How the Engineering Team Implemented VM Usage Tracking in Azure Lab Services

Hello Mas023, here's a link to the official MS documentation that gives you a script to automatically shutdown VMs -- https://zcusa.951200.xyz/en-us/azure/virtual-machines/auto-shutdown-vm?tabs=azure-cli.

You can extend the above script to specifically track the number of hours of activity before shutting the VMs down.

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Thank you for your response. I already know how to stop and deallocate a VM. However, the link you provided, along with other online resources, doesn't explain how to track the number of hours a VM has been used.

Hi Mas023,

Welcome to the Microsoft Q&A Platform! Thank you for asking your question here.

There are various Microsoft solutions that you might consider as a direct replacement for Azure Lab Services. Each of these Microsoft solutions offers browser-based web access. While these solutions aren't necessarily education-specific, they support a wide range of education and training scenarios.

• Azure Virtual Desktop
• Windows 365
• Azure DevTest Labs
• Microsoft Dev Box
• Partner solutions (Apporto, CloudLabs by Spektra Systems, Nerdio Manager for Enterprise, and Skillable) To facilitate a smooth transition, detailed guidelines and help are available on Microsoft's support page. Users can also create support tickets through the Azure portal to address specific technical queries.
  Azure DevTest Labs offer features that can help you manage costs effectively, including tracking usage and automating shutdowns.
  To set up automatic VM shutdown and deallocation after a certain number of hours in Azure DevTest Lab, you can follow these steps:

Azure DevTest Lab

1. Enable Azure Metering to track the usage of your VMs.
2. Create a policy in Azure DevTest Lab to track the usage of your VMs.
3. Use Azure Automation or Azure Functions to automate the shutdown and deallocation of your VMs. Here is an example of how you can use Azure Automation to automate the shutdown and deallocation of your VMs:

      # Get the VM usage
      $vmUsage = Get-AzMetric -ResourceGroupName "yourResourceGroup" -ResourceName "yourVMName" -MetricName "Percentage CPU" -TimeGrain 01:00:00 -StartTime (Get-Date).AddHours(-50)
      # Check if the usage exceeds 50 hours
      if ($vmUsage.Average -gt 50) {
          # Shut down and deallocate the VM
          Stop-AzVM -ResourceGroupName "yourResourceGroup" -Name "yourVMName" -Force
          Remove-AzVM -ResourceGroupName "yourResourceGroup" -Name "yourVMName" -Force
      }
   

   You can also use Azure Functions and Azure Logic Apps to automate the shutdown and deallocation of your VMs.

Please let us know if you have any further queries. Iam happy to assist you further :-)

Thank you!

Thank you @Mounika Reddy Anumandla for your reply.
Before I try your solution, I just want to clarify something: Does the automation logic you provided track the total usage of a virtual machine (VM)? Specifically, the VM isn’t running continuously. We provide these VMs to users, allowing them up to 50 hours of usage within a specific timeframe. Users can shut down the VM in between sessions, and we also have automatic shutdown enabled from the portal. However, over a given period—let’s say two months—we want to ensure that no user exceeds the 50-hour limit. Does your solution handle this scenario?

Thank you!

Something similar to quota in Azure Lab Services