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There is an issue where remote access (RDP) can stop working all of a sudden to all instances of a deployment that are running in Azure.  The problem is that the process that handles RDP requests has crashed.  If you have Windows Azure Diagnostics enabled and gather the event log files, you will see the following entries in the Application Event log:

Log Name: Application
Source: Application Error
Date: 3/19/2012 11:42:43 PM
Event ID: 1005
Task Category: (100)
Level: Error
Keywords: Classic
User: N/A
Computer: RD00155D3A1AF9
Description:
Windows cannot access the file for one of the following reasons: there is a problem with the network connection, the disk that the file is stored on, or the storage drivers installed on this computer; or the disk is missing. Windows closed the program Windows Azure Remote Desktop Forwarder because of this error.
Program: Windows Azure Remote Desktop Forwarder
File: 
The error value is listed in the Additional Data section.
User Action
1. Open the file again. This situation might be a temporary problem that corrects itself when the program runs again.
2. If the file still cannot be accessed and
- It is on the network, your network administrator should verify that there is not a problem with the network and that the server can be contacted.
- It is on a removable disk, for example, a floppy disk or CD-ROM, verify that the disk is fully inserted into the computer.
3. Check and repair the file system by running CHKDSK. To run CHKDSK, click Start, click Run, type CMD, and then click OK. At the command prompt, type CHKDSK /F, and then press ENTER.
4. If the problem persists, restore the file from a backup copy.
5. Determine whether other files on the same disk can be opened. If not, the disk might be damaged. If it is a hard disk, contact your administrator or computer hardware vendor for further assistance.
Additional Data
Error value: C000026E
Disk type: 0
Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="https://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
<System>
<Provider Name="Application Error" />
<EventID Qualifiers="49152">1005</EventID>
<Level>2</Level>
<Task>100</Task>
<Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
<TimeCreated SystemTime="2012-03-19T23:42:43.000Z" />
<EventRecordID>713</EventRecordID>
<Channel>Application</Channel>
<Computer>RD00155D3A1AF9</Computer>
<Security />
</System>
<EventData>
<Data>
</Data>
<Data>Windows Azure Remote Desktop Forwarder</Data>
<Data>C000026E</Data>
<Data>0</Data>
</EventData>
</Event>

Log Name: Application
Source: Application Error
Date: 3/19/2012 11:42:43 PM
Event ID: 1000
Task Category: (100)
Level: Error
Keywords: Classic
User: N/A
Computer: RD00155D3A1AF9
Description:
Faulting application RemoteForwarderAgent.exe, version 6.0.6002.18314, time stamp 0x4eb31078, faulting module mscorlib.ni.dll, version 2.0.50727.4216, time stamp 0x4e154615, exception code 0xc0000006, fault offset 0x000000000039cd2b, process id 0xa44, application start time 0x01cd016989a1c16d.
Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="https://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
<System>
<Provider Name="Application Error" />
<EventID Qualifiers="0">1000</EventID>
<Level>2</Level>
<Task>100</Task>
<Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
<TimeCreated SystemTime="2012-03-19T23:42:43.000Z" />
<EventRecordID>712</EventRecordID>
<Channel>Application</Channel>
<Computer>RD00155D3A1AF9</Computer>
<Security />
</System>
<EventData>
<Data>RemoteForwarderAgent.exe</Data>
<Data>6.0.6002.18314</Data>
<Data>4eb31078</Data>
<Data>mscorlib.ni.dll</Data>
<Data>2.0.50727.4216</Data>
<Data>4e154615</Data>
<Data>c0000006</Data>
<Data>000000000039cd2b</Data>
<Data>a44</Data>
<Data>01cd016989a1c16d</Data>
</EventData>
</Event>
Log Name: Application
Source: Application Error
Date: 3/21/2012 1:52:20 PM
Event ID: 1000
Task Category: (100)
Level: Error
Keywords: Classic
User: N/A
Computer: RD00155D3A2303
Description:
Faulting application RemoteForwarderAgent.exe, version 6.0.6002.18314, time stamp 0x4eb31078, faulting module mscorwks.dll, version 2.0.50727.4216, time stamp 0x4e154582, exception code 0xc0000006, fault offset 0x00000000001a8892, process id 0x%9, application start time 0x%10.
Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="https://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
<System>
<Provider Name="Application Error" />
<EventID Qualifiers="0">1000</EventID>
<Level>2</Level>
<Task>100</Task>
<Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
<TimeCreated SystemTime="2012-03-21T13:52:20.000Z" />
<EventRecordID>709</EventRecordID>
<Channel>Application</Channel>
<Computer>RD00155D3A2303</Computer>
<Security />
</System>
<EventData>
<Data>RemoteForwarderAgent.exe</Data>
<Data>6.0.6002.18314</Data>
<Data>4eb31078</Data>
<Data>mscorwks.dll</Data>
<Data>2.0.50727.4216</Data>
<Data>4e154582</Data>
<Data>c0000006</Data>
<Data>00000000001a8892</Data>
</EventData>
</Event>

