DP-300 Microsoft Azure Database – Recommend and test HA/DR strategies, and configure HA/DR Part 2

3. Creating Virtual Machines for Failover Cluster and Always On Availability Group

In this video, we’re going to create three virtual machines that we need to use. One for the domain controller and two which contain SQL Server. So I’m going to start off with going to virtual machines and create a virtual machine. This is for the domain controller, and this image that we’re going to be using is just going to be a standard Windows Server. So here we have a Windows Server 2019 data center, for instance. So we’re going to create a new resource group.

So this is completely blank resource group. So I’m going to call this computer VM domain Controller and the resource group, I’m going to call it SQL H-A-D-R. So most of the rest I think is as is. We need an administrator account. So I’m going to choose the same one as I’ve been using all through the second part of this course. And we have got RDP selected so I can connect to it. So all the rest are going to be the same. The networking is going to create a new virtual network and that is important.

So all the rest going to be fine. We’ve got basic Security group with http I’m also going to add Http to all of these and that’s it. So we’ve got disks, we can choose what sort of disks you want. Management just leave as is for this particular example and everything else just as is. So I’m going to review and create this. So make a note of the name of the virtual network. So in this case, SQL h a dr VNet. So I’m going to click create.

And it’s important that you allow this virtual machine to be created before we create the next one with SQL Server. Admittedly, it won’t actually take that long because we haven’t got SQL Server on this. This is just a standard Windows machine. I’m just going to pause the video here right now, it’s done, it just took a few minutes. I will now create my next machine. So I’ll go to Azure SQL and I’ll click Create and I will take an image wave, a free SQL license, SQL 2019 developer on Windows Server 2019.

So this is just going to be a standard install. So. Virtual machine name SQL Server One. I want a region UK South and I want the same group as I’ve had before. So this is going to be the SQL hair. So at this stage you can also put infrastructure in as you wish. But this is just a test for the Windows Server failover groups and always on availability groups, so we don’t need that for this particular thing. So I enter username and password again, I’m just going to have Http and RDP on and this is the important bit. When I go into networking, I need to have the SQL H adrvnet, so the ones I previously used.

So again, I’ve got a basic Nic Network security group, wave port 83 three, eight, nine available. So I could click on all the rest, but I think I’m just going to leave them as is. Maybe apart from SQL authentication, I generally like to have it on for test machines, even though I don’t think we’re going to be using it for this particular purpose. So review and create.

And as I say, the important thing is that the virtual network is the same as the one that we’ve just set up. So click Create and then while this is deploying so this is SQL Server One. I can now do SQL Server Two. I do not have to wait. So I’ll go back into Azure SQL, I will create same license. So this is going to be SQL Server Two, same resource group, which allows us to have the same networking. So all the rest are going to be the same as before. So we’re in the same virtual network.

Basic 83, eight, nine, review and create and then we can create. So this is how we create the free virtual machines that we’ll need for this part of the call see part in the next video. We’re going to then connect them all together by means of using a domain.

4. Connecting Virtual Machines to a Domain

In this video, we’re going to connect these three virtual machines together using a domain. So the domain controller is going to establish the domain, and then the other two computers which are still being created are going to connect to it. So I’m going to click on my VM domain controller, and it’s already started. If it wasn’t, I’d have to start it. And I’m going to click to connect using RDP remote desktop protocol. So click download the RDP file, click on it. This publisher, this remote connection cannot be identified. Are you sure you want to connect anyway? Yes, I do.

So now I need to use a different account. So I’ll use the username and password that I set up in the previous video. Are you sure you want to connect? Connecting. And it would take a few seconds for the very first screen to come up. So here we are. And eventually the server manager will come in. Do we want to allow a PC to be discoverable by other PCs and devices on this network? I’m going to say yes to that. So it takes a few seconds for the server manager to fully load up. Now, what I need is to have the active directory domain services.

So this isn’t Azure Active Directory. This is Windows Server active Directory. And I do this by going up to manage in the top right hand corner of the screen. If you don’t get something immediately, it may just be taking a while to boot up. It wasn’t my case. And click Add roles and features. So, going to go down next. Next. Now, note the IP address. This is going to be quite important. An IP address. Internet Protocol address. This is how computers speak to each other. So there are four numbers connected with zero to 255, and then the dot, and then another zero to 255 and a dot and so forth. Now, you see these first two numbers I want you to remember.

So in my case, it’s ten dot, five. Your case might be something completely different. So if yours are different, then you use what you use. So in my case, ten, 50, four. Please remember that. Right, we’re going into server roles. And here is the active directory domain services. So I’m going to now add those features and just Next. Next, next. And install. So it is installing. So now it has installed. But notice we have got a message promote this server to a domain controller.

