Running Azure Compute Emulator on a TeamCity Agent

Question

I'm having a problem running the compute emulator on a TeamCity agent as part of a CI process doing integration tests with xunit. I'm using the following code to start the emulator and deploy my instances while executing my Xunit tests.

    ExecuteCsrunWith(serviceDirectory + " " + configurationFile);

    private ProcessExecutionResult ExecuteCsrunWith(string argument)
    {
        var result = new ProcessExecutionResult();
        using (var process = new Process())
        {
            process.StartInfo = new ProcessStartInfo(PathToCsrun, argument)
            {
                UseShellExecute = false,
                RedirectStandardOutput = true,
                RedirectStandardError = true
            };
            process.Start();
            result.Output = process.StandardOutput.ReadToEnd();
            result.Error = process.StandardError.ReadToEnd();
            process.WaitForExit();
           Log(result.Output);
           Log(result.Error);
        }
        return result;
    }

The test doesn't work and I have this error in event log:

Application: csmonitor.exe Framework Version: v4.0.30319 Description: The process was terminated due to an unhandled exception. Exception Info: System.InvalidOperationException Stack: at System.Windows.Forms.MessageBox.ShowCore(System.Windows.Forms.IWin32Window, System.String, System.String, System.Windows.Forms.MessageBoxButtons, System.Windows.Forms.MessageBoxIcon, System.Windows.Forms.MessageBoxDefaultButton, System.Windows.Forms.MessageBoxOptions, Boolean) at System.Windows.Forms.MessageBox.Show(System.String, System.String, System.Windows.Forms.MessageBoxButtons, System.Windows.Forms.MessageBoxIcon) at Microsoft.ServiceHosting.Tools.CloudServicesMonitor.Program.Main(System.String[])

Followed by:

Faulting application name: csmonitor.exe, version: 2.4.6489.1, time stamp: 0x53bdc3cc Faulting module name: KERNELBASE.dll, version: 6.2.9200.16864, time stamp: 0x531d34d8 Exception code: 0xe0434352 Fault offset: 0x0000000000047b8c Faulting process id: 0xe98 Faulting application start time: 0x01cff4c9c18a8431 Faulting application path: C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDKs\Azure\Emulator\csmonitor.exe Faulting module path: C:\Windows\system32\KERNELBASE.dll Report Id: 2321e30b-60bd-11e4-9406-00155dfd9db8 Faulting package full name: Faulting package-relative application ID:

I need to use UseShellExecute = false because I need to redirect and read the output.

AHMED EL-HAROUNY AHMED EL-HAROUNY · Accepted Answer · 2014-10-31T23:18:09

The problem was: Teamcity Agent was running as a (Local System) account. Seems to be an issue in compute emulator when csrun.exe process starts using (Local System) account.

The fix: I changed Teamcity Agent (a windows service) to start using a custom (build master) account and everything works as expected now.

Running Azure Compute Emulator on a TeamCity Agent

1 Answers