We have a customised vCloud environment. We are trying to download the vAPP image as ovf file for migrating it to some other environment. I am following this procedure
Stop the VM.
Click on download button on setting
It asks for download location and type of image (ova/ovf).
It initiates the download.
Now my problem lies on 4th step. When I click download it initiates download and I could see "enabling download" when it happened. After some unknown time(can't predict the time may be 2hr, 3hr 4hr, 1hr) the process gets failed. I have to repeat the process multiple times(at least 3 to 5 times) to start the actual download process where it actually copies the VM image on disk.
I am not able to predict the actual time of VM download and why the process get failed many time before it start the actual export process.
Can someone tell me answers of below mentioned questions
Does vCloud enable download functionality before it allows us to download the VM? If it does how much time it takes for this functionality to enable.
Can we enable this functionality beforehand so that vCloud should just start the VM download process instantly once I shutdown the machine and start the VM export process?
Do you think using CLI tool like ovftool will make the process faster and prevent it from failing so that I will get to know the actual VM download time and we can prepare a plan for migration?
From my limited understanding of working with the API and SDK, I do not think 1 is possible... if it is... it's not straightforward.. at least to me
as for #3 if you are not using the CLI for scripting and automating purposes, yes it would definitely help
Related
I want to package programs into an MSI and create Scheduled Tasks (i.e. run on Boot/Startup).
I'm trying solutions available on the market such as Advanced Installer and EMCO MSI Packager, but I get the same error in both:
Verify that you have sufficient privileges to start system services
This means my account does not have the "Login as a service" privilege. However, looking up solutions, you'll find that Advanced Installer offers little help.
Basically, they suggest either (1) hardcoding user credentials, which is obviously unviable or (2) creating a new user with the required privileges, also unviable.
I've created tasks before in plain C++ and it was very easy, a simple
system("schtasks [args]")
Was enough to create tasks, and as long as the program was running after a UAC prompt was accepted, the tasks were successfully created.
So what exactly is the aforementioned error, and how can I fix it, preferably with a solution from the market (it is cleaner than having to manually make a setup.exe, ask for privileges, manually make tasks).
Edit: Any answers that provide some clarity on creating Scheduled Tasks that automatically run elevated (i.e. have access to Program Files, etc) are greatly appreciated.
Edit 2: Setting user to LocalService did not work.
Verify that you have sufficient privileges to start system services is a red herring. It's a generic error message from MSI saying it couldn't start the service. There's a bakers dozen reasons (that I've answered on here: Error 1920 service failed to start. Verify that you have sufficient privileges to start system services )
Here's a couple tips:
DLLs going to Win SXS and GAC don't happen until after StartServices because of a design limitation in MSI. Try installing but not starting the service. Then after it's installed try to start it. If it works, it could be that.
You could be missing files. You can try to run the exe from a command prompt while it's hung and see if it says anything is missing.
The application could be crashing on startup.
I offer free 1 hour consulting sessions. If you can share the files with me I could look at it with you. Look me up if you are interested.
I am planning to use Azure VMSS for deploying a set of spring boot apps. I am planning to create a custom linux VM image with all the required softwares/utilities as well as the required directory structure and configure this image in VMSS. We use jenkins as CI/CD tool and Git as source code repo. What is the best way to build and deploy these spring boot apps on VMSS?
I think one way is to write a custom script extension which downloads code from Git repo and then starts these spring boot apps. I believe this script will then get executed every time a new VM is provisioned.
But what about cases where already multiple VMs are running on top of minimum scale instance count. I believe a manual restart will not trigger the CSE script to run on these already running VMs right?
Could anyone advise the best way to handle this?
Also once a VM is deallocated due to auto scale down, what is the best/cost optimal way to back up the log files from VM to storage (blob or file share)?
You could enable Automatically tear down virtual machines after every use in the organization settings/project setting >> agent pool >> VMSS agent pool >> settings. Then, a new VM instance is used for every job. After running a job, the VM will go offline and be reimaged before it picks up another job. The Custom Script Extension will be executed on every virtual machine in the scaleset immediately after it is created or reimaged. Here is the reference document: Create the scale set agent pool.
To back up the log files from VM, you could refer to Troubleshoot and support about related file path on the target virtual machine.
I'm new to Azure-Pipeline and struggling to put together a C++ oriented pipeline that uses camke which properly compiles, run tests and build documentation on Ubuntu, macOS, and Windows.
I managed the macOS and Ubuntu cases rather easily but am struggling with the Windows case not knowing what's installed and what's in system PATH for the given image & container I've selected.
