Lab: Implementing and configuring virtualization in Windows Server

Scenario

Contoso is a global engineering and manufacturing company with its head office in Seattle, USA. An IT office and data center are in Seattle to support the Seattle location and other locations. Contoso recently deployed a Windows Server server and client infrastructure.

Because of many physical servers being currently underutilized, the company plans to expand virtualization to optimize the environment. Because of this, you decide to perform a proof of concept to validate how Hyper-V can be used to manage a virtual machine environment. Also, the Contoso DevOps team wants to explore container technology to determine whether they can help reduce deployment times for new applications and to simplify moving applications to the cloud. You plan to work with the team to evaluate Windows Server containers and to consider providing Internet Information Services (Web services) in a container.

Note: An interactive lab simulation is available that allows you to click through this lab at your own pace. You may find slight differences between the interactive simulation and the hosted lab, but the core concepts and ideas being demonstrated are the same.

Objectives

After completing this lab, you’ll be able to:

  • Create and configure VMs.
  • Install and configure containers.

Estimated time: 60 minutes

Lab Setup

Virtual machines: AZ-800T00A-SEA-DC1, AZ-800T00A-SEA-SVR1, and AZ-800T00A-ADM1 must be running. Other VMs can be running, but they aren’t required for this lab.

Note: AZ-800T00A-SEA-DC1, AZ-800T00A-SEA-SVR1, and AZ-800T00A-SEA-ADM1 virtual machines are hosting the installation of SEA-DC1, SEA-SVR1 and SEA-ADM1

  1. Select SEA-ADM1.

  2. Sign in using the following credentials:

    • User name: Administrator
    • Password: Pa55w.rd
    • Domain: CONTOSO

For this lab, you’ll use the available VM environment.

Exercise 1: Creating and configuring VMs

Scenario

In this exercise, you will use Hyper-V Manager and Windows Admin Center to create and configure a virtual machine. You will start with creating a private virtual network switch. Next, you decide to create a differencing drive of a base image that has already been prepared with the operating system to be installed on the VM. Finally, you will create a generation 1 VM that uses the differencing drive and private switch that you have prepared for the proof of concept.

The main tasks for this exercise are as follows:

  1. Create a Hyper-V virtual switch
  2. Create a virtual hard disk
  3. Create a virtual machine
  4. Manage virtual machines using Windows Admin Center

Task 1: Create a Hyper-V virtual switch

  1. On SEA-ADM1, open Server Manager.
  2. In Server Manager, select All Servers.
  3. In the Servers list, select SEA-SVR1 and use its context-sensitive menu to start Hyper-V Manager targeting that server.

  4. In Hyper-V Manager, use the Virtual Switch Manager to create on SEA-SVR1 a virtual switch with the following settings:

    • Name: Contoso Private Switch
    • Connection type: Private network

Task 2: Create a virtual hard disk

  1. On SEA-ADM1, in Hyper-V Manager, use the New Virtual Hard Disk Wizard to create on SEA-SVR1 a new virtual hard disk with the following settings:

    • Disk Format: VHD
    • Disk Type: Differencing
    • Name: SEA-VM1
    • Location: C:\Base
    • Parent Disk: C:\Base\BaseImage.vhd

Task 3: Create a virtual machine

  1. On SEA-ADM1, in Hyper-V Manager, on SEA-SVR1, create a new virtual machine with the following settings:

    • Name: SEA-VM1
    • Location: C:\Base
    • Generation: Generation 1
    • Memory: 4096
    • Networking: Contoso Private Switch
    • Hard disk: C:\Base\SEA-VM1.vhd
  2. Open the Settings window for SEA-VM1 and enable Dynamic Memory with a Maximum RAM value of 4096.
  3. Close Hyper-V Manager.

Task 4: Manage Virtual Machines using Windows Admin Center

  1. On SEA-ADM1, start Windows PowerShell as Administrator.

    Note: Perform the next two steps in case you have not already installed Windows Admin Center on SEA-ADM1.

  2. In the Windows PowerShell console, run the following command, and then press Enter to download the latest version of Windows Admin Center:

    Start-BitsTransfer -Source https://aka.ms/WACDownload -Destination "$env:USERPROFILE\Downloads\WindowsAdminCenter.msi"

  3. Enter the following command, and then press Enter to install Windows Admin Center:

    Start-Process msiexec.exe -Wait -ArgumentList "/i $env:USERPROFILE\Downloads\WindowsAdminCenter.msi /qn /L*v log.txt REGISTRY_REDIRECT_PORT_80=1 SME_PORT=443 SSL_CERTIFICATE_OPTION=generate"

    Note: Wait until the installation completes. This should take about 2 minutes.

  4. On SEA-ADM1, start Microsoft Edge and connect to the local instance of Windows Admin Center at https://SEA-ADM1.contoso.com.