Looking at these messages, you can see that the RemoteForwarderAgent.exe has crashed.  This means that no connections can be made to the Windows Azure instances through RDP.

Solution

To resolve this, you need to reboot the deployment from the Windows Azure portal.

We have seen an issue where a worker role running inside Windows Azure will crash, especially if it is under heavy load.  The problem is with IntelliTrace being enabled.  To determine if this is causing your worker role to crash, the first thing to look for are some event logs that look like this:

Application: WaWorkerHost.exe
Framework Version: v4.0.30319
Description: The process was terminated due to an unhandled exception.
Exception Info: System.Runtime.CallbackException
Stack:
   at System.Runtime.Fx+IOCompletionThunk.UnhandledExceptionFrame(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)
   at System.Threading._IOCompletionCallback.PerformIOCompletionCallback(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)

Log Name:      Application
Source:        .NET Runtime
Date:          10/4/2011 3:16:01 PM
Event ID:      1026
Task Category: None
Level:         Error
Keywords:      Classic
User:          N/A
Computer:      RD00155D3203F9
Description:
Application: WaWorkerHost.exe
Framework Version: v4.0.30319
Description: The process was terminated due to an unhandled exception.
Exception Info: System.Runtime.CallbackException
Stack:
   at System.Runtime.Fx+IOCompletionThunk.UnhandledExceptionFrame(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)
   at System.Threading._IOCompletionCallback.PerformIOCompletionCallback(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)

Event Xml:
<Event xmlns="https://schemas.microsoft.com/win/2004/08/events/event">
  <System>
    <Provider Name=".NET Runtime" />
    <EventID Qualifiers="0">1026</EventID>
    <Level>2</Level>
    <Task>0</Task>
    <Keywords>0x80000000000000</Keywords>
    <TimeCreated SystemTime="2011-10-04T15:16:01.000Z" />
    <EventRecordID>426</EventRecordID>
    <Channel>Application</Channel>
    <Computer>RD00155D3203F9</Computer>
    <Security />
  </System>
  <EventData>
    <Data>Application: WaWorkerHost.exe
Framework Version: v4.0.30319
Description: The process was terminated due to an unhandled exception.
Exception Info: System.Runtime.CallbackException
Stack:
   at System.Runtime.Fx+IOCompletionThunk.UnhandledExceptionFrame(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)
   at System.Threading._IOCompletionCallback.PerformIOCompletionCallback(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)
</Data>
  </EventData>
</Event>

If you see event logs like these, it doesn’t definitely mean that IntelliTrace is causing the problem, but if you have IntelliTrace enabled, it is pretty likely that it is.

