Author: murphyslaw4267

Let us compare the data I collected from both my scripts I made for AWS and Azure. Each script accomplishes the same things:

• Deploy two Windows Server VMs from the providers official image repository
• Deploy one internet facing load balancer with the two servers behind it on port 80
• Use the providers built in orchestration method to install IIS and place a simple webpage in the root web directory
• Validate the website is being served over the internet through the Load Balancer

Here is a comparison of the common tasks:

Here is a table of all the data:

Azure
Task	Seconds	Duration in Seconds	Duration in Minutes
Script Start	0		0.00
Create Load Balancer	14	14	0.23
Create VM1	176	162	2.70
Install IIS On VM1	816	640	10.67
Deploy Website on VM1	878	62	1.03
Add VM1 to LoadBalancer	954	76	1.27
Create VM2	1115	161	2.68
Install IIS On VM2	1485	370	6.17
Deploy Website on VM2	1547	62	1.03
Add VM2 to LoadBalancer	1601	54	0.90
Website Available	1602	1	0.02
Script Complete (Total)	1602	1602	26.70
AWS
Task	Seconds	Duration in Seconds	Duration in Minutes
Script Start	0		0.00
Create Load Balancer	8	8	0.13
Create VM1	15	7	0.12
Create VM2	21	6	0.10
Assign SSM IAM Role on VM1	37	16	0.27
Assign SSM IAM Role on VM2	41	4	0.07
Deploy System Management Agent on VM1	167	126	2.10
Deploy System Management Agent on VM2	170	129	2.15
Execute Install IIS & Website On VM1	172	2	0.03
Execute Install IIS & Website On VM2	173	1	0.02
Add VM1 to LoadBalancer	175	2	0.03
Add VM2 to LoadBalancer	177	2	0.03
Website Available	260	83	1.38
Script Complete (Total)	260	260	4.30
Certain tasks in AWS do not wait for their execution to complete. Checks were added in the script and the duration column indicates which were essentially run in parallel.

As you can see from the data above, in terms of automation AWS is much faster.

As a follow on to my script that deploys a cluster of two load balanced Windows servers, installs IIS, and deploys a website for Azure, I created a similar script to do so in AWS. A few things of note that I feel makes AWS’s script better.

• Certain tasks are non blocking and do not wait for the action to complete. I added wait states in the script to make sure time comparisons are true.
• AWS actions are much faster. On average in my script it takes Azure 65 seconds to add a VM to a load balancer where in AWS its an average of 2 seconds.
• AWS’s CLI allows for multiple instance IDs to be provided per command to increase efficiency even though my script doesn’t really take advantage of this which provides a more true comparison since I don’t think Azure’s CLI or PowerShell module allows for this.

Here is the script:

#This script creates a number of Windows VMs, installs IIS, a simple webpage, and places them behind a load balancer
#run this if needed
#aws configure
function elapsedTime {
    $CurrentTime = $(get-date)
    $elapsedTime = $CurrentTime - $StartTime
    $elapsedTime = [math]::Round($elapsedTime.TotalSeconds,2)
    Write-Host "Elapsed time in seconds: " $elapsedTime -BackgroundColor Blue
}
#Captures start time for script elapsed time measurement
$StartTime = $(get-date)

#Sets "Constants" to be used to create VMs
$imageID = "ami-0182e552fba672768" #Amazon's provided windows 2019 datacenter base
$subnet = "subnet-000000000" #my subnet for us-east-2a
$securityGroup = "sg-00000000" #My network security baseline
$instanceType = "t2.medium" #Instance size, 2 vCPUs, 4 GB RAM
$keyPair = "ServerHobbyist" #Keypair to retreive administrator password
$instanceName = "WebWinApp" #sets base name
$class = "disposable" #sets class tag as disposable for easier identification and cleanup

