walinuxagent Updates

This document describes the process to update and test new versions of the walinuxagent package in SRUs.

The walinuxagent package is an Ubuntu distribution of the upstream Microsoft Azure Linux Agent that manages Linux provisioning, and VM interaction with the Azure Fabric Controller.

It provides the following functionality for Ubuntu cloud image deployments:

• Image Provisioning.
• Networking setup.
• Kernel setup.
• Diagnostics setup.
• SCVMM Deployments
• VM Extensions Management

For a more detailed list of functionallity this package provides to Ubuntu cloud images, refer to the upstream project page at GitHub: https://github.com/Azure/WALinuxAgent

QA Process

This is the QA process that proposed walinuxagent packages are subjected to:

• The new package candidate version is built in a PPA and tested on the target suite before being uploaded to the archive at all. This will involve one or both of:
  • Installing the PPA packages on an Azure VM, manually restoring the VM to a first boot state and rebooting it,
  • Generating a fresh image with the PPA package version preinstalled and testing that directly
• Once the manual packaging tests pass successfully and the package requires no further changes, it will be uploaded to the archive.
• Once accepted in to -proposed, a test image is built from -proposed, which is subjected to the full CPC image tests; this tests for more regressions across multiple Azure instance sizes. This includes tests for the following bugs:

  • Bug #1479610 regression on dhcp configuration

  • Bug #1079897 mangled server identity and access on upgrade

  • Bug #1305418 breaks sshd configuration

SRU Test Cases

These are the test cases that all walinuxagent SRUs are subjected to:

[Test case 1]: Upgrade testing
1.) Launch instance on Azure
2.) Upgrade walinuxagent from -proposed
3.) Confirm that "waagent" is running, check /var/log/waagent.log
4.) Reboot, repeat step 3
5.) Capture instance and provision new instances; repeat step 3
  
[Test Case 2]: New instance
1.) Build new cloud image from -proposed
2.) Boot instance
3.) Confirm that instance provisioned