Azure : Pushing Azure Resource Manager Templates through a CI/CD (release) pipeline with Visual Studio Team Services

Introduction

From template code to deployment… If we really want to control this, then we’ll be pushing these templates through a CI/CD (continuous integration / continuous deployment) pipeline. What does that mean? We are going to put our template in a source code repository (like Github). Everytime we update the code, we’ll going to kick in a “build”. During this build we’ll be packaging it (read : create a zip file of it) and it is also strongly advised to do testing here too. Next up, if all goes well, we’ll be using that package to deploy to all our environments. And in the end, we want to be able to have a nice view on this too…

Why do it like this? Quality! We all make mistakes. We want to detect them early and not repeat them. And every change, we want to put it through the exact same process… time and time again!

 

Prerequisites

Starting off, I’m assuming you already have VSTS (Visual Studio Team Services) in place. If not, register for it! It’s free up till 5 users. And let’s be honest, at about 5€ per user / month & 8€ per build agent per month, … it’s still a steal! 😉

10 years… Time goes fast!

WOW, really… WOW! It has been 10 years since I started my blog…! And here we are… more than 500 posts later. With more than 300 comments being posted. At the moment this blog has about 7000 visitors per month. My head still cannot fanthom this.

When I first started it was a kind of attempt to document things I discovered. As someone who has been an active member of the OSS community, I’ve always seen given back to the community as a task of everyone. I often joke that my job is “google premium”. Though when looking at ourselves, we must admit that a big chunk of our job relies on finding the right information. Therefore I always publish my findings online, in the hope that it might help someone else out there. That way we can keep evolving at a great pace. 🙂

 

Anyhow, as closing thought of today ;

Thanks to every single visitor out there!

Azure : Deploying a domain controller via DSC pull

Introduction

Today’s blog post will showcase how you can leverage the DSC pull feature of Azure Automation when deploying workloads to Azure. To many, the following question will pop up ; “Why use a pull mechanism, whilst I could use the DSC extension to push my configs?”. The answer is pretty simple  The pull mechanism facilitates the lifecycle flow of workloads better. You can easily update the config of the virtual machine and do follow-up on the rollout of your configuration.

 

The Flow

Now how would such a flow go?

1. We’ll use an ARM template to deploy (and afterwards keep) our Azure Automation Account (up-to-date)
2. We’ll use a script to import the Powershell modules into our Azure Automation Account, which are needed to compile configurations.
3. We’ll use a script to import & compile the DSC configurations into ou Azure Automation Account.
4. We’ll use an ARM template to deploy the domain controller.
5. This ARM template will also register the VM with the Azure Automation Account and link it with a given DSC configuration.
6. The configuration will be applied and the updates will be reported back to the Azure Automation Account.

 

Deep-dive Demo

(EDIT 30/7/17  : Added network pre-req)

Azure Governance – Policy Automation

Introduction

In my last post I talked about the possibility to manage “Azure Resource Manager Policies” via the portal. Where the policy is a good location to view the policies, this is not the area you want to be managing your policies! In today’s post, we’ll look how we can automate these things. This to ensure that all policies are effective towards their scope and remain that way. Once your subscriptions grows, you can have way too many resources & resource groups at your hands. Setting up things manually is not the way to go…

 

Microsoft Azure Enterprise Scaffold

How to do governance in Azure is a very common questions. So if you have found yourself asking questions in regards to that topic, do not feel strange! One of the prime resources I can recommend in this area is the “Microsoft Azure Enterprise Scaffold” ;

The scaffold is based on practices we have gathered from many engagements with clients of various sizes. Those clients range from small organizations developing solutions in the cloud to Fortune 500 enterprises and independent software vendors who are migrating and developing solutions in the cloud. The enterprise scaffold is “purpose-built” to be flexible to support both traditional IT workloads and agile workloads; such as, developers creating software-as-a-service (SaaS) applications based on Azure capabilities.