To determine for sure that IntelliTrace is the problem, you would need to capture a dump of the Worker Role process (WaWorkerHost.exe) by remoting into the instance and attaching a debugger to the process.  If you look at the dump with Windbg or some other dump analysis tool, you want to look for the following exception:

Exception object: 0000000004acefc8
Exception type:   System.Runtime.CallbackException
Message:          Async Callback threw an exception.
InnerException:   System.InvalidProgramException, Use !PrintException 0000000004ad8f68 to see more.
StackTrace (generated):
<none>
StackTraceString: <none>
HResult: 80131501
0:018> !pe 0000000004ad8f68 
Exception object: 0000000004ad8f68
Exception type:   System.InvalidProgramException
Message:          Common Language Runtime detected an invalid program.
InnerException:   <none>
StackTrace (generated):
<none>
StackTraceString: <none>
HResult: 8013153a
====================================================================
0:106> !pe 00000000044ec790
Exception object: 00000000044ec790
Exception type:   System.InvalidProgramException
Message:          Common Language Runtime detected an invalid program.
InnerException:   <none>
StackTrace (generated):
    SP               IP               Function
    000000002CF1E600 0000000000000000 System_ServiceModel!System.ServiceModel.Dispatcher.ErrorBehavior.HandleErrorCommon(System.Exception, System.ServiceModel.Dispatcher.ErrorHandlerFaultInfo ByRef)+0x1
    000000002CF1E6D0 000007FF00F6B837 System_ServiceModel!System.ServiceModel.Dispatcher.ChannelDispatcher.HandleError(System.Exception, System.ServiceModel.Dispatcher.ErrorHandlerFaultInfo ByRef)+0xa7
    000000002CF1E730 000007FF00F6B650 System_ServiceModel!System.ServiceModel.Dispatcher.ChannelHandler.HandleError(System.Exception)+0x30
    000000002CF1E780 000007FF00E76AB2 System_ServiceModel!System.ServiceModel.Dispatcher.ChannelHandler.OpenAndEnsurePump()+0xc2
    000000002CF1E7E0 000007FF00E58184 System_Runtime_DurableInstancing!System.Runtime.IOThreadScheduler+ScheduledOverlapped.IOCallback(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)+0xf4
    000000002CF1E860 000007FF00E58035 System_Runtime_DurableInstancing!System.Runtime.Fx+IOCompletionThunk.UnhandledExceptionFrame(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)+0x115
    000000002CF1E8C0 000007FF009DC35B mscorlib!System.Threading._IOCompletionCallback.PerformIOCompletionCallback(UInt32, UInt32, System.Threading.NativeOverlapped*)+0x9b

StackTraceString: <none>

Note, this was shown using psscor4 and running !dumpallexceptions and then !printexception on the inner exception.

Solution

To resolve this, you need to redeploy your package to Azure and disable IntelliTrace.

Note

This problem was first posted on the MSDN forums.

In this situation, you will see something in the Application event log that looks like this:
     Note: you may not see both of these errors but either or both of them point to the same problem.

The way to resolve this issue is to either wrap the code inside a Try/Catch block and catch the exception or see what is causing the exception and fix that bug.  But if a block of code can throw an exception, it is always good to wrap it so that it can’t cause the entire process to crash.

The process crashing is something that started with .NET 2.0.  You can read this KB article to get more information about this and how to make it run without crashing.  There is also some more information on this on MSDN.

We recently had a case where a role was stuck in this state.  So on the portal, the deployment line said “Initializing” and the role says “Preparing Node” and it never moves past this.  We cannot remote in using RDP or anything else to see what is happening with the deployment.  The error looks like:

Turns out one problem that can cause this is if you are using Unicode file names.   During the packaging and preparation of the files, we urlencode the names so that they can be stored in a compressed format.  If the encoded file names become longer then 260 bytes, then the compression tools fail to unzip the package correctly and you will be left in a state like this when trying to deploy.

Workaround

There are a couple of things you can do here to fix this problem.

1. Don’t use Unicode characters in file names.
2. Shorten the file names so they get until the 260 byte limit.

Using either of these methods will allow you to deploy successfully to Azure.

There are the standard things that you need to make sure you do:

• Make sure the certificate is at least 2048 bits
• Make sure the certificate is uploaded and listed in the Azure portal under the management certificates

But assuming those things are all correct, you also need to make sure you use the SSL_CTX_set_mode function to set the following OpenSSL options:

• SSL_MODE_AUTO_RETRY
• SSL_ENABLE_PARTIAL_WRITE

That should allow you to connect to the management APIs.

You can also take a look at this forum post to see how to get curl to connect.  This can be really helpful as curl has all of the source code so you can use that to see how to connect.