Not being super familiar with the Azure-Platform I'm basically relying on commit-push-run-pipeline every single little change to my YAML file thus wasting time and resources.
I can't imagine that the only way is to blindly try out commands by commit, push and run the pipeline.
I managed to find a basic description of the currently (hopefully) available images here following the included software link for Windows link yoou end up on a comprehensive list of what's supposedly installed (I have some doubts on whether this documentation actually matches the content of the image). Calling some of those tools like cmake and choco, present in the above list, failed. Whether or not they're actually installed and in system PATH I have no idea.
Q1: Is there any way to locally test out an Azure-Pipeline YAML?
Q2: Is there any way to figure what is actually installed on a given image/container (without issuing a DIR /s from the root folder??)
Q3: Is it possible to connect to a running container (or is it a VM???) instance and directly tinker with it?
Q4: Alternatively, is it possible to run such an image locally (Docker)? Does it imply execution on a Windows machine or is that a standalone VM image?
EDIT: Found out about this question, although doesn't quite answer mine: Is there a tool to validate an Azure DevOps Pipeline locally?
Q1: Is there any way to locally test out an Azure-Pipeline YAML?
The answer is yes. You could create your private agent to execute the Azure-Pipeline YAML.
Self-hosted agents
Q2: Is there any way to figure what is actually installed on a given
image/container (without issuing a DIR /s from the root folder??)
Just as you know, we could check the document Software for the software installed on the agent. If you want to know the install the path of some software, you could check the debug log from the build task. For example, cmake. We could check the build log from the cmake task:
Q3: Is it possible to connect to a running container (or is it a
VM???) instance and directly tinker with it?
For the hosted agent, I am afraid the answer is not.
Q4: Alternatively, is it possible to run such an image locally
(Docker)? Does it imply execution on a Windows machine or is that a
standalone VM image?
The answer is yes, we could Run a self-hosted agent in Docker. And it imply execution on a Windows machine.
We have multiple windows server 2016 running, will automatic updates on. I want to change the Windows Update mode to Manual.
The problem is when instance is created, out software installation fails many times due to running updates installation. I tried to set instance metadata 'disable-agent-updates' to TRUE. But it doesn't seem to be working.
Please help on how to modify windows update mode on creation and start of instance.
The quick answer is you cannot with Google provided Windows images.
You can create a Windows VM, configure as you desire and then create a new image that you use to launch new instances. This will accomplish your goal with some effort. This is standard practice for companies that manage/control patches and updates.
Note: I do not recommend disabling Windows Update from installing security patches on startup unless you understand the implications.
i have virtual machines running on vmware ESXi and vmware workstation.
i need to execute "revert to snapshot" from inside the guest.
i have done so much searching, but all solutions proposed so far suggest doing it from "outside" - either some external machine or the host itself.
other workarounds suggest to enable automatic reverting to snapshot on power off event.
please do not suggest anything in that direction. i really need to execute it from within the guest. for example:
as scheduled task
as batch script (at the end of completing some other tasks)
edit:
this is the reason why i think there must be some way to achieve this: inside the guest there are "vmare tools" running as system service. so i would expect this component to also expose a functionality to trigger the host / hypervisor reverting the current VM to snapshot.
if this is not possible currently it should be implemented as new feature :)
in case it's currently not possible to execute it "from inside": that would also be an "answer" ...
I've actually done this pretty recently, try this:
Install VMware vSphere PowerCLI 5.1 (it's a command line scripting interface for ESX)
Write a script (perhaps in Notepad) that contains the following code:
Connect-VIServer <vCenter Server IP>
Set-VM <VM name> -Snapshot <Snapshot name> -Confirm:$false
This will connect to your vCenter server and revert your VM to the specified snapshot.
Save the script as revert_snapshot.ps1 (PowerShell file extension)
Using Windows Task Schedule, create a new tasks. The General and Triggers tabs are self
explanatory, but the Actions tab is where you'll configure the scheduled tasks to launch
your PowerShell script.
For 'Action' select 'Start a Program'. Under 'Program/script', enter the following:
C:\Windows\SysWOW64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\powershell.exe
For the 'Add arguments' field, you'll specify the path of your PowerShell script:
-psc "C:\Program Files (x86)\VMware\Infrastructure\vSphere PowerCLI\vim.psc1" "<path to your script>"
note: vim.psc1 is not available in the latest version of PowerCLI.
Save your task and run it manually as a test. Be patient as sometimes the cmdlet for logging into vCenter (Connect-VIServer) can take a few seconds to connect.