#creates load balancer
$lbName = "WinWebLB1"
Write-Host "Creating Loadbalancer $($LbName)"
aws elb create-load-balancer `
    --load-balancer-name $lbName `
    --listeners "Protocol=HTTP,LoadBalancerPort=80,InstanceProtocol=HTTP,InstancePort=80" `
    --subnets $subnet `
    --security-groups $securityGroup
aws elb add-tags --load-balancer-name $lbName --tags Key=Class,Value=$class #tags elb with disposable class
aws elb configure-health-check --load-balancer-name $lbName --health-check Target=HTTP:80/,Interval=5,UnhealthyThreshold=2,HealthyThreshold=2,Timeout=3 #sets a lower threshold for health checks
Write-Host "Load Balancer $($Lbname) created"
elapsedTime


$serverCount = 2 #how many VMs to deploy
$instancesDeployed =  New-Object System.Collections.Generic.List[System.Object] #creates array list that will contain instance IDs deployed
for ($i=1; $i -le $serverCount; $i++){
    
    $instanceNameTag = $instanceName + $i
    Write-Host "Creating VM $($instanceNameTag)"
    $instance = aws ec2 run-instances `
        --image-id $imageID `
        --count 1 `
        --instance-type $instanceType `
        --key-name $keyPair `
        --security-group-ids $securityGroup `
        --subnet-id $subnet | ConvertFrom-Json
    aws ec2 create-tags --resources $instance.instances.InstanceId --tags Key=Name,Value=$instanceNameTag #tags instance with name
    aws ec2 create-tags --resources $instance.instances.InstanceId --tags Key=Class,Value=$class #tags instance with name

    $instancesDeployed.Add($instance.Instances.InstanceId)
    Write-Host "VM $($instanceNameTag) created"
    elapsedTime
}
Start-Sleep -Seconds 15

#Checks to make sure each instance deployed from above is in a running state, otherwise it can't recieve the IAM role.
foreach ($instanceDeployed in $instancesDeployed){
    $instance = aws ec2 describe-instances --instance-ids $instanceDeployed | ConvertFrom-Json
    $InstanceTags = $Instance.Reservations.Instances.Tags
    $InstanceName = $InstanceTags | Where-Object {$_.Key -eq "Name"}
    $InstanceName = $InstanceName.Value
    Write-Host "Checking if instance $($InstanceName)  is ready to receive IAM role for SSM"
    while ($instance.Reservations.Instances.State.Name -ne "running") {
        Write-Host "Instance $($InstanceName) not ready. Waiting to check again"
        sleep 5
        Write-Host "Checking if instance $($InstanceName) is ready to receive IAM role for SSM"
        $instance = aws ec2 describe-instances --instance-ids $instanceDeployed | ConvertFrom-Json
    }
    Write-Host "Instance $($InstanceName) is now ready, assigning role"
    elapsedTime
    aws ec2 associate-iam-instance-profile --instance-id $instanceDeployed --iam-instance-profile Name=AmazonSSMRoleForInstancesQuickSetup
    
}
Start-Sleep -Seconds 15
#Checks to make sure each instance deployed from above has the SSM agent. Otherwise commands can't be sent through AWS's orchestration system
foreach ($instanceDeployed in $instancesDeployed){
    $instance = aws ec2 describe-instances --instance-ids $instanceDeployed | ConvertFrom-Json
    $InstanceTags = $Instance.Reservations.Instances.Tags
    $InstanceName = $InstanceTags | Where-Object {$_.Key -eq "Name"}
    $InstanceName = $InstanceName.Value
    Write-Host "Checking if instance $($InstanceName) has receieved the system management agent"
    $ssmTest = aws ssm list-inventory-entries --instance-id $instanceDeployed --type-name "AWS:InstanceInformation" | ConvertFrom-Json
    while ($ssmTest.Entries.AgentType -ne "amazon-ssm-agent"){
        $ssmTest = aws ssm list-inventory-entries --instance-id $instanceDeployed --type-name "AWS:InstanceInformation" | ConvertFrom-Json
        Write-Host "Instance $($InstanceName) has not yet received the SSM agent"
        start-sleep -Seconds 5
    }
    Write-Host "Instance $($InstanceName) has received the SSM agent. Proceeding to next instance or step."
    elapsedTime
}

