The document discusses lab management in software testing with a focus on Microsoft's Visual Studio Team Lab Management. It outlines the infrastructure needed for effective testing environments, including Hyper-V virtualization, and highlights the features of the 2012 version, such as dynamic memory and live storage move. Best practices for managing these environments are also provided, emphasizing the need for efficient resource allocation and collaboration amongst development teams.

1. Lab Management for everyone
Matteo Emili
http://blogs.ugidotnet.org/j3r
http://mattvsts.blogspot.com
matteo.emili@domusdotnet.org
@MattVSTS
…

2. Grazie agli sponsor

3. How do we test our software
today?
• Multiple environments
• “On my machine!”
• Give the package to the test team and
forget
• Is it seamless?

4. Visual Studio Team Lab Management
2010
• First release of the Microsoft‟s solution for
automating Quality Assurance tasks
• It needs a huge infrastructure effort (Active
Directory in place, Hyper-V, System Center
Virtual Machine Manager)

5. New technologies on the edge!
• Windows 8 provides us Hyper-V like
server OSes, but without their limits
• Visual Studio Team Lab Management 2012
provides us a new set of features

6. Hyper-V
Parent Partition Child Partition
WMI Provider
VM Management
Service
Applications
vmwp.ex
vmwp.ex
e
vmwp.ex
e
vmwp.ex
e
e
Devic
e VS VS
Kernel Kernel
Driver P C
s
VMBus VMBus
Hypervisor (Hyper-V)
Hardware (VT-x or AMD-V capable)

7. Hyper-V Requirements
•Hardware virtualization capable CPU (Intel
VT, AMD-V)
•NX Bit support on CPU and motherboard
(Intel XD bit, AMD Enhanced Virus
Protection)
•SLAT capable CPU (Intel Core iX, Xeon
L/E/X55xx, AMD Phenom, Athlon II)
•For Windows 8 Hyper-V

8. Nice to have…
• Fast dedicated HDDs (7200rpm+)
• Gigabit Ethernet connection (if you want to
do storage move)
• Tons of RAM!

9. Hyper-V features for the vDev
• Dynamic Memory
• Dynamic allocation of memory based on
consumption
• Live storage move (while they are running,
and without a shared storage!)
• VHDX file format for Virtual Hard Drives up
to 64TB each
• Support for hybernation and sleep (so you
can use it on a laptop!)

10. Developer -> Team
• Expanding developers‟ needs to a
common, shared testing environment
• The testing environment must be
predictable and capable of managing
multiple, complex infrastructures
• You might need allowing someone else
interacting with it
• You might need integration with Team
Foundation Server

11. Visual Studio Standard
Environment
• New VSTLM 2012 mode
• No infrastructure requirements
• The only requirements are Microsoft Test
Manager 2012, Team Build and the Visual
Studio Agents

12. FAQs over Standard Environment
“Feedback client?” Yes.
“Deploy to it with Team Build?” Yes.
“Physical machines?” Yes.
“Use it on my laptop?” Yes.
“VMWare support?” Yes.

13. DEMO
A lap around Standard Environments
a.k.a. Lab Management for Everyone

14. Virtual labs as a foundation for
everything
• Virtual labs can be employed in thousand
of different scenarios
• It‟s a quality enabler at all levels
• Developers can have a „certified‟ environment
for testing
• Continuous Delivery
• Stakeholders‟ feedback

15. Tips for management
• Sysprep
Built-in into Windows, it enables creation of
a clean base OS with all you need
• Snapshots
Hyper-V feature which allows taking
snapshots to have certain states saved. Be
careful: do not use it with Domain
Controllers

16. Best practices
• Use a separate high speed drive
(7200rpm+) for VMs
• Mark the environments „In Use‟ if shared
• Use Dynamic Memory and set the OS as
if it should save as much energy as
possible

17. Questions & Answers