Manual installation

You can install Azure CycleCloud with an ARM template, through Azure Marketplace, or by using a container in the Azure Container Registry. We recommend installing with the Azure Marketplace image. However, for some production situations, manually installing CycleCloud as described in this article might be useful.

System requirements

To install CycleCloud, you must have administrator (root) rights. In addition, your system needs to meet the following minimum requirements:

• A 64-bit Linux distribution
• Java Runtime Environment (version 8)
• At least 8 GB of RAM (16 GB recommended)
• Four or more CPU cores
• At least 250 GB of free disk space

SSH key

The default SSH key used in CycleCloud is /opt/cycle_server/.ssh/cyclecloud.pem. If this key doesn't already exist, CycleCloud automatically generates it when it starts up (or restarts).

Installation

To determine your Linux distribution, run the following command:

cat /etc/lsb-release

If the /etc/os-release file exists, its contents show if your distribution is Debian-based, like Ubuntu. If the file doesn't exist, run this command:

cat /etc/redhat-release

If the /etc/redhat-release file exists, its contents show if your distribution is Enterprise-Linux based, like RedHat Enterprise Linux or Alma Linux.

Installing on Debian or Ubuntu

First, download the Microsoft signing key and add it to Apt's trusted keyring:

sudo apt-get -qq update && sudo apt-get -y -qq install curl gnupg2
sudo mkdir -m 0755 -p /etc/apt/keyrings
curl -fsSL https://packages.microsoft.com/keys/microsoft.asc |
  gpg --dearmor | sudo tee /etc/apt/keyrings/microsoft.gpg > /dev/null
sudo chmod go+r /etc/apt/keyrings/microsoft.gpg

Then, configure Apt to pull from the CycleCloud repository:

echo "deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/microsoft.gpg] https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/cyclecloud stable main" |
  sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/cyclecloud.list > /dev/null
sudo apt-get -qq update 

Finally, install CycleCloud with apt:

sudo apt -y install cyclecloud

sudo apt-get -y -q install cyclecloud8

Installing on Enterprise Linux (RHEL) clones

First, configure a cyclecloud.repo file:

cat | sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/cyclecloud.repo > /dev/null <<EOF
[cyclecloud]
name=cyclecloud
baseurl=https://packages.microsoft.com/yumrepos/cyclecloud
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=https://packages.microsoft.com/keys/microsoft.asc
EOF

Finally, install cyclecloud with yum (or dnf):

sudo yum -y install cyclecloud

sudo yum -y -qq install cyclecloud8

yum install <filename.rpm>

dpkg -i <filename.deb>

Insiders builds

CycleCloud Insiders builds are available for prerelease feature testing. Insiders builds might contain unresolved issues. Note: the Insiders builds aren't labeled differently than production builds; they're just early release candidates.

The following steps add the Insiders repository to give you access to Insiders builds. When you run this command on a machine, installing or upgrading the package gets the latest version from the Insiders repository. You don't need to add both the standard and Insiders repositories because the latest Insiders build is either the same as or newer than the latest standard build.

These instructions switch to only using Insiders builds. To switch back, follow the preceding installation instructions.

Debian/Ubuntu

To install the Insiders build on Debian or Ubuntu, run the following command:

echo "deb [signed-by=/etc/apt/keyrings/microsoft.gpg] https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/cyclecloud-insiders stable main" |
  sudo tee /etc/apt/sources.list.d/cyclecloud.list > /dev/null
sudo apt-get -qq update 

This command is the same as the standard installation steps but uses https://packages.microsoft.com/repos/cyclecloud-insiders/pool/main/c/cyclecloud8/ instead.

Enterprise Linux

To install the Insiders build on Enterprise Linux, run the following command:

cat | sudo tee /etc/yum.repos.d/cyclecloud.repo > /dev/null <<EOF
[cyclecloud]
name=cyclecloud
baseurl=https://packages.microsoft.com/yumrepos/cyclecloud-insiders
gpgcheck=1
gpgkey=https://packages.microsoft.com/keys/microsoft.asc
EOF

This command is the same as the standard installation steps but uses https://packages.microsoft.com/yumrepos/cyclecloud-insiders/ instead.

Notes on security

The default installation of CycleCloud uses non-encrypted HTTP running on port 8080. We strongly recommend configuring SSL for all installations.

Don't install CycleCloud on a shared drive or any drive where non-admin users have access. Anyone with access to the CycleCloud group can access non-encrypted data. We recommend that you don't add non-admin users to this group.

Configuration

After installation, you can configure CycleCloud through your web browser. The sign-in screen loads after the webserver fully initializes, which can take several minutes.

Step 1: Welcome

Enter a Site Name and select Next.

Step 2: License Agreement

Accept the license agreement and then select Next.

Step 3: Administrator Account

Set up the local administrator account for CycleCloud. Use this account to administer the CycleCloud application. It's not an operating system account. Enter a User ID, Name, and Password, and then select Done to continue.

Step 4: Set Your SSH Key

After you set up your administrator account, set your SSH public key so you can easily access any Linux machines that CycleCloud starts. To set your SSH public key, go to My Profile under the user menu in the top right and choose Edit Profile. Learn about creating SSH keys here.

Update CycleCloud

See the Update Azure CycleCloud page.