如何将VM上传到Azure

Question

I see a lot of confusion about how to connect to Azure and upload a VM. It involves creating a management certificate with makecert and uploading with csupload , and there are a lot of flags to get wrong. So I thought I'd ask the question and answer it to save someone some trouble.

Answer 1

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Basic Principles

1. You must have Visual Studio and the Azure SDK installed.

2. To connect to Azure, you create a security certificate on your local machine that identifies you. Then you go to Azure and import the certificate. Now your local machine and Azure are able to talk to each other securely. For this reason you can't start the work on one machine and finish it on another. Work on one machine.

3. You must have the certificate in your Current User certificate store and also exported to your hard drive. You need a copy on the hard drive to upload to Azure, and you need it in the certificate store because when you connect to Azure that's where it will look for it. You can create it on your hard drive and import it, or you can create it in the certificate store and export it. The following instructions show you how to do the latter.

Create the Certificate

1. Open a Visual Studio command prompt as an Administrator. (right click on the menu item, and click "run as administrator".

2. Copy/paste the following:

   makecert -sky exchange -r -n "CN=MyCertificateName" -pe -a sha256 -len 2048 -ss My "MyCertificateName.cer"
   
   This will create the certificate and install it in your Current User certificate store. It will not create a copy on your hard drive. It's the "My" key word that causes the certificate to be stored in the certificate store for your current account.

3. Open the certificate manager by typing certmgr in the start menu command. You should see Certificates - Current User at the top. Open Personal/Certificates and you should see the certificate you just created.

4. Right click the certificate and click All Tasks, Export. Click Next. Select No do not export the private key. Click Next. Select the DER encoded format. Click Next. Save the certificate on your hard drive somewhere with the same name as you used to create it (doesn't have to be the same but it avoids confusion).

Import the Certificate into Azure

1. Log into Azure.

2. Click Settings then Management Certificates then Upload.

3. Browse to the management certificate that you just exported and saved, and upload it.

4. Copy the Subscription Identifier and Thumbprint from the uploaded certificate and paste them into a text file. Save the file on your local hard drive. You need these numbers handy for the next step.

5. If you want to be safe, delete the certificate that you exported to your hard drive. You don't need it there any more. Azure will look for the certificate in your certificate store when it authorizes you, not on your hard drive.

At this point you are able to make a secure connection between your computer/account and Azure. You will now use this secure connection to upload your Virtual Machine.

Upload your Virtual Machine

1. First establish a secure connection to Azure. Open an Azure command prompt as an Administrator and enter the following:

   csupload Set-Connection "SubscriptionId=YourSubscriptionIdGoesHere;CertificateThumbprint=YourCertificateThumbPrintGoesHere;ServiceManagementEndpoint= https://management.core.windows.net "

2. Finally it's time to upload the file. Open the Azure portal, select your storage account and copy the blobs service endpoint URL. Enter the following at the same Azure command prompt as above:

   csupload Add-PersistentVMImage -Destination "YourBlobServiceEndPointUrlGoesHere/vhds/YourVhdNameGoesHere" -Label YourVhdNameGoesHere-LiteralPath "ThePathToYourVhdOnTheLocalComputerGoesHere" -OS Windows

The VHD should begin to upload.

Answer 2

Here's an easier way, you will need:
Windows Azure PowerShell

1. Open "Windows Azure PowerShell"
   -OR- open a PS prompt and run:
   Set-ExecutionPolicy RemoteSigned
   Import-Module "C:\\Program Files (x86)\\Microsoft SDKs\\Windows Azure\\PowerShell\\Azure\\Azure.psd1"

2. Get-AzurePublishSettingsFile
(Will prompt you to save a .publishsettings file required in the next step)

3. Import-AzurePublishSettingsFile "C:\\Temp\\Windows Azure...credentials.publishsettings"

4. add-azurevhd -destination "https://.blob.core.windows.net/vhds/File.vhd" -localfilepath "C:\\Users\\Public\\Documents\\Hyper-V\\Virtual hard disks\\File.vhd"

For more info see:
Get Started with Windows Azure Cmdlets