Visual Studio Lab Management
Encyclopedia
Visual Studio Lab Management is a software development tool developed by Microsoft
for software testers to create and manage virtual environments. Lab Management extends the existing Visual Studio Application Lifecycle Management platform to enable an integrated Hyper-V
based test lab.
in a virtual environment represents a role required for the application that is to be tested, developed or run.
Lab Management can be used to start all the virtual machines in a virtual environment to run an application, or test an application. Lab Management uses System Center Virtual Machine Manager
(SCVMM) to allow access to virtual machines or templates in a library as golden masters. These golden masters are created by using either Hyper-V or SCVMM. SCVMM is used to deploy the virtual machines and templates in the environments on the specified host group.
(SCVMM) to enable management of multiple physical computers that host virtual machines and to manage the storage of virtual machines, virtual machine templates, and other configuration files in SCVMM library servers. It enables:
Microsoft
Microsoft Corporation is an American public multinational corporation headquartered in Redmond, Washington, USA that develops, manufactures, licenses, and supports a wide range of products and services predominantly related to computing through its various product divisions...
for software testers to create and manage virtual environments. Lab Management extends the existing Visual Studio Application Lifecycle Management platform to enable an integrated Hyper-V
Hyper-V
Microsoft Hyper-V, codenamed Viridian and formerly known as Windows Server Virtualization, is a hypervisor-based virtualization system for x86-64 systems. A beta version of Hyper-V was shipped with certain x86-64 editions of Windows Server 2008, and the finalized version was released on June 26,...
based test lab.
Virtual Environment
A virtual environment is a collection of virtual machines (VMs). Each Virtual MachineVirtual machine
A virtual machine is a "completely isolated guest operating system installation within a normal host operating system". Modern virtual machines are implemented with either software emulation or hardware virtualization or both together.-VM Definitions:A virtual machine is a software...
in a virtual environment represents a role required for the application that is to be tested, developed or run.
Lab Management can be used to start all the virtual machines in a virtual environment to run an application, or test an application. Lab Management uses System Center Virtual Machine Manager
System Center Virtual Machine Manager
System Center Virtual Machine Manager forms part of Microsoft's System Center line of management and reporting tools, alongside previously established tools such as Microsoft Operations Manager and Microsoft Systems Management Server...
(SCVMM) to allow access to virtual machines or templates in a library as golden masters. These golden masters are created by using either Hyper-V or SCVMM. SCVMM is used to deploy the virtual machines and templates in the environments on the specified host group.
Using Lab Management for application lifecycle management
Visual Studio Lab Management is integrated with System Center Virtual Machine ManagerSystem Center Virtual Machine Manager
System Center Virtual Machine Manager forms part of Microsoft's System Center line of management and reporting tools, alongside previously established tools such as Microsoft Operations Manager and Microsoft Systems Management Server...
(SCVMM) to enable management of multiple physical computers that host virtual machines and to manage the storage of virtual machines, virtual machine templates, and other configuration files in SCVMM library servers. It enables:
- Reproduce the exact conditions of a bug or other development issue
- Build, deploy, and test applications automatically in a clean environment
- Reduce the time required to create and configure machines for testing an application
- Run multiple copies of a test or development at the same time
- Enable members of a team to create and manage virtual environments without requiring system administrator privileges