So I’ll click on that, and that gives us this active directory domain services configuration wizard. So what I’m going to do is add a new forest. Now, you can type whatever you want as this. I’m going to type my website and click Next. Next, we’ll need the domain controller option. So basically we need passwords there. So I’m just going to use my standard password and then I’ll just keep going, just keep on clicking Next. So eventually the net BIOS domain name comes file cats and now you can see all prerequisite checks passed successfully. Click install to begin installation.

So you got a few warnings and if I was doing this in a non test environment, there’ll be a lot more that I’ll be doing. But I’m just doing this for this particular course which has a few objectives and I want to get there as quickly as I can. So it’s now installing, so now it is installed and the computer is going to be started because it has now been installed so it’s going to be rebooted. So I’m going to be thrown out of that and that’s all I need to do with this VM domain controller so I could log in if I wanted to. I don’t think I need to now. I just want to point out the IP address if I go to Networking and click on the Network interface. This is what’s regulating everything here.

So you can see that I have a private IP address of Ten 50 four. Now if I go to my virtual machines I have here, if I refresh, there we go, my SQL Server One and if I go do exactly the same thing, go to Networking, you’ll see I’m at ten 50 five and similarly if I go to SQL Server Two, go to Networking ten 50 Six. So it’s that ten five bit together with a few other things that keep it all together. Now what I need to do is to say, okay, I want you to use the domain controller as the domain name system and the way I can do that is by clicking on the network interface going down to the domain name system DNS Server, click on Custom and add in my Ten 50 Four in this case.

So click Save and it’s the same on my SQL Server. To click on the network interface, go to DNS Servers, click on Custom, go to Ten 50 Four, click Save. Now, if you’re used to Windows servers, you may know other ways of changing the DNS. However, this is the way you do it in Microsoft Azure. So let’s go back to the virtual machines and when you’ve done these changes, what I like to do is just stop these machines. So stop SQL Server One and stop SQL Server Two. I also want to boot into the VM domain controller so I will just connect to that one again.

This will be for the last time, I think, in this course, because we won’t need it again, but I just like to make sure that I can boot into it and that everything is okay. So now I’ve booted into it and you can see that we’ve got a DDS on the left hand side and we can also see if I go into this PC and go into properties that we are on the domain balcats Co UK. So that’s great. So let’s go back to our list of virtual machines. It shows that everything is running. So I’m just going to refresh that. So you can see these two are stopped de alllocated. So I’m just going to refresh this and start. I’m going to SQL Server Two refresh and start. So might just need to just wait a few seconds until they have started. So I’ll just pause the video until that’s the case and I’ll just refresh again. Right.

So let’s go to server one. So I’m going to go to this PC or my PC by opening up Windows Explorer, right and clicking on this PC. Going to Properties and then I’ve currently got a work group, I would need to change that to a domain. So I’ll click on Change Settings and then when I’ve done that I click on Change again and then when I’ve done that I go to Domain and type in FILECATS Co UK. So I’m going to click OK and I’m going to type in my standard username and password. And there we are. Welcome to the FILECATS co UK domain. So it’s now going to restart the computer. I’m going to show you another way of getting to that dialog box. You can go to our local server, click on the Workgroup and click on Change. So going to go to a new domain file Cast or UK.

And again, I need the standard credentials that I’ve been using and again it needs a reboot. So now if I go back to SQL Server One and I go to Connect, the external TCP IP address may have changed so I’ll keep redownloading the connection string that I need and while it’s downloading I’ll do exactly the same thing with SQL Server Two while it’s booting up. So now I’ve got two computers virtual machines open but it’s a bit difficult to tell apart which computer I am in. So there’s a clue right at the top but if you’ve got this expanded then there isn’t that much of a clue.

So what I’m going to do is I’m going to add in a little graphical file. So I’ve just downloaded a file so I’m just going to copy that, paste it onto the desktop and then right and click and go to Personalize. And the background is on the left hand side. I’m going to browse for a picture on my desktop number one and I want it to be tiled so we can see that this is server number one or SQL Server One and then do exactly the same here in number two, except we’ve got a different graphic.

So now we’ve got these two different virtual machines. If I go into either of them I can go into File Explorer, right and click on this PC and you can see that both of them are now domain joined. So previously it was saying a particular workgroup but now it’s saying that it’s in a domain and hopefully you can also see how easy it is to know which particular computer you’re in, because the background is different for each of these.

So in this video, we have taken our virtual machines that we’ve previously created and we have now added a domain. So these two computers are now able to speak to each other with the help of the domain controller, which we won’t be using in any future videos.