For more information on how to do this kind of thing from windows, take a look at this MSDN article.

Cerebrata has a Storage Analytics Configuration utility that allows you to configure all of the settings or you can use the sample code posted by Steve Marx here to do this either from the website he has running or from your own web site that you build yourself using the source he provides.

Once you have the logging enabled, you then just wait for the logs to be propagated to blob storage and then you can look at them.  For blob storage, you can use CloudBerry's nice UI to see all of the entries.  For the other types, you have to use a tool to browse to the folder where they exist.  One way is using the CloudBerry tool and connecting to your blob storage and typing in a custom path of just "$logs".  You will then get something like the following:

From here you can browse into the subfolders for each of them and will end up seeing a log files, see this page for information about the folder structure.  if you open that you will see the traffic coming into or out of the storage account.  You can look at the documentation for Storage Analytics to see the format of the log files.

For metric data, there are tables created that you can look at.  You can look at the metric files here for the format of the tables.  You can use the Cerebrata Cloud Storage Studio to view these tables.  They have a 30-day trial available or you can purchase it.  Hopefully other tools will support these tables soon as well.  You can read more about the metrics here.

Common items that use storage that you may not know about include:

• IntelliTrace
• Azure Diagnostics

These can be seen using this tool and if enabled, disabled if you aren't developing/debugging your Azure application.

Psscor4 Managed-Code Debugging Extension for WinDbg

This should have the same functionality as Psscor2 does but it works against the .NET 4.0 Framework.  Please let me know if you run into any problems downloading or using this extension.  I would also love to know if you have any feature requests for it.

• Windows Azure role stuck in Initializing/Busy/Stopping
• Another common reason for Windows Azure role to stuck in Initializing/Busy/Stopping

One of the problems outlined here shows up because an exception is thrown in the OnStart function inside the WebRole.cs file in your Windows Azure WebRole.  If an exception happens here, it becomes an unhandled exception because there is no try/catch and so the process that it is running in will be shut down.  There is a great description of this at CLR Inside Out- Unhandled Exception Processing In The CLR.

So one way to help this situation is to add a try/catch inside the OnStart function.  Below is such an example but I took it a step further and added code in the catch that will log the exception in the Event Log.  That way we can see what is happening and investigate the problem.

Note: If the exception is caused by the Diagnostics code, you can’t use that to get the event log data, but you would be able to remote into the machine and look at the event log on the machine.  The steps for that are here.

Here is what that function would look like:

   1: public override bool OnStart()

   2: {

   3:     try

   4:     {

   5:         // For information on handling configuration changes

   6:         // see the MSDN topic at https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=166357.

   7:  

   8:     }

   9:     catch (Exception e)

  10:     {

  11:         #region "Handle Exception"

  12:         System.Text.StringBuilder message = new System.Text.StringBuilder("\r\n\r\nException Occurred:\r\n\r\nappId=");

  13:  

  14:         String appId = (string)AppDomain.CurrentDomain.GetData(".appId");

  15:         if (appId != null)

  16:             message.Append(appId);

  17:  

  18:         message.AppendFormat("\r\n\r\ntype={0}\r\n\r\nmessage={1}\r\n\r\nstack=\r\n{2}\r\n\r\n",

  19:             e.GetType().FullName,

  20:             e.Message,

  21:             e.StackTrace);

  22:  

  23:         string webenginePath = System.IO.Path.Combine(System.Runtime.InteropServices.RuntimeEnvironment.GetRuntimeDirectory(), "webengine.dll");

  24:  

  25:         if (!System.IO.File.Exists(webenginePath))

  26:         {

  27:             throw new Exception(String.Format(System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantCulture,

  28:                 "Failed to locate webengine.dll at '{0}'. This module requires .NET Framework.",

  29:                 webenginePath));

  30:         }

  31:  

  32:         System.Diagnostics.FileVersionInfo ver = System.Diagnostics.FileVersionInfo.GetVersionInfo(webenginePath);

  33:         string _sourceName = string.Format(System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantCulture, "ASP.NET {0}.{1}.{2}.0",

