Install the Windows Azure Integration Components

When a VM Role instance is first brought online, the generalized image that is used to create the instance must run through a setup specialization phase. This specialization phase is performed by the System Preparation Tool (sysprep), provided by the Windows Azure Integration Components.

In order to automate the specialization phase, the Windows Azure Integration Components install an answer file to the root directory of the VM Role instance. The default name of the answer file is c:\unattend.xml.

The answer file provides a set of default Windows configuration settings during the specialization phase that sets up the operating system. These default settings include:

• Setting the system locale to EN-US.
  
  
• Setting the system time zone to UTC. You must not change this setting value.
  
  
• Turning off Windows Update.
  
  
• Setting the administrator password.
  
  

The Administrator account is disabled after you upload the server image to Windows Azure. However, if, during the process of preparing the server image, you generalize it, then specialize it again, the administrator password is needed for the specialization pass.

The Windows Azure Integration Components install the service runtime APIs to the image, so that the VM Role instance may gather dynamic information from the Windows Azure environment. The service runtime APIs provide access to service configuration information such as the values of configuration settings, to VM Role instance information such as the instance ID and the upgrade domain that the instance belongs to, and to network address information for all instances in the cloud service deployment.

Note
The service runtime API is accessible only to code that is running under an Administrator or LocalSystem account in the VM Role instance.

The Windows Azure Integration Components create any named local storage resources that you define in the service model for the VM Role. You can access local storage resources from within the VM Role instance by using the service runtime API (LocalResource), or by accessing the resources at c:\Resources\<resource-name>.

When the VM Role instance starts, access to the local resource directory is restricted to the Administrator account. Your code should modify the security settings for the directory if a process running in a lower-privilege account must access it.

The components also create the system local storage resources where diagnostic data is written while the VM Role instance is online.

The Windows Azure Integration Components install any certificates that you specify in the service definition to the LocalMachine store location for the VM Role instance. You can specify that a certificate should be installed to a preexisting certificate store name, or you can specify a custom store name. For details on specifying certificate store location and name in your service definition file, see Service Definition Schema.

Note
All certificates are installed to the LocalMachine store location; it is not possible to install certificates to the CurrentUser store location or any other store location.

A certificate that is installed on a VM Role instance must first be uploaded to your Windows Azure certificate store for your cloud service. All certificates must be installed from the Windows Azure certificate store. For more information about certificates needed for VM Role instances, see Use Certificates With a VM Role in Windows Azure.

Note
Installing a certificate on the server image that is uploaded is not recommended. The System Preparation Tool (sysprep), which must be run to generalize your image before it is deployed to Windows Azure, destroys private key information.

• In Hyper-V Manager, select the virtual machine, and then click Settings.

• In the Hardware pane, under IDE Controller 1, click DVD Drive.

• In the Settings page, browse to the %ProgramFiles%\Windows Azure SDK\<VersionNumber>\iso\ folder, select the wavmroleic.iso file, and then click OK.

  Where VersionNumber is the current version of the Windows Azure SDK.

• In Hyper-V Manager, click Connect.

• In the virtual machine window, open Windows Explorer, select the DVD drive, and then double-click WaIntegrationComponents-x64.msi.

• Enter the Administrator password that is used when the operating system starts after the image is prepared and deployed to Windows Azure. Finish the installation of the components. You must restart the virtual machine for the components to be completely installed.

  Note
  It is recommended that you create a password reset disk to ensure that you can access the virtual machine if the password is lost or forgotten. For more information, see Create an Administrator Password.