Start and stop VM automatically in CI/CD workflow

[Andy-Grigg]

We should investigate how easy it is to automatically start and stop the VM when we need it. This will reduce the cost of running the machine, since it will only be running when we need it.

• Have CI/CD workflow wait for machine to respond before running integration tests
• Have CI/CD workflow start machine if it's not running
• Have CI/CD workflow stop machine if it started it

[da1910]

We can generate a Service Principal, then optionally federate using OIDC. Those credentials are then stored as a secret and we can use azure cli as normal, we should make sure our principal has the minimum possible permissions, but it should be straightforward to setup.

See this article for the general approach: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/app-service/deploy-github-actions?tabs=userlevel

There's some more information about using OIDC which might be a better option for us here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/developer/github/connect-from-azure?tabs=azure-portal%2Clinux#use-the-azure-login-action-with-openid-connect

[akaszynski]

Agree with this approach. Be sure to limit the principal (and the resource group) as much as possible.