Deploying Azure Webrole gets stuck starting

Question

I am having some major issues trying to get a web role deployed. After about 30 mins the portal keeps telling me

Busy (Starting role... Sites were deployed. [2013-10-15T05:54:43Z])

If I actually visit the website I can visit it, however I am not comfortable everything is ok with the message being shown in the azure portal.

I have checked the dll's are all set to copy local. I have updated the web.config

  <dependentAssembly>
    <assemblyIdentity name="Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime" publicKeyToken="31bf3856ad364e35" culture="neutral" />
    <bindingRedirect oldVersion="0.0.0.0-2.1.0.0" newVersion="2.1.0.0" />
  </dependentAssembly>

I think my service def is ok

<ServiceDefinition name="My.Azure" xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceDefinition" schemaVersion="2013-03.2.0">
 <WebRole name="My.WebApplication" vmsize="Small">
<Sites>
  <Site name="Web">
    <!--<VirtualApplication name="API" physicalDirectory="_PublishedWebsites\Api"/>-->
    <Bindings>
      <Binding name="HttpsIn" endpointName="HttpsIn"/>
    </Bindings>
  </Site>
</Sites>
<Endpoints>
 <InputEndpoint name="HttpsIn" protocol="https" port="443" certificate="CoolCert"/>
</Endpoints>
<Imports>
  <Import moduleName="Diagnostics" />
  <Import moduleName="RemoteAccess" />
  <Import moduleName="RemoteForwarder" />
</Imports>
<Certificates>
  <Certificate name="CoolCert" storeLocation="LocalMachine" storeName="CA"   />
</Certificates>

My WebRole

  public class WebRole : RoleEntryPoint
{
    public override bool OnStart()
    {

        if (!Trace.Listeners.OfType<DiagnosticMonitorTraceListener>().Any())
        {
            Trace.Listeners.Add(new DiagnosticMonitorTraceListener());
        }
        AppDomain.CurrentDomain.UnhandledException += UnhandledExpectionEventHandler;

        Trace.TraceInformation("Started" + DateTime.Now);
        return base.OnStart();
    }

    private void UnhandledExpectionEventHandler(object sender, UnhandledExceptionEventArgs e)
    {
        var ex = e.ExceptionObject as Exception;
        var baseEx = ex.GetBaseException();
        Trace.TraceError(baseEx.Message+"\n"+baseEx.StackTrace);
    }
}

I have taken a look at the event viewer on the server and nothing is jumping out at me.

There is this error

The description for Event ID 8 from source TraceLog Profiler cannot be found. Either the component that raises this event is not installed on your local computer or the installation is corrupted. You can install or repair the component on the local computer.

 If the event originated on another computer, the display information had to be saved with     the event.

 The following information was included with the event: 

 w3wp.exe
 DumpObject

Can anyone see anything wrong from above or suggest something else I can try.

Answer 1

The first place to check is the WaHostBootstrapper log to see what the last few things are in that log. The series at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/kwill/archive/2013/08/09/windows-azure-paas-compute-diagnostics-data.aspx will walk you through all the diagnostics data and how to use the data to troubleshoot issues like this.