Automating That "Other" OS

Automating That "Other" OS
Cooking with Chef on Windows
Julian Dunn <jdunn@getchef.com>
Engineering Lead – Field Solutions
Chef Software, Inc.
CloudDevelop Conference
Columbus, OH
October 2014

Jeffrey Snover and the Monad Manifesto

Evolution of Automation on Windows
1996: WMI
2003:
Subsystem
for Unix
Applications
1999:
Services for UNIX
2008:
PowerShell 2.0
&
Server Core
2006:
PowerShell 1.0
2013:
PowerShell 4.0/
Desired State
Configuration
2012:
PowerShell 3.0
2014:
PowerShell 5.0
(Preview)
2002:
Monad
Manifesto

The GUI isn't dead, but it's dying on
the server OS. Don't be caught off-guard
when it's finally gone.
- Don Jones, Redmond Magazine, July 2011
http://redmondmag.com/articles/2011/07/01/the-gui-is-dead.aspx

Declarative Configuration
Management

Model your IT by describing what it
should look like -- not how it should
be done.

Imperative versus Declarative
Imperative:
PS C:> Add-WindowsFeature Web-WebServer
Declarative:
Configuration MySite {
WindowsFeature IIS {
Ensure = "Present"
Name = "Web-Server"
}
}

Platform-Neutral Domain-Specific Language
package 'httpd'
template '/etc/httpd/conf/httpd.conf' do
owner 'root'
group 'root'
action :create
source 'httpd.conf.erb'
notifies :reload, 'service[httpd]'
End
service 'httpd' do
action [:start, :enable]
end
windows_feature 'IIS-WebServerRole'
template 'c:inetpubwwwrootindex.html' do
owner 'Administrator'
group 'IIS_IUSRS'
action :create
source 'index.html.erb'
notifies :reload, 'service[W3SVC]'
End
service 'W3SVC' do
action [:start, :enable]
end

Chef Mechanics
• Recipes go in cookbooks
• Cookbooks are uploaded to a Chef
server
• Nodes periodically check in and
get their recipes to run ("run list")
• If system state is already desired
state, Chef makes no changes
• "Convergence"

What's the Purpose of Declarative CM?
• Consistent, reproducible configurations
• Manage & deploy thousands of machines correctly
• Deploy applications correctly
• Keep them in compliance with declared policy
+ =
Infrastructure Applications Service

Wait, What About System Center?

Microsoft System Center
• Advisor
• App Controller
• Configuration Manager (SCCM)
• Data Protection Manager
• Endpoint Protection
• Orchestrator/SMA
• Operations Manager
• Service Manager
• Virtual Machine Manager

System Center Configuration Manager
• Origin: Started as Systems
Management Server (1994), renamed
SCCM in ~2007
• Purpose: Manage large groups of
computers running Windows, Windows
Embedded, Mac OS X, and/or
Linux/UNIX
• Components:
• Remote control
• Patch management
• Software distribution
• OS deployment using MDT
• Hardware/software inventory
• System configuration

SCCM: The Good, Bad and the Ugly
• Good:
• Easy-to-use UI
• Lots of functionality
• Great for managing desktops
• Integrates with other System Center products
• Bad:
• Prescriptive workflow
• Point-and-click
• Needs Active Directory
• Hard to automate the automation
• No easily versionable artifacts

SCCM and Chef
• SCCM (Compliance Settings)
• Configuration settings set via UI
• Configuration item primitives
• WMI, registry, scripts, applications
• Shareable artifacts (baselines)
• Restrictive workflow
• Idempotence is up to you
• Agent-based
• Chef:
• Configuration settings via plain text files
• Resource primitives
• file, template, service, powershell_script, etc.
• Shareable & versionable artifacts
(cookbooks)
• Flexible workflow
• Built-in idempotence
• Agent-based

Provisioning with Chef on Microsoft Azure
1. Upload content (cookbooks, roles, etc.)
2. Request VM
4. Register with Chef server
5. Execute run_list
3. Create VM, install Azure
and Chef agents

