Building a windows 10 instrument machine from MDT

Building a new instrument virtual machine from MDT

Note: this page documents the process of building a windows 10 system. This page does not focus on deploying IBEX itself, and if you are converting an instrument from SECI to IBEX you will generally not need to perform this process as a suitable NDX machine will already exist.

Find a suitable physical host

• Find a suitable physical host server. The server will need a minimum of 14GB of memory and 256GB of hard disk space free
  • If you are building a real instrument machine, this will usually be NDHINST, and the virtual machine that you're building will usually be NDXINST

Copy needed files onto physical host

• Copy the set of IBEX VHDs you wish to install from the share onto the NDH host computer, ensuring that you are copying onto a disk with a suitable amount of free space.
  • Note: ensure the VHDs are not corrupt first by mounting them on your local machine - if they fail to mount, they may be corrupt and you should select a different set of VHDs. After mounting each VHD should contain some files, e.g. the Apps VHD should contain an EPICS installation and a client.
• Find the latest windows 10 ISO file from <mdt deployment share location>\Boot\LiteTouchPE_x64_Hyper-V.iso and copy this ISO onto the NDH machine
  • Note: This ISO is not really a windows PE iso, it is instead an ISO which has been built by MDT. You cannot just use a version downloaded from microsoft.com
  • The MDT deployment share location and credentials can be found on the passwords page if you are unsure

Configure the VM

• Go into hyper-v manager on the MDT server host and select new machine. Default settings are mostly ok other than:
  • Set the name to the intended hostname of the NDX machine
  • Make sure VM files are stored on a disk with adequate space (often D:\ or E:\ on NDH machines)
  • Set startup memory to 14GB (in hyper-v set to NUMA architecture limit which is usually just below 14gb).
  • Set it to connect to ISIS network if you get the option, otherwise it will be ok on the default.
  • Set virtual hard disk size to 128GB
  • Install OS later
• In Hyper-V manager, add the VHDs as disks for the virtual machine. You do not need to specify a mount point, just make the disks available.
  • Note: if you are replacing existing disks, you still need to eject and re-add them in Hyper-V on the NDH for them to be recognized!
• Tell Hyper-V to boot from the windows PE ISO you copied earlier by adding it as the "DVD" drive in hyper-v
• Boot the virtual machine from hyper-v
• Select "Build thick updated windows 10 image"
• Computer name - set it to NDXINST (same as name in Hyper-V)
• Join the default ISIS workgroup (found on passwords page if you are unsure)
• Don't restore settings or data
• When asked for admin password, refer to passwords page and add the new password there if necessary.

Setting up IBEX before first use

• Run the script c:\makeinst.cmd. This should create Apps, Settings and Var folders with the contents of the VHDs you mounted
  • Check that this step has worked before proceeding! The makeinst.cmd script is flaky and may appear to have worked while actually leaving the system in an invalid state.
• Start the MYSQL server by adding it as a service. MDT will have cloned ibex_utils into C:\instrument, from there run windows_10_vhd_deploy.bat
• Change the settings folder name from NDHSPARE70 (which is the build server) to the machine you are building
• Inside the settings folder, do a git checkout to the correct config branch and pull
• See also any manual steps listed at https://github.com/ISISComputingGroup/IBEX/issues/5437

Starting IBEX

• At this stage you should be able to start IBEX. Make sure you start it as a standard user, not admin, otherwise all of the log files and directories will be created with the wrong permissions.
  • It seems that the Var and Settings VHDs in particular are very sensitive to getting into a state where the files are "owned" by admin but admin can't delete them, and a reboot does not fix this. To fix this, install fresh settings/var vhds by following the "upgrade/change vhd" instructions below.

Upgrading/changing IBEX VHDs

If you need to upgrade/change IBEX VHDS, the process is as follows:

• Shutdown the NDX machine (gracefully)
• Go into hyper-V and remove the three IBEX VHDS from the VM (Apps, Settings, Var)
• Replace the VHDS on the filesystem on the NDH with the new versions you wish to install
• Add these back in to the VM via Hyper-V manager
• Boot the VM
• Re-run the makeinst.cmd in C:\ script in an admin powershell prompt
• Ensure that the filesystem looks sensible e.g. that Apps/ contains EPICS and a client, Settings contains a settings directory, and Var/ contains the expected file structure.

Note: you can not simply replace the VHDs on the NDH by name. This is because Hyper-V sets some attributes on the VHDs when they are explicitly added; if these attributes are not set, you will get an error on attempting to boot the VM.