  34:             ver.FileMajorPart, ver.FileMinorPart, ver.FileBuildPart);

  35:  

  36:         if (!System.Diagnostics.EventLog.SourceExists(_sourceName))

  37:         {

  38:             throw new Exception(String.Format(System.Globalization.CultureInfo.InvariantCulture,

  39:                 "There is no EventLog source named '{0}'. This module requires .NET Framework.",

  40:                 _sourceName));

  41:         }

  42:  

  43:         System.Diagnostics.EventLog Log = new System.Diagnostics.EventLog();

  44:         Log.Source = _sourceName;

  45:         Log.WriteEntry(message.ToString(), System.Diagnostics.EventLogEntryType.Error);

  46:         #endregion

  47:     }

  48:  

  49:     return base.OnStart();

  50: }

I added a region so you can minimize the catch code and just focus on your code inside the try.  Hope this helps people to be able to handle problems in this function better and not have it keep the Role from starting up.

One last thing, I put this under the ASP.NET Source in the Event Log.  So that is what you would look for in regards to entries.  You can change this to something else, but keep in mind that if you add your own event source, the process can’t use it until it is restarted.  There is an example doing that here.  This is the same code that is shown in Unhandled exceptions cause ASP.NET-based applications to unexpectedly quit in the .NET Framework 2.0.

So this is where using the OnStart of the WebRole can really help a developer out.  For this example, I am going to use the IIS Application Warm-Up module.  This is a good example because it is a rather complicated module to install and use properly.

Here is how you go about getting this module running in Windows Azure.

Note: You must be using the Windows Azure 1.3 SDK and have your site running using Full IIS for this to work.

1. Download the IIS Application Warm-Up module on your local machine and install it.  This will get you the actual module: %windir%\system32\inetsrv\appwarmup.dll.
2. Add the appwarmup.dll module above to your Visual Studio WebRole project.  Add it to the root of the application and be sure under Properties you have Build Action set to Content and Copy to Output Directory set to Copy always.
3. Add a Reference in the WebRole project to %windir%\system32\inetsrv\Microsoft.Web.Administration.dll.
4. Under the Properties of the newly added reference, change Copy Local to True.
5. Open the WebRole.cs file in the WebRole project, Modify it with the following code:

      1: using System;

      2: using System.Collections.Generic;

      3: using System.Linq;

      4: using Microsoft.WindowsAzure;

      5: using Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics;

      6: using Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime;

      7: using Microsoft.Web.Administration;

      8:  

      9: namespace WebRole1

     10: {

     11:     public class WebRole : RoleEntryPoint

     12:     {

     13:         public override bool OnStart()

     14:         {

     15:             // For information on handling configuration changes

     16:             // see the MSDN topic at https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=166357.

     17:  

     18:             try

     19:             {

     20:                 System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine("OnStart");

     21:                 // Before we do anything else, we have to create the schema file and write it to disk

     22:                 string appwarmupSchemaLocation = System.IO.Path.Combine(Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("windir") + @"\", @"system32\inetsrv\config\schema\appwarmup_schema.xml");

     23:                 if (!System.IO.File.Exists(appwarmupSchemaLocation))

     24:                 {

     25:                     string[] lines = {

     26:                         "<configSchema>",

     27:                         "    <sectionSchema name=\"system.webServer/httpWarmupGlobalSettings\">",

     28:                         "      <attribute name=\"httpWarmupEnabled\" type=\"bool\" defaultValue=\"true\" />",

     29:                         "    </sectionSchema>",

     30:                         "",

     31:                         "    <sectionSchema name=\"system.webServer/httpWarmup\">",

     32:                         "      <element name=\"userContext\">",

     33:                         "        <attribute name=\"authMode\" type=\"enum\" defaultValue=\"SetNull\" >",

     34:                         "          <enum name=\"SetNull\" value=\"0\" />",

     35:                         "          <enum name=\"SetUserOnly\" value=\"1\" />",

     36:                         "          <enum name=\"SetToken\" value=\"2\" />",

     37:                         "        </attribute>",

     38:                         "        <attribute name=\"authType\" type=\"string\" defaultValue=\"\" />",