#Installs IIS and deploys website
foreach ($instanceDeployed in $instancesDeployed){
    Write-Host "Sending command to install IIS and deploy website on $($instanceDeployed)"
    aws ssm send-command `
        --document-name "AWS-RunPowerShellScript" `
        --parameters commands=['Add-WindowsFeature Web-Server; Invoke-WebRequest -Uri "https://serverhobbyist.com/deployment/index.html" -OutFile "c:\inetpub\wwwroot\index.html"'] `
        --targets "Key=instanceids,Values=$($instanceDeployed)" `
        --comment "Installs IIS"
    Write-Host "Command sent to $($instanceDeployed)"
    elapsedTime
}

#adds VMs to load balancer
foreach ($instanceDeployed in $instancesDeployed){
    Write-Host "Registering instance $($instanceDeployed) with LB"
    aws elb register-instances-with-load-balancer --load-balancer-name $lbName --instances $instanceDeployed #registers instance with load balancer
    Write-Host "Registered instance $($instanceDeployed) with LB"
    elapsedTime
}

Write-Host "Checking if website is ready to be served from load balancer"
$lbURL = aws elb describe-load-balancers --load-balancer-name $lbName | ConvertFrom-Json
$lbURL = "http://" + $lbUrl.LoadBalancerDescriptions.CanonicalHostedZoneName
$check = $false
while ($check -eq $false){
try {
    $check = $true
    $result = invoke-webrequest -uri $lbURL -UseBasicParsing -TimeoutSec 20
}
catch {
    $check = $false
    Write-Host "Website failed to load. Trying again"
    Start-Sleep -Seconds 5
}}
Write-Host "Website is now loading at $lbURL"
elapsedTime

Write-Host "Script completed" -BackgroundColor Blue
elapsedTime

Since I’ve been using AWS as a hobbyist for about a decade it is the public cloud I am most comfortable with. Lately to expand my horizons I’ve been learning about Microsoft’s take on it with Azure. I hope I’m not too bias since its easier for me to favor AWS since I’ve been using it for so long however my initial take on Azure is not positive. It is slow. I’m working on a comparison in terms of speed between AWS and Azure with the goal of standing up a 2 node load balanced IIS cluster. While I continue to work on making a good comparison write-up here is the code that deploys out the Azure resources. It is written in PowerShell and includes a function that measures completion time.

Import-Module Az
function elapsedTime {
    $CurrentTime = $(get-date)
    $elapsedTime = $CurrentTime - $StartTime
    $elapsedTime = [math]::Round($elapsedTime.TotalSeconds,2)
    Write-Host "Elapsed time in seconds: " $elapsedTime -BackgroundColor Green
}
#Run this to connect to Azure account if needed
#Connect-AzAccount
#Captures start time for script elapsed time measurement
$StartTime = $(get-date)
#Sets "Constants" to be used throughout script
$resourceGroup = "DisposableLab"
$location = Get-AzLocation | Where-Object {$_.DisplayName -like "North Central US"}
$vnet = "vnet1"
$subnet = "default"
$securityGroup = "DisposableLabSecurityGroup"
$secpasswd = ConvertTo-SecureString "password" -AsPlainText -Force
$credential = New-Object System.Management.Automation.PSCredential ("username", $secpasswd)
$lbname = "WebAppWinLB"
$availSetName = "WinWebappAvailabilitySet"
#Creates Availability Set to allow both servers to be load balanced
New-AzAvailabilitySet `
   -Location $location.Location `
   -Name $availSetName `
   -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroup `
   -Sku aligned `
   -PlatformFaultDomainCount 2 `
   -PlatformUpdateDomainCount 2

