How to Setup SharePoint 2013 on Windows Azure: Step 1

Veena Sarda
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How to: Set Up SharePoint 2013 Virtual Machine on Windows Azure

I was very excited with my MSDN subscription on Windows Azure and wanted to quickly set up SharePoint Server 2013 on the Windows Azure infrastructure. I started by logging into "https://manage.windowsazure.com", entered my credentials and started with the screen as shown below.

Wrong way of provisioning SharePoint Server 2013 on Windows Azure

I see a SharePoint Server 2013 Trial image virtual machine in the Gallery and started directly provisioning the SharePoint Server thinking that a single standalone SharePoint Server 2013 will be provisioned.

But after the VM was provisioned and I attempted to launch the SharePoint Administrator as done on the premise of SharePoint Server 2013 installation, I soon realised that this template (VM image) is not meant for a single standalone SharePoint Server 2013 installation. I get the following message:

Correct way of provisioning SharePoint Server 2013 on Windows Azure

At the minimum, there are 4 steps and multiple sub-steps that need to be followed to properly provision SharePoint Server 2013 on Windows Azure. So the 3 steps are as follows:

Create and Configure Network components
Install and Configure Domain Controller
Install and Configure SQL Server
Install and Configure SharePoint Server 2013

In this article we will see the initial step details and in subsequent articles we will see the remaining steps.

Create and configure Network components

So the first step is to create and configure network components. At the minimum we will need the following network components:

One Virtual Private Network
One DNS Server
Three Subnets
One Windows Azure Storage Account

Create VPN

Click on the Network Services in the Windows Azure Manage portal and click on "New". Enter the details such as Name and Region as shown below.

Create a DNS Server as shown below. Choose the IP as "10.0.0.4" since this is the static IP given to the DNS Server. Note: I realised this when I got an error to connect other servers to the domain.

Create SubNets

I have created 4 subnets below but a minimum of 3 is required for a small farm where AppSubnet and WebSubnet can be clubbed together. As the name suggests, we are using these for the Domain Controller, SQL Database, Application Server and Web Server roles.

Once all this is done, click on the "OK" tab and wait for a few minutes; your VPN will be created as shown below.

Create a storage account

After the network is ready, as shown below create a storage account. Give it a name and follow the wizard. Your storage account will be created.

In the next article we will see how to create and configure a domain controller.