     39:                         "        <attribute name=\"username\" type=\"string\" defaultValue=\"\" />",

     40:                         "        <attribute name=\"password\" type=\"string\" encrypted=\"true\" caseSensitive=\"true\" defaultValue=\"[enc:AesProvider::enc]\" />",

     41:                         "      </element>",

     42:                         "      <element name=\"requests\" >",

     43:                         "        <collection addElement=\"add\" clearElement=\"clear\" removeElement=\"remove\" mergeAppend=\"false\" >",

     44:                         "          <attribute name=\"requestUrl\" type=\"string\" required=\"true\" isUniqueKey=\"true\" />",

     45:                         "          <attribute name=\"allowedResponseCodes\" type=\"string\" defaultValue=\"200-399\" />",

     46:                         "          <attribute name=\"warmupContext\" type=\"string\" />",

     47:                         "          <attribute name=\"sendMode\" type=\"enum\" defaultValue=\"Asynchronous\" >",

     48:                         "            <enum name=\"Synchronous\" value=\"1\" />",

     49:                         "            <enum name=\"Asynchronous\" value=\"2\" />",

     50:                         "          </attribute>",

     51:                         "        </collection>",

     52:                         "      </element>",

     53:                         "    </sectionSchema>",

     54:                         "",

     55:                         "</configSchema>"};

     56:  

     57:                     System.IO.File.WriteAllLines(appwarmupSchemaLocation, lines);

     58:                 }

     59:  

     60:                 // Create an instance of our ServerManager

     61:                 ServerManager iisManagerFirst = new ServerManager();

     62:  

     63:                 // Get the applicationHost.config file

     64:                 Configuration appHostConfigFirst = iisManagerFirst.GetApplicationHostConfiguration();

     65:  

     66:                 // Create a Section Definition for our new settings under <system.webServer>

     67:                 SectionDefinition definition = RegisterSectionDefinition(appHostConfigFirst, "system.webServer/httpWarmupGlobalSettings");

     68:                 definition.OverrideModeDefault = "Deny";

     69:                 definition.AllowDefinition = "MachineToApplication";

     70:                 SectionDefinition definition2 = RegisterSectionDefinition(appHostConfigFirst, "system.webServer/httpWarmup");

     71:                 definition2.OverrideModeDefault = "Allow";

     72:                 definition2.AllowDefinition = "MachineToApplication";

     73:  

     74:                 // Write these new settings out to the file, this allows us to add them later, otherwise we will get an exception

     75:                 // because the section doesn't have a definition

     76:                 iisManagerFirst.CommitChanges();

     77:  

     78:                 // Get another instance of our ServerManager as the first one is committed so it is read-only

     79:                 ServerManager iisManager = new ServerManager();

     80:  

     81:                 // Find our application

     82:                 Application app = iisManager.Sites[RoleEnvironment.CurrentRoleInstance.Id + "_Web"].Applications[0];

     83:  

     84:                 // Get the applicationHost.config file

     85:                 Configuration appHostConfig = iisManager.GetApplicationHostConfiguration();

     86:  

     87:                 // Get the appPool for this application

     88:                 ConfigurationSection appPoolSection = appHostConfig.GetSection("system.applicationHost/applicationPools");

     89:                 ConfigurationElementCollection poolCollection = appPoolSection.GetCollection();

     90:                 ConfigurationElement appPoolElement = FindElement(poolCollection, "add", "name", app.ApplicationPoolName);

     91:  

     92:                 if (appPoolElement == null) throw new InvalidOperationException("App Pool element not found!");

     93:  

     94:                 // Set the attribute startMode="AlwaysRunning"

     95:                 appPoolElement.SetAttributeValue("startMode", "AlwaysRunning");

     96:  

     97:                 // Add AppWarmupModule to the globalModules section of system.webServer, only if it doesn't already exist

     98:                 ConfigurationSection globalSection = appHostConfig.GetSection("system.webServer/globalModules");

     99:                 ConfigurationElementCollection globalCollection = globalSection.GetCollection();

    100:                 ConfigurationElement globalElement = FindElement(globalCollection, "add", "name", "AppWarmupModule");

