When trying to install SQL Server 2008 R2 on a Windows Server 2008 R2 Virtual Machine on Azure, you might come across the following error at the Setup Support Rules step:

This has to do with two manifest files that are corrupt.

If you have another working installation, you can copy the following two manifest files from the working server to the failing server:

• C:\Windows\winsxs\Manifests\amd64_microsoft.vc80.atl_1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b_8.0.50727.4053_none_8a1a02152edb659b.manifest
• C:\Windows\winsxs\Manifests\x86_microsoft.vc80.atl_1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b_8.0.50727.4053_none_d1c738ec43578ea1.manifest

If you don’t have another working installation, find and open the files mentioned above and paste the following xml in them:

• AMD64 Manifest:
  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
  <!-- Copyright © 1981-2001 Microsoft Corporation -->
  <assembly xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1" manifestVersion="1.0">
  <noInheritable/>
  <assemblyIdentity type="win32" name="Microsoft.VC80.ATL" version="8.0.50727.4053" processorArchitecture="amd64" publicKeyToken="1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b"/>
  <file name="ATL80.dll" hash="99840dcc34e78af239d80841eba316c184e407cd" hashalg="SHA1"/>
  </assembly>
• X86 Manifest:
  <?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8" standalone="yes"?>
  <!-- Copyright © 1981-2001 Microsoft Corporation –>
  <assembly xmlns="urn:schemas-microsoft-com:asm.v1" manifestVersion="1.0">
  <noInheritable/>
  <assemblyIdentity type="win32" name="Microsoft.VC80.ATL" version="8.0.50727.4053" processorArchitecture="x86" publicKeyToken="1fc8b3b9a1e18e3b"/>
  <file name="ATL80.dll" hash="6d7ce37b5753aa3f8b6c2c8170011b000bbed2e9" hashalg="SHA1"/>
  </assembly>

Note: You probably need to change the permissions for those files to be able to overwrite them.
To do so, go to the file properties, Security tab, Advanced, Owner tab, Edit, Select the Administrators group and click three times OK until all windows are closed.
Reopen the properties for the file, Security tab, Edit, Select the Administrators group and select Full Control.

I had to write a stored procedure that writes the current database size to a text file on a shared network location. This needed to happen each month, and we will use SQL Jobs for that... I didn't find any good solutions on the net so I thought to share this one!

Stored procedure code

SET ANSI_NULLS ON
GO
SET QUOTED_IDENTIFIER ON
GO
-- =============================================
-- Author:        CODit
-- Create date: 05/01/2010
-- Version: 1.1
-- Description:   Calculate Database Size and write to a file
-- =============================================
CREATE PROCEDURE [dbo].[qry_spaceused_toFile]
 @FullFolderPath varchar(255),
 @DatabaseName varchar(255),
 @SQLServerName varchar(255)
AS
BEGIN
declare @myDate varchar(255),
@QueryString varchar(4000),
@QueryString2 varchar(4000)

Select @myDate = convert(varchar, getdate(), 2)
Select @FullFolderPath = @FullFolderPath + @SQLServerName + '--' + @myDate + '.txt'
Select @QueryString = 'sqlcmd -S"'+@SQLServerName+'" -E -d '+@DatabaseName+' -Q"execute sp_spaceused" >>"'+@FullFolderPath+'" -s"" '
Select @QueryString2 = 'type "'+@FullFolderPath+'"'
create table #errorlog(line varchar(2000))
execute master.dbo.xp_cmdshell @QueryString

insert into #errorlog 

execute master.dbo.xp_cmdshell @QueryString2

Select @QueryString = 'sqlcmd -S"'+@SQLServerName+'" -E -d '+@DatabaseName+' -Q"print CHAR(13)" >>"'+@FullFolderPath+'" -s"" '
execute master.dbo.xp_cmdshell @QueryString
execute master.dbo.xp_cmdshell @QueryString

select line from #errorlog

drop table #errorlog
END

Usage (Make sure your path folder already exists):

exec qry_spaceused_toFile 'PathToFileLocation', 'DataBase', 'SQLServerName'

Possible Output:

database_name       database_size     unallocated space  
------------------------------------------------------------ 
CIPPlatform             6.75 MB             0.81 MB             

reserved          data              index_size        unused            
------------------------------------------------------------
3264 KB           1712 KB           1288 KB           264 KB

Explanation:

We are using the sqlcmd to write to a text file. This has some limitations, but it's fine to use in our situation. I didn't find any easy method to write to a file using sql. If you want to learn more about the sqlcmd utility, I suggest you to read this tutorial. As the name states, sqlCMD, you normally use this command in a command prompt. However, you can use it in SQL by using the master.dbo.xp_cmdshell procedure! We are using the built-in system query 'sp_spaceused' to calculate the space. After executing, you'll see two resultsets. In order to write those 2 resultsets to a file we write the results to a temporary table and write the contents that are stored in the table. The output file name is a concatenation of the database name and date.