3. “A train, a database, bad
internet, and a small
farming town in Quebec.”
4. Agenda
Quick overview of…
Microsoft Azure Virtual Networks
Microsoft Azure Storage
Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines
Running SharePoint 2013 on Microsoft Azure
How to set up your environment
Azure Traffic Manager
Preview Portal: New SharePoint Server Farms option
7. Microsoft Azure Virtual Networks
Microsoft Azure Virtual Networks:
Provides a logical boundary around a
group of VMs
Allows Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines to
communicate with each other
Building Blocks:
IP Addressing scheme (subnets)
DNS server(s)
VPN (optional)
12. Microsoft Azure Storage – By the numbers…
Each Storage account is limited to 5,000 IOPs
Each Virtual Disk on a Standard VM is limited to 500 IOPs (300 for
basic)
Putting it together..
~10 VHDs max out a storage account
13. Microsoft Azure Storage – More numbers…
SharePoint Servers would max out around 1,500 IOPs
OS Disk
Data Disk (Logs)
Data Disk (Index)
SQL Servers could use more (depending on configuration)
OS Disk
Data X # of disks
Backups
19. Active Directory, Security
Active Directory
Required for a SharePoint Farm (1+ SharePoint Servers)
Standalone Domain (no VPN)
Corporate Domain or One-way Trust (Azure VPN)
Least-privilege accounts
Security
Server Hardening
Non-default ports, named SQL instances
Always use SSL, with SHA-2 Certificates
20. SQL on Microsoft Azure
High-Availability Support
SQL Server Failover Cluster Not Supported!
AlwaysOn Availability Groups
Note: Limited to a single Availability Group; High IO needs
Multiple Standalone SQL Servers
Use Aliases so you can scale out later
Disk Layout
What is supported?
21. SharePoint 2013 on Microsoft Azure
Design:
Plan your Azure Virtual Network topology
Plan for your HA requirements
Plan your SQL topology – how will you scale out?
Plan your Azure Storage Accounts – how many IOPs do you need?
Software Versions (Windows, SQL, SP, etc)
“Measure twice, cut once”
22. SharePoint 2013 on Microsoft Azure
What do you put on all those disks?
Disk 1: SharePoint Logs, IIS Logs
Disk 2: Program Files, SharePoint Index
SQL
Disk 1: Content DB 1 (mdf and ldf)
Disk 2: Content DB 2 (mdf and ldf)
Disk 3: System & Service Applications (non-Search)
Disk 4: Search DBs
Disk 5: TempDBs
Disk 6: Backup files
23. SharePoint 2013 on Microsoft Azure
App
SQL
AD/DNS
WFE
OS Data Data
OS Data Data
OS Data Data Data
OS Data
24. SharePoint 2013 on Microsoft Azure
Other considerations
Monitoring
Detailed server monitoring (i.e. SCOM)
Application monitoring (i.e. is www.yoursite.com up?)
Patching
WSUS
SCCM
Manually (Do *NOT* have Windows Update automatically install updates!)
Backups
SQL backups? Local disk backups?
Standalone backup system?
27. Setting Up Your Environment
Azure Provisioning
1. Create a new Azure subscription
2. Plan your network topology (subnets, IPs, etc)
3. Create virtual network
4. Create storage accounts
5. Create VMs
6. Add Data disks
28. Setting Up Your Environment
AD & SQL Provisioning
1. Initialize & format data disks
2. Install AD/DNS on your DC
3. Promote it to a domain controller
4. Join servers to the domain
5. Download SQL binaries
6. Create Service Accounts
7. Install & configure SQL
29. Setting Up Your Environment
SharePoint Setup
1. Install SharePoint
2. Patch SharePoint
3. Configure Farm
4. Create Web Application(s)
5. Configure Service Application(s)
6. Publish Externally
Note: You can use scripts to do this (http://autospinstaller.codeplex.com)
30. “A bad host, a LOT of
downtime, and one heck of
a Citrix Netscaler!”
32. What is Traffic Manager?
Allows for routing of traffic to your site (WaaS or IaaS) based on
three options:
Failover *
Performance
Weighted round-robin
Leverages DNS CNAME records
34. Why should you use this?
Allow for planned maintenance while still providing a static page
Provide a semi-automated Failover to a maintenance page / “site is
down” page
Note: You still need to know that something went wrong! Suggest using an
external / 3rd party monitoring system
35. Key Considerations for Traffic Manager
Failover Scenarios:
IIS Response code that is NOT 200
This does not include:
SQL is down (IIS still returns a 200)
Any redirects (301/302 redirects)
AD is down
Etc
Usually need to set this to a specific URL (i.e.
http://yoursite.com/Probe.aspx)
38. SharePoint Server Farm Options
High-Availability (9 servers)
Two Web Front End Servers
Two App Servers
SQL AlwaysOn Cluster with file share witness
Two Domain Controllers
Non-HA (4 servers)
Single WFE; Single App
Single SQL; Single DC
39. SharePoint Server Farm Options
All servers, accounts, DBs have a prefix
i.e. “MySP”
Can use different passwords for some of the
accounts
A few clicks… some forms… and then it runs
~2hrs for non-HA Farm
~4hrs for HA Farm
41. SharePoint Server Farm Issues
General:
Single Storage Account for all VHDs
OS Version is 2012 for SP, 2012R2 for everything else
Azure Agent isn’t fully configurable
WinRM enabled publicly by default
SQL Setup
SQL Version compatibility with SharePoint Version
No SQL Alias
SQL Data / Log files are on different disks
42. SharePoint Server Farm Issues
SharePoint:
Install & Farm Accounts are the only two used
Secondary disk not used (although it is provisioned)
Central Admin port not configurable; Published externally
No Service Applications are provisioned
44. “I know I wrote a blog post
on that, but where is it?”
45. More reading!
How to Fully Patch SharePoint 2013 with SP1: http://tinyurl.com/imas-patch
Creating a SharePoint Server Farm in Azure: http://tinyurl.com/imas-spfarm
Traffic Manager on Microsoft Azure: http://tinyurl.com/imas-trafficman
Architecture of SharePoint 2013 Farms: Search Components and Tier
Performance: http://tinyurl.com/imas-spsearch
46. I just want the content!
Available on Slide Share at 9pm EST tonight!
http://www.slideshare.net/ZacharyMillis/lessons-from-the-field-setting-up-sharepoint-
on-azure
http://tinyurl.com/tagif-Nov12
46 11/12/2014