  5. If prompted, in the Windows Security dialog box, enter the following credentials, and then select OK:

    • Username: CONTOSO\Administrator
    • Password: Pa55w.rd
  6. In Windows Admin Center, add a connection to sea-svr1.contoso.com and connect to it as CONTOSO\Administrator with the password of Pa55w.rd.
  7. In the Tools list, select Virtual Machines and review the Summary pane.
  8. In the Inventory pane open SEA-VM1 and review the Setting.
  9. Use Windows Admin Center to create a new disk, 5 GB in size.
  10. Use Windows Admin Center to start SEA-VM1, and then display the statistics for the running VM.
  11. Use Windows Admin Center to shut down SEA-VM1.
  12. In the Tools list, select Virtual switches and identify the existing switches.

Exercise 1 results

After this exercise, you should have used Hyper-V Manager and Windows Admin Center to create a virtual switch, a virtual hard disk, a virtual machine, and then manage the virtual machine.

Exercise 2: Installing and configuring containers

Scenario

In this exercise, you will use Docker to install and run Windows containers. You will also use Windows Admin Center to manage containers.

The main tasks for this exercise are as follows:

  1. Install Docker on Windows Server
  2. Install and run a Windows container
  3. Use Windows Admin Center to manage containers

Task 1: Install Docker on Windows Server

  1. On SEA-ADM1, in Windows Admin Center, while connected to sea-svr1.contoso.com, use the Tools menu to establish a PowerShell Remoting session to that server.

    Note: The Powershell connection in Windows Admin Center may be relatively slow due to nested virtualization used in the lab, so an alternate method is to run Enter-PSSession -ComputerName SEA-SVR1 from a Windows Powershell console on SEA-ADM1.

  2. In the PowerShell console, run the following commands to force the use of TLS 1.2 and install the PowerShellGet module:

    [Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = [Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol -bor [Net.SecurityProtocolType]::Tls12
Install-PackageProvider -Name NuGet -Force
Install-Module PowerShellGet -RequiredVersion 2.2.4 -SkipPublisherCheck

  3. After the installation completes, run the following command to restart SEA-SVR1:

    Restart-Computer -Force

  4. After SEA-SVR1 restarts, use the PowerShell tool again to establish a new PowerShell Remoting session to SEA-SVR1.

  5. In the Windows PowerShell console, run the following command to install the Docker Microsoft PackageManagement provider on SEA-SVR1:

    Install-Module -Name DockerProvider -Repository PSGallery -Force

  6. In the Windows PowerShell console, run the following command to install the Docker runtime on SEA-SVR1:

    Install-Package -Name docker -ProviderName DockerProvider

  7. After the installation completes, run the following commands to restart SEA-SVR1:

    Restart-Computer -Force

Task 2: Install and run a Windows container

  1. After SEA-SVR1 restarts, use the PowerShell tool again to establish a new PowerShell Remoting session to SEA-SVR1.

  2. In the Windows PowerShell console, run the following command to verify the installed version of Docker:

    Get-Package -Name Docker -ProviderName DockerProvider

  3. Run the following command to identify Docker images currently present on SEA-SVR1:

    docker images

    Note: Verify that there are no images in the local repository store.

  4. Run the following command to download a Nano Server image containing an Internet Information Services (IIS) installation:

    docker pull nanoserver/iis

    Note: The time it takes to complete the download will depend on the available bandwidth of the network connection from the lab VM to the Microsoft container registry.

  5. Run the following command to verify that the Docker image has been successfully downloaded:

    docker images

  6. Run the following command to launch a container based on the downloaded image:

    docker run --isolation=hyperv -d -t --name nano -p 80:80 nanoserver/iis

    Note: The docker command starts a container in the Hyper-V isolation mode (which addresses any host operating system incompatibility issues) as a background service (-d) and configures networking such that port 80 of the container host maps to port 80 of the container.

  7. Run the following command to retrieve the IP address information of the container host:

    ipconfig

    Note: Identify the IPv4 address of the Ethernet adapter named vEthernet (nat). This is the address of the new container. Next, identify the IPv4 address of the Ethernet adapter named Ethernet. This is the IP address of the host (SEA-SVR1) and is set to 172.16.10.12.

  8. On SEA-ADM1, switch to the Microsoft Edge window, open another tab and go to http://172.16.10.12. Verify that the browser displays the default IIS page.

  9. On SEA-ADM1, switch back to the PowerShell Remoting session to SEA-SVR1 and, in the Windows PowerShell console, run the following command to list running containers:

    docker ps

    Note: This command provides information on the container that is currently running on SEA-SVR1. Record the container ID because you will use it to stop the container.

  10. Run the following command to stop the running container (replace the <ContainerID> placeholder with the container ID you identified in the previous step):

    docker stop <ContainerID>

  11. Run the following command to verify that the container has stopped:

    docker ps

Task 3: Use Windows Admin Center to manage containers

  1. On SEA-ADM1, in Windows Admin Center, in the Tools menu of sea-svr1.contoso.com, select Containers. When prompted to close the PowerShell session, select Continue.
  2. In the Containers pane, browse through the Overview, Containers, Images, Networks, and Volumes tabs.

Exercise 2 results

After this exercise, you should have installed Docker on Windows Server, downloaded a Windows container image containing web services, and verified its functionality.