Managing Lab Environments and Virtual Machines
You manage lab environments, physical machines, virtual machines, and templates in Test Manager, in Lab Center, using the Lab and Library tabs.
Note
For an overview of lab environments, see Using a Lab Environment for Your Application Lifecycle. In addition, this topic assumes you understand the concepts in Guidance for Creating and Managing SCVMM Environments.
Requirements
- Visual Studio Ultimate, Visual Studio Premium, Visual Studio Test Professional
The Lab tab lists the lab environments that have been deployed to your team project lab, and lets you perform these tasks on objects in the team project lab:
Connect to lab environments.
Connect to and manage virtual and physical machines using Environment Viewer.
Create, deploy, and manage standard environments and SCVMM environments
Copy a virtual machine and then store the copy in your team project library as a stored virtual machine or template
Copy an SCVMM environment and store the copy in your team project library
Create, restore, and manage snapshots of SCVMM environments
The Library tab lists SCVMM environments, virtual machines, and templates that are stored in your team project library. However, you can’t connect to or run tests on the lab environments and virtual machines in your team project library until you deploy them to your team project lab. Use the Library tab to perform these tasks:
Create a new SCVMM environment from stored virtual machines and templates, and then deploy that environment to your team project lab
Import stored virtual machines and templates from SCVMM to your team project library
Manage stored virtual machines, templates, and stored environments
Deploy a new copy of a stored environment to your team project lab
Before You Start
Before you manage lab environments, machines, and templates, configure your lab management components. See Test on a lab environment.
Tasks
These topics describe how to operate, modify, and manage your lab environments and the machines in those environments:
Task summary |
More information |
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Create a guest-based or host-based connection to the environment |
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Start, pause, shut down, power off, and delete an SCVMM environment |
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Change properties of an SCVMM environment |
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Change properties of a virtual machine or template in an SCVMM environment |
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Store a copy of a deployed virtual machine or template for use in another SCVMM environment |
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Add virtual machines and templates from System Center Virtual Machine Manager to your Team Project Library |
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Store a copy of an SCVMM environment in your library so that you can run multiple instances |
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Save a copy of an SCVMM environment as a restore point that you can share with other users |
What’s Next
After you learn how to create and manage lab environments and virtual machines, you’re ready to run tests in your lab environments. Use these topics to get started:
Run tests in your lab environment: You can run manual and automated tests in your lab environment, using Microsoft Test Manager, the Tcm.exe command line utility, or a build-deploy-test workflow. See Test on a lab environment.
Configure automated build, deployment, and testing: Create build-deploy-test workflows to automatically create a build of your application, deploy the build to your lab environment, and run tests on the deployed application. See Automated build-deploy-test workflows.
See Also
Concepts
Using a Lab Environment for Your Application Lifecycle