$publicIp = New-AzPublicIpAddress -Name 'LB1PublicIP' -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroup -AllocationMethod Static -Location $location.Location
#sets up the inbound IP pool for the load balancer
$feip = New-AzLoadBalancerFrontendIpConfig -Name 'myFrontEndPool' -PublicIpAddress $publicIp
$bepool = New-AzLoadBalancerBackendAddressPoolConfig -Name 'myBackEndPool' 
#creates health check for load balancer
$probe = New-AzLoadBalancerProbeConfig `
 -Name 'myHealthProbe' `
 -Protocol Http -Port 80 `
 -RequestPath / -IntervalInSeconds 360 -ProbeCount 5
#creates load balancing rule
$rule = New-AzLoadBalancerRuleConfig `
  -Name 'webInbound' -Protocol Tcp `
  -Probe $probe -FrontendPort 80 -BackendPort 80 `
  -FrontendIpConfiguration $feip `
  -BackendAddressPool $bepool
#creates new LB from settings gathered so far
 $lb = New-AzLoadBalancer `
  -ResourceGroupName $ResourceGroup `
  -Name $lbname `
  -Location $location.Location `
  -FrontendIpConfiguration $feip `
  -BackendAddressPool $bepool `
  -Probe $probe `
  -LoadBalancingRule $rule 

elapsedTime

$serversCount = 2
for ($i=1; $i -le $serversCount; $i++) {
  elapsedTime
$VMName = "WebappWin" + $i
Write-Host "Creating VM " + $VMName
#Generates new public IP for the new load balancer to be created
$VM = Get-AzVM -Name $VMName
$NIC = Get-AzNetworkInterface -Name $VMName
#creates new VM
New-AzVm `
    -Credential $credential `
    -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroup `
    -Name $VMName `
    -Location $location.Location `
    -VirtualNetworkName $vnet `
    -SubnetName $subnet `
    -SecurityGroupName $securityGroup `
    -PublicIpAddressName "$($VMName)PublicIP" `
    -AvailabilitySetName $availSetName
Write-Host "VM $($VMName) has been created"
elapsedTime
Write-Host "Installing IIS for " + $VMName
$PublicSettings = '{"commandToExecute":"powershell Add-WindowsFeature Web-Server"}'
#Waits a few seconds for the VM to become available to recieve 
Start-Sleep -Seconds 5
Set-AzVMExtension -ExtensionName "IIS" -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroup -VMName $vmName `
  -Publisher "Microsoft.Compute" -ExtensionType "CustomScriptExtension" -TypeHandlerVersion 1.4 `
  -SettingString $PublicSettings -Location $location.location
Write-Host "IIS Installed for $($VMName)"
elapsedTime
Write-Host "Deploying website for " + $VMName

Invoke-AzVMRunCommand -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroup -VMName $VMName -CommandId "RunPowerShellScript" -ScriptPath "C:\pathhere\WebsiteTest\deployWebsite.ps1"
Write-Host "Website deployed on $($VMname)"
elapsedTime
#Gets load balancer object based on name
$lb = Get-AzLoadBalancer -Name $lbname
$backendConfig = Get-AzLoadBalancerBackendAddressPoolConfig -LoadBalancer $lb
#Get's NIC from virtual machine
$NIC = Get-AzNetworkInterface -Name $VMName
#Removes VM from LB
#$nic.Ipconfigurations[0].LoadBalancerBackendAddressPools=$null
#Adds VM to LB
Write-Host "Adding $($VMName) to Loadbalancer " + $lbname
$nic.IpConfigurations[0].LoadBalancerBackendAddressPools=$lb.BackendAddressPools[0]
Set-AzNetworkInterface -NetworkInterface $nic
Write-Host "VM $($VMName) added to the load balancer"
elapsedTime
}

Write-Host "Script completed" -BackgroundColor Blue
elapsedTime