    101:  

    102:                 if (globalElement == null)

    103:                 {

    104:                     ConfigurationElement globalElement2 = globalCollection.CreateElement("add");

    105:                     globalElement2.SetAttributeValue("name", "AppWarmupModule");

    106:                     string appwarmupLocation = System.IO.Path.Combine(Environment.GetEnvironmentVariable("RoleRoot") + @"\", @"approot\appwarmup.dll");

    107:                     System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine("Location: " + appwarmupLocation);

    108:                     globalElement2.SetAttributeValue("image", appwarmupLocation);

    109:                     globalCollection.Add(globalElement2);

    110:                 }

    111:  

    112:                 // Add AppWarmupModule to the modules section of system.webServer, only if it doesn't already exist

    113:                 // This is adding to the <location path="" ...> section, which is why we have a second parameter

    114:                 ConfigurationSection modulesSection = appHostConfig.GetSection("system.webServer/modules", "");

    115:                 ConfigurationElementCollection modulesCollection = modulesSection.GetCollection();

    116:                 ConfigurationElement modulesElement = FindElement(modulesCollection, "add", "name", "AppWarmupModule");

    117:  

    118:                 if (modulesElement == null)

    119:                 {

    120:                     System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine("Add AppWarmupModule");

    121:                     ConfigurationElement modulesElement2 = modulesCollection.CreateElement("add");

    122:                     modulesElement2.SetAttributeValue("name", "AppWarmupModule");

    123:                     modulesCollection.Add(modulesElement2);

    124:                 }

    125:  

    126:                 // Add httpWarmupEnabled to the new httpWarmupGlobalSettings section of system.webServer

    127:                 // This is adding to the <location path="OurRoleId" ...> section, which is why we have a second parameter

    128:                 ConfigurationSection warmupSection = appHostConfig.GetSection("system.webServer/httpWarmupGlobalSettings", RoleEnvironment.CurrentRoleInstance.Id + "_Web");

    129:                 System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine("Add httpWarmupEnabled");

    130:                 warmupSection.SetAttributeValue("httpWarmupEnabled", "true");

    131:  

    132:                 // Add our requests to the new httpWarmup section of system.webServer

    133:                 // This is adding to the <location path="OurRoleId" ...> section, which is why we have a second parameter

    134:                 ConfigurationSection warmupSection2 = appHostConfig.GetSection("system.webServer/httpWarmup", RoleEnvironment.CurrentRoleInstance.Id + "_Web");

    135:                 ConfigurationElement requestsElement = warmupSection2.GetChildElement("requests");

    136:                 ConfigurationElementCollection warmupCollection = requestsElement.GetCollection();

    137:  

    138:                 // TODO: change <Warmup File.aspx> to the correct filename we want to browse to warm up the application

    139:                 ConfigurationElement warmupElement = FindElement(warmupCollection, "add", "requestUrl", "<Warmup File.aspx>");

    140:  

    141:                 if (warmupElement == null)

    142:                 {

    143:                     ConfigurationElement warmupElement2 = warmupCollection.CreateElement("add");

    144:  

    145:                     // TODO: change <Warmup File.aspx> to the correct filename we want to browse to warm up the application

    146:                     warmupElement2.SetAttributeValue("requestUrl", "<Warmup File.aspx>");

    147:                     warmupElement2.SetAttributeValue("allowedResponseCodes", "200-399");

    148:                     warmupElement2.SetAttributeValue("warmupContext", "This is a warmup request");

    149:                     warmupElement2.SetAttributeValue("sendMode", "Asynchronous");

    150:                     warmupCollection.Add(warmupElement2);

    151:                 }

    152:  

    153:                 System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine("CommitChanges");

    154:                 iisManager.CommitChanges();

    155:             }

    156:             catch (Exception e)

    157:             {

    158:                 System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine(e.ToString());

    159:             }

    160:  

    161:             return base.OnStart();

    162:         }

    163:  

    164:         /// <summary>

    165:         /// This function will create a SectionDefinition given a configuration and a path, the path can have /'s in it

