Overview
Compute Engine allows you to create virtual machines (VMs) that run different operating systems, including multiple flavors of Linux (Debian, Ubuntu, Suse, Red Hat, CoreOS) and Windows Server, on Google infrastructure. You can run thousands of virtual CPUs on a system that is designed to be fast and to offer strong consistency of performance.
In this hands-on lab, you create VM instances of various machine types using the Google Cloud console and the gcloud
command line in Cloud Shell. You also learn how to connect an NGINX web server to your VM.
Although you can easily copy and paste commands from the lab to the appropriate place, it is recommended that you type the commands yourself to reinforce your understanding of the core concepts.
What you'll do
Create a VM with the Cloud console.
Create a VM with the
gcloud
command line.Deploy a web server and connect it to a VM.
Prerequisites
- Familiarity with standard Linux text editors such as
vim
,emacs
, ornano
.
Task 1. Create a new instance from the Cloud console
In this section, you create new predefined machine types with Compute Engine from the Cloud console.
In the Cloud console, on the Navigation menu (), click Compute Engine > VM Instances.
This may take a minute to initialize for the first time.
To create a new instance, click CREATE INSTANCE.
There are many parameters you can configure when creating a new instance. Use the following for this lab:
Field | Value | Additional Information |
Name | gcelab | Name for the VM instance |
Region | europe-west4 | For more information about regions, see the Compute Engine guide, Regions and Zones. |
Zone | europe-west4-a | Note: Remember the zone that you selected to use later. For more information about zones, see the Compute Engine guide, Regions and Zones. |
Series | E2 | Name of the series |
Machine Type | 2 vCPU | This is an (e2-medium), 2-CPU, 4GB RAM instance. Several machine types are available, ranging from micro instance types to 32-core/208GB RAM instance types. For more information, see the Compute Engine guide, About machine families. Note: A new project has a default resource quota, which may limit the number of CPU cores. You can request more when you work on projects outside this lab. |
Boot Disk | New 10 GB balanced persistent diskOS Image: Debian GNU/Linux 11 (bullseye) | Several images are available, including Debian, Ubuntu, CoreOS, and premium images such as Red Hat Enterprise Linux and Windows Server. For more information, see Operating System documentation. |
Firewall | Allow HTTP traffic | Select this option in order to access a web server that you install later. Note: This automatically creates a firewall rule to allow HTTP traffic on port 80. |
Click Create.
It should take about a minute for the VM,
gcelab
, to be created. Aftergcelab
is created, the VM Instances page lists it in the VM instances list.To use SSH to connect to the VM, click SSH to the right of the instance name,
gcelab
.This launches an SSH client directly from your browser.
Note: Learn more about how to use SSH to connect to an instance from the Compute Engine guide, Connect to Linux VMs using Google tools.
Task 2. Install an NGINX web server
Now you install an NGINX web server, one of the most popular web servers in the world, to connect your VM to something.
Update the OS:
sudo apt-get update
Copied!content_copy
Expected output:
Get:1 http://security.debian.org stretch/updates InRelease [94.3 kB] Ign http://deb.debian.org strech InRelease Get:2 http://deb.debian.org strech-updates InRelease [91.0 kB] ...
Install NGINX:
sudo apt-get install -y nginx
Copied!content_copy
Expected output:
Reading package lists... Done Building dependency tree Reading state information... Done The following additional packages will be installed: ...
Confirm that NGINX is running:
ps auwx | grep nginx
Copied!content_copy
Expected output:
root 2330 0.0 0.0 159532 1628 ? Ss 14:06 0:00 nginx: master process /usr/sbin/nginx -g daemon on; master_process on; www-data 2331 0.0 0.0 159864 3204 ? S 14:06 0:00 nginx: worker process www-data 2332 0.0 0.0 159864 3204 ? S 14:06 0:00 nginx: worker process root 2342 0.0 0.0 12780 988 pts/0 S+ 14:07 0:00 grep nginx
To see the web page, return to the Cloud console and click the External IP link in the row for your machine, or add the External IP value to
http://EXTERNAL_IP/
in a new browser window or tab.This default web page should open:
To check your progress in this lab, click Check my progress below. A checkmark means you're successful.
Create a Compute Engine instance and add an NGINX Server to your instance with necessary firewall rules.
Check my progress
Task 3. Create a new instance with gcloud
Instead of using the Cloud console to create a VM instance, use the command line tool gcloud
, which is pre-installed in Google Cloud Shell. Cloud Shell is an interactive shell environment for Google Cloud loaded with all the development tools you need (gcloud
, git
, and others) and offers a persistent 5-GB home directory.
Note: If you want to try this on your own machine, read the gcloud command line tool guide.
In the Cloud Shell, use
gcloud
to create a new VM instance from the command line:gcloud compute instances create gcelab2 --machine-type e2-medium --zone=$ZONE
Expected output:
Created [...gcelab2]. NAME: gcelab2 ZONE: europe-west4-a MACHINE_TYPE: e2-medium PREEMPTIBLE: INTERNAL_IP: 10.128.0.3 EXTERNAL_IP: 34.136.51.150 STATUS: RUNNING
To check your progress in this lab, click Check my progress below. A checkmark means you're successful.
Create a new instance with gcloud.
Check my progress
The new instance has these default values:
The latest Debian 11 (bullseye) image.
The
e2-medium
machine type.A root persistent disk with the same name as the instance; the disk is automatically attached to the instance.
When working in your own project, you can specify a custom machine type.
To see all the defaults, run:
gcloud compute instances create --help
Note: You can set the default region and zones that
gcloud
uses if you are always working within one region/zone and you don't want to append the--zone
flag every time.To do this, run these commands:
gcloud config set compute/zone ...
gcloud config set compute/region ...
To exit
help
, press CTRL + C.In the Cloud console, on the Navigation menu, click Compute Engine > VM instances.
Your two new instances should be listed.You can also use SSH to connect to your instance via
gcloud
. Make sure to add your zone, or omit the--zone
flag if you've set the option globally:gcloud compute ssh gcelab2 --zone=$ZONE
Type Y to continue.
Do you want to continue? (Y/n)
Press ENTER through the passphrase section to leave the passphrase empty.
Generating public/private rsa key pair. Enter passphrase (empty for no passphrase)
After connecting, disconnect from SSH by exiting from the remote shell:
exit
Task 4. Test your knowledge
Test your knowledge about Google Cloud by taking the quiz. (Please select multiple correct options if necessary.)
Question: Through which of the following ways can you create a VM instance in Compute Engine?
The gcloud command line tool
The Cloud console
Answers of Lab
NOTE :- Make sure to export the "REGION & ZONE" as shown in video
COPY ALL THE COMMAND AND PASTE
curl -LO raw.githubusercontent.com/quiccklabs/Labs_solutions/d51b46a30325298b314a3c2f90624909dfcd5014/Creating%20a%20Virtual%20Machine/quicklabgsp001.sh
sudo chmod +x quicklabgsp001.sh
./quicklabgsp001.sh