Provisioning with Chef
$ knife azure server create
--azure-source-image a699494373c04fc0bc8f2bb1389d6106__Windows-Server-2012-R2-201409.01-en.us-127GB.vhd
--bootstrap-protocol cloud-api
--winrm-user chef
--winrm-password DELETED
--azure-dns-name DELETED
-r "role[base-windows], role[fourthcoffee-classic]"
...........
Waiting for virtual machine to reach status 'provisioning'............vm state 'provisioning' reached after 2.6 minutes.
Waiting for virtual machine to reach status 'ready'..........................vm state 'ready' reached after 6.23 minutes.
.
DNS Name: DELETED.cloudapp.net
VM Name: DELETED
Size: Medium
Azure Source Image: a699494373c04fc0bc8f2bb1389d6106__Windows-Server-2012-R2-201409.01-en.us-127GB.vhd
Azure Service Location: East US
Public Ip Address: XXXXXXXX
Private Ip Address: YYYYYYYY
WinRM Port: 5985
Environment: _default

Provisioning with Chef
Waiting for Resource Extension to reach status 'wagent provisioning'....
Resource extension state 'wagent provisioning' reached after 0.03 minutes.
Waiting for Resource Extension to reach status 'installing'....................
Resource extension state 'installing' reached after 2.17 minutes.
Waiting for Resource Extension to reach status 'provisioning'....................................
Resource extension state 'provisioning' reached after 4.33 minutes.
Waiting for Resource Extension to reach status 'ready'....................
Resource extension state 'ready' reached after 2.16 minutes.
.
DNS Name: DELETED.cloudapp.net
VM Name: DELETED
Size: Medium
Azure Source Image: a699494373c04fc0bc8f2bb1389d6106__Windows-Server-2012-R2-201409.01-en.us-127GB.vhd
Azure Service Location: East US
Public Ip Address: XXXXXX
Private Ip Address: YYYYYY
WinRM Port: 5985
Environment: _default
Runlist: ["role[base-windows]", "role[fourthcoffee-classic]"]

Welcome to Fourth Coffee Corporation of Seattle

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain
windows_feature 'IIS-WebServerRole' do
action :install
end
# Pre-requisite features for IIS-ASPNET45 that need to be installed first, in this order.
%w{IIS-ISAPIFilter IIS-ISAPIExtensions NetFx3ServerFeatures NetFx4Extended-ASPNET45 IIS-NetFxExtensibility45}.
each do |f|
windows_feature f do
action :install
end
end
windows_feature 'IIS-ASPNET45' do
action :install
end

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain
remote_directory node['fourthcoffee']['install_path'] do
source 'fourthcoffee'
action :create
end
iis_pool 'FourthCoffee' do
runtime_version '4.0'
action :add
end
iis_site 'FourthCoffee' do
protocol :http
port 80
path node['fourthcoffee']['install_path']
application_pool 'FourthCoffee'
action [:add,:start]
end

Challenges to Automation on Windows
• No real package manager
• Many COTS vendors don’t understand automation
• UAC (User Access Control)
• WinRM Quotas
• Win32 Redirector
• Not all preferences/state stored in registry
• Reboots!
• Other annoyances (KB2773898, KB2918614, KB2842230)

Desired State Configuration
The Future of Automation on Windows

PowerShell DSC: The Future of Automation
"DSC represents a significant break in administration, because it
asks … administrators to not actually configure anything
themselves. Instead, DSC asks administrators to describe, in fairly
simple text files, how they would like a computer to be configured.
The computer, in turn, reads that text file, and configures itself
accordingly."
- The DSC Book, Don Jones & Steve Murawski

The Relationship between DSC and Chef
• As PerfMon is to Solarwinds, DSC is to Chef
• DSC provides automation primitives that Chef recipes can call
• It deliberately lacks the ecosystem:
• Content distribution
• Cross-platform support
• Monitoring/logging/analytics
• However, it brings a standard base for automation to Windows
• No MSFT product in the future may ship without DSC modules!