    166:         /// </summary>

    167:         /// <param name="config"></param>

    168:         /// <param name="sectionPath"></param>

    169:         /// <returns></returns>

    170:         private SectionDefinition RegisterSectionDefinition(Configuration config, string sectionPath)

    171:         {

    172:             string[] paths = sectionPath.Split('/');

    173:  

    174:             SectionGroup group = config.RootSectionGroup;

    175:             for (int i = 0; i < paths.Length - 1; i++)

    176:             {

    177:                 SectionGroup newGroup = group.SectionGroups[paths[i]];

    178:                 if (newGroup == null)

    179:                 {

    180:                     System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine("Creating: " + paths[i]);

    181:                     newGroup = group.SectionGroups.Add(paths[i]);

    182:                 }

    183:  

    184:                 group = newGroup;

    185:             }

    186:  

    187:             SectionDefinition section = group.Sections[paths[paths.Length - 1]];

    188:             if (section == null)

    189:             {

    190:                 System.Diagnostics.Trace.WriteLine("Creating: " + paths[paths.Length - 1]);

    191:                 section = group.Sections.Add(paths[paths.Length - 1]);

    192:             }

    193:  

    194:             return section;

    195:         }

    196:  

    197:         /// <summary>

    198:         /// This function will look for an element with the given name/value pairs and the given elementTagName

    199:         /// </summary>

    200:         /// <param name="collection"></param>

    201:         /// <param name="elementTagName"></param>

    202:         /// <param name="keyValues"></param>

    203:         /// <returns></returns>

    204:         private ConfigurationElement FindElement(ConfigurationElementCollection collection, string elementTagName, params string[] keyValues)

    205:         {

    206:             foreach (ConfigurationElement element in collection)

    207:             {

    208:                 if (String.Equals(element.ElementTagName, elementTagName, StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase))

    209:                 {

    210:                     bool matches = true;

    211:                     for (int i = 0; i < keyValues.Length; i += 2)

    212:                     {

    213:                         object o = element.GetAttributeValue(keyValues[i]);

    214:                         string value = null;

    215:                         if (o != null)

    216:                             value = o.ToString();

    217:  

    218:                         if (!String.Equals(value, keyValues[i + 1], StringComparison.OrdinalIgnoreCase))

    219:                         {

    220:                             matches = false;

    221:                             break;

    222:                         }

    223:                     }

    224:  

    225:                     if (matches)

    226:                         return element;

    227:                 }

    228:             }

    229:  

    230:             return null;

    231:         }

    232:     }

    233: }

   Update (2/23/2011): I have made a few updates above based on some testing.

   Note: On lines 82, 128, 134 this code uses “_Web” as part of the role name.  If you change the name in the ServiceDefinition.csdef file (<Site name=”Web”>) then you will need to adjust that code accordingly.  Also, if you have multiple sites, all 3 of these locations (adding the values there) will need to be done for each site you want to warm up.

6. In the OnStart function that we just added above, change the two instances of <Warmup File.aspx> (these are on lines 139 and 146 in the above code) to point to the file you want to have browsed for warming up your application.

   Note: You can add additional requests and more advanced things to this, check out the Advanced Scenarios section of Getting Started with the IIS 7.5 Application Warm-Up Module for more information.

7. Open the ServiceConfiguration.cscfg file and ensure the osFamily attribute of the ServiceConfiguration element is set to “2”.  This will ensure you are using Windows Server 2008 R2 which has IIS 7.5 which is required for the IIS Application Warm-Up module.
8. Open the ServiceDefinition.csdef file and add the following entry inside the <WebRole > section:

   <Runtime executionContext="elevated" />

   
   
9. Build your application and upload it to Windows Azure.

Once you have done these steps, your application should be running now using the Warm-Up module.  So the first request to a page, once the site is ready to run, should be just as fast as any other request.

There is another alternative, instead of doing all of this in the OnStart of your WebRole and forcing your Role to run elevated, you can also create a StartupTask to do the same thing and have it run elevated.  That would basically entail doing this same code in your own exe and then running the StartupTask.  There is a good discussion of them at Azure Startup Tasks and Powershell- Lessons Learned - Jim O'Neil