How to set up a machine configuration authoring environment

The PowerShell module GuestConfiguration automates the process of creating custom content including:

• Creating a machine configuration content artifact (.zip)
• Validating the package meets requirements
• Installing the machine configuration agent locally for testing
• Validating the package can be used to audit settings in a machine
• Validating the package can be used to configure settings in a machine
• Publishing the package to Azure storage
• Creating a policy definition
• Publishing the policy

Support for applying configurations through machine configuration is introduced in version 3.4.2.

Base requirements

Operating systems where the module can be installed:

• Ubuntu 20
• Windows

The module can be installed on a machine running PowerShell 7.x. Install the versions of PowerShell listed in the following table for your operating system.

For Linux, the following shell script downloads and installs PowerShell 7.2.4.

###################################
# Prerequisites

# Update the list of packages
sudo apt-get update

# Install pre-requisite packages.
sudo apt-get install -y wget

# Download the PowerShell package file
wget https://github.com/PowerShell/PowerShell/releases/download/v7.2.4/powershell_7.2.4-1.deb_amd64.deb

###################################
# Install the PowerShell package
sudo dpkg -i powershell_7.2.4-1.deb_amd64.deb

# Resolve missing dependencies and finish the install (if necessary)
sudo apt-get install -f

# Delete the downloaded package file
rm powershell_7.2.4-1.deb_amd64.deb

# Switch the user to root before launching PowerShell
sudo su

# Start PowerShell
pwsh

The GuestConfiguration module requires the following software:

• Azure PowerShell 5.9.0 or higher. The required Az PowerShell modules are installed automatically with the GuestConfiguration module, or you can follow these instructions.

Install the GuestConfiguration module from the PowerShell Gallery

To install the GuestConfiguration module on either Windows or Linux, run the following command in PowerShell 7.

# Install the machine configuration DSC resource module from PowerShell Gallery
Install-Module -Name GuestConfiguration

Validate that the module has been imported:

# Get a list of commands for the imported GuestConfiguration module
Get-Command -Module GuestConfiguration

Install the PSDesiredStateConfiguration module from the PowerShell Gallery

On Windows, to install the PSDesiredStateConfiguration module, run the following command in PowerShell 7.

# Install PSDesiredStateConfiguration version 2.0.7 (the stable release)
Install-Module -Name PSDesiredStateConfiguration -RequiredVersion 2.0.7
Import-Module -Name PSDesiredStateConfiguration

On Linux, to install the PSDesiredStateConfiguration module, run the following command in PowerShell 7.

# Install PSDesiredStateConfiguration prerelease version 3.0.0
Install-Module -Name PSDesiredStateConfiguration -RequiredVersion 3.0.0-beta1 -AllowPrerelease
Import-Module -Name PSDesiredStateConfiguration

Validate that the module has been imported:

# Get a list of commands for the imported PSDesiredStateConfiguration module
Get-Command -Module PSDesiredStateConfiguration

Next step