Example DSC Code
Configuration FourthCoffee
{
# Install the IIS role
WindowsFeature IIS
{
Ensure = "Present"
Name = "Web-Server"
}
# Install the ASP .NET 4.5 role
WindowsFeature AspNet45
{
Ensure = "Present"
Name = "Web-Asp-Net45"
}
...
}

DSC Invoked from Chef
Configuration FourthCoffee
{
# Install the IIS role
WindowsFeature IIS
{
Ensure = "Present"
Name = "Web-Server"
}
# Install the ASP .NET 4.5 role
WindowsFeature AspNet45
{
Ensure = "Present"
Name = "Web-Asp-Net45"
}
...
}
dsc_resource 'webserver' do
resource_name :windowsfeature
property :name, 'Web-Server'
property :ensure, 'Present'
end
dsc_resource 'dotnet45' do
resource_name :windowsfeature
property :name, 'Web-Asp-Net45'
property :ensure, 'Present'
end

DevOps is a Two-Way Street
• It's great when developers
care about:
• Uptime!
• Scaling!
• Deployment!
• Argh! Put them on call! That'll
teach them!

DevOps is a Two-Way Street
• Sysadmins/infracoders have a lot to learn
from developers as well!
• Good developers:
• Write unit tests
• Write acceptance tests
• Practice test-driven-development
• Build confidence that their program code works
correctly
• Avoid breaking their applications
• Good infracoders:
• Do all of the above
• Avoid breaking ALL THE THINGS

Testing on the desktop
• Chef Ecosystem Tools:
• Test Kitchen
• Acceptance testing (ServerSpec)
• Bring-your-own hypervisor (VirtualBox, VMWare
Fusion/Workstation, Hyper-V…) and/or middleware
(Vagrant)
• Demo

Example Test Suite
describe windows_feature('IIS-WebServer') do
it { should be_installed }
end
describe port(80) do
it { should be_listening }
end
describe file('C:inetpubFourthCoffeeDefault.cshtml') do
it { should be_file }
end

Test Kitchen Demo
fourthcoffee ~$ kitchen test default-windows-2012R2 --destroy=never
-----> Starting Kitchen (v1.3.0)
-----> Cleaning up any prior instances of <default-windows-2012R2>
-----> Testing <default-windows-2012R2>
-----> Creating <default-windows-2012R2>...
Bringing machine 'default' up with 'virtualbox' provider...
==> default: Importing base box 'win2012r2-datacenter-chef11.16.2'...
Vagrant instance <default-windows-2012R2> created.
Finished creating <default-windows-2012R2> (2m57.54s).
-----> Converging <default-windows-2012R2>...
-----> Chef Omnibus installation detected (true)
Transferring files to <default-windows-2012R2>
Concurrent threads set to :max_threads => 2
[2014-10-13T19:16:36-07:00] INFO: Starting chef-zero on host localhost, port 8889 with repository at repository at
C:/tmp/kitchen
One version per cookbook
[2014-10-13T19:16:40-07:00] INFO: *** Chef 11.16.2 ***
[2014-10-13T19:16:40-07:00] INFO: Chef-client pid: 1656

Test Kitchen Demo
[2014-10-13T19:19:10-07:00] INFO: Chef Run complete in 142.572914 seconds
[2014-10-13T19:19:10-07:00] INFO: Running report handlers
[2014-10-13T19:19:10-07:00] INFO: Report handlers complete
Finished converging <default-windows-2012R2> (22m55.08s).
-----> Setting up <default-windows-2012R2>...
-----> Running postinstall for serverspec plugin
Finished setting up <default-windows-2012R2> (0m45.62s).
-----> Verifying <default-windows-2012R2>...
-----> Running serverspec test suite
Windows feature "IIS-WebServer" should be installed
Port "80" should be listening
File "C:inetpubFourthCoffeeDefault.cshtml" should be file
Finished in 13.41 seconds (files took 0.48432 seconds to load)
3 examples, 0 failures
Finished verifying <default-windows-2012R2> (0m22.73s).
Finished testing <default-windows-2012R2> (27m11.16s).
-----> Kitchen is finished. (27m12.60s)

Summary
• Don't point-and-click to administer your Windows servers
• Learn PowerShell!
• Learn declarative configuration management
• Test your infrastructure code

Automating That "Other" OS

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Editor's Notes