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HOW TO CREATE HIGHLY AVAILABLE (LOAD BALANCED) FTP SERVER ON WINDOWS AZURE?

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There are a lot of blog posts that explains how to create a FTP Server on Windows Azure, the best one that I’ve encountered was this one.

https://itq.nl/walkthrough-hosting-ftp-on-iis-7-5-a-windows-azure-vm-2/ by Ronald Wildenberg

So in this post I won’t explain how to create a FTP server on Windows Azure, I’ll explain how to create highly available load balanced FTP Server on Windows Azure.

1st step:

So let’s start by creating two Virtual machines in the same availability set in the same Virtual network and Join them to the same Domain Controller on Azure, check how to add two machines to the same availability set in the below Url.

https://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/windows/common-tasks/manage-vm-availability/

2nd step:

After doing this you attach to each virtual machine an empty disk from Windows Azure, check this Url to know how you can attach an empty disk to Windows Azure VM

https://www.windowsazure.com/en-us/manage/windows/how-to-guides/attach-a-disk/#attachempty

3rd step:

You configure the FTP Service on both of the Virtual Machines using the Ronalds’ blog postabove.

4th step:

You install DFS Service on both servers by following the below steps:

1. on the Server Manager , click manage and then click on Add roles and features and wait till the wizard opens and then click next and then choose Role-based or feature-based installation as per the screenshot below

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2. Make sure the highlighted services in RED in the screenshot below are installed on both servers.

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3. Finish the installation of the services on both servers and let’s configure the DFS server in the next step.

4. Open the Server Manager and click on Tools and then click on DFS management, the following wizard will open.

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5. Click on New namespace which allows you to make shared folders located on multiple servers appear as a single tree of folders, follow the wizard below.

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6. choose the name of the server of the first FTP server from the browse wizard and click Next, you will see the next screenshot

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7. Enter the name of the namespace and then choose the permissions that you want to give to the users that will access the folders and then click Next

8. In the Namespace Type , choose the Domain-based namespace and make sure that Enable Windows Server 2008 check box is selected then click Next

9. Confirm your settings and then click create in the wizard, after it finishes, we will click on New Replication Group in the DFS Management

10. choose the Multi purpose Replication group from the wizard as in the screenshot below and then click Next

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11. Enter the name of the Replication Group and make sure that the Domain Controller is selected and then click Next

12. Add both servers as Replication Group Members by click on Add button in the below Screenshot and then click Next

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12. In the Topology Selection , make sure to Select Full Mesh topology and click Next

13. In the Replicate Group Schedule and bandwidth, choose the right schedule and bandwidth you wish to.

14. Choose each FTP server as the primary in the Primary member step.

15. In the Folders to Replicate step , add the drivers that you attached to each FTP server, each drive on each server

16. In the Local Path of F on other Members , make sure to specify the place where you want to replicate the files from the primary member to the other member.

17. After doing this step, review the setup and then click create , then you are done.

Make sure to replicate same steps on both servers to have completely redundant servers.

Please feel free to get back to me with any questions regarding the implementation or if you faced any errors during the implementation.