure on Microsoft Azure, explains how to create storage and networking required to build your first virtual machine on Azure.

Chapter 5, Connecting to Microsoft Azure, deals with establishing connections with the Azure datacenter.

Chapter 6, Managing the Microsoft Hybrid Cloud, shows you how to manage the Azure Active Directory and carry out efficient management. This chapter will explain how PowerShell can be used to automate tasks.

Chapter 7, High Availability, Protection, and Recovery using Microsoft Azure, explains how Azure can be used to both protect on-premises servers and servers running on Azure.

Chapter 8, Migrating to Microsoft Azure, explains the tools that are available for the migration of servers to Azure.

Chapter 9, Summary and a Look into the Near Future, concludes this book and provides a look into the future of Azure.

Appendix, Configuration Maximums, provides an overview of the configuration maximums of Microsoft Azure.

What you need for this book

To be able to perform the procedures described in this book yourself, you need a Microsoft Azure account to start with. Such an account can easily be created. Also, you need at least a Hyper-V host with enough resources to run System Center Virtual Machine Manager and some additional virtual machines.

Who this book is for

This book is great for IT pros, IT managers, consultants and architects who want to learn about hybrid cloud computing using Microsoft Azure, System Center, and Windows Server. It will explain the benefits of a hybrid cloud, how to connect to it, and how to manage it.

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