Azure VM – SQLXpertise

Hi Everyone, In this article, we will see how to provision SQL Server 2017 on Linux in Azure Virtual Machine

Step 1: Please login to azure portal and go to Virtual Machine blade

Step 2: Please search for SQL Server 2017

Step 3: Please select SQL Server 2017 Developer on Ubuntu Server, I have used Ubuntu linux for this demo but you can use Red Hat or Suse Linux as well

Step 4: Please review the legal terms, select deployment model, I prefer to use Resource Manager, so that management and cleanup is easier, Please also copy the highlighted command which will be helpful for configuring the sa password for SQL Server later

Step 5: Please provide the name of the VM, select Disk type, provide user name and select Authentication Type, in this case I am using Password

Please select the Azure Subscription

For Resource group, I am creating a new one named “SQLLinux” and using Azure data center location as “East US”, please change this according to your region

Step 6: In this step, we need to select the Size of our Linux VM, I am using B2S Standard, which has 2 vCPUs and 4 GB RAM, which is good for our testing, but you can choose the size based on your requirement, after selecting the size, Please click “Select” to proceed

Step 7: In this step, we will review some of the important settings

Virtual Network – For this demo, I am creating a new Virtual Network, but if you already have other VMs running in Azure and you need this SQL Server VM to be accessible for them, Please use the existing Virtual Network

Public IP Address – I have enabled Public IP Address for this demo, but this is optional, Please don’t enable this, if you are planning to use this server only within Azure, so that it will reduce the exposure

Network Security Group (Firewall) – We will see in next step, How to configure firewall to allow external access

Auto Shutdown – This is an useful optional setting for demo or test servers, so that you can configure it to shutdown automatically based on a timing, this will reduce billing of your VM

Time Zone – Please select the time zone based on your region

Step 8: Additional Settings Please enable Monitoring for both Boot diagnostics and Guest OS diagnostics, This will help you see the Boot log for any error or messages, after making required Settings changes, Click “Ok” to proceed

Step 9: To allow external access to SQL Server, we need to change Network Firewall setting by adding Inbound and Outbound security rules for MSSQL Service

Note: You can do this change after creating the Virtual machine

Step 10: Review the selection options and click “Purchase” to buy and create the virtual machine

Step 11: You can review the Virtual Machine deployment progress in the screen

If you closed it, you can see from the Top right corner Notifications area

You can also see the status under Virtual Machines blade as well

Once Virtual machine is provisioned and ready, you should see the status as “Running”, see below screenshot

Step 12: Please click on the Virtual Machine to see the settings and also to monitor the CPU/Network/Disk usage

Step 13: Configuring SQL Server in Azure Linux VM

Please connect to Azure Linux VM using any preferred SSH client, In this demo, I am using Bash Shell on Windows, since its built in Windows 10 now

Command to connect, Please type “Yes” to accept the authenticity of the host

ssh username@serveripaddress

Step 14: After logging in to VM, Please run the below command to check the status of SQL Server

sudo systemctl status mssql-server

Since we haven’t configured SA password, SQL Server is not running, so you seeing the status as “Inactive”

Step 15: Please run below command to configure SA password

sudo /opt/mssql/bin/mssql-conf setup

Please select your preferred edition of SQL Server, in this demo, we will use Developer edition, in next prompt, Please specify the SA password and press enter