I have lots of links covering Azure global and specific topics. For example, my warehouse of Azure Shortcuts at aka.ms/Azure/Shortcuts, and an Azure IaaS Operations Guide located at aka.ms/Azure/IaaSOpsGuide. But to just get off the ground there are some essential tools that just everyone should have, or at least know about, along with a few more that may be a lot more specific. So let’s get started and make a list of essential tools and then add a few more that we’ll call “Added Value” tools, as I can can determine and dig up while writing this.
Azure Essential Tools
- https://portal.azure.com. I know you’re a creature of habit! If you’ve only been using this all along, at least since the preview release, then you’re doing great. If not, get used to this portal. Yes, there are for a bit some things like, ahem Azure AD, that are still in the old portal, but that not only will change, but the link to redirect you there already exists in the new portal. Not sure what’s “there”? Just click B once you are at the portal, and it will open the Browse window. See something you like, click the star to the right of it, highlighting it in yellow, and voila!….it will be added to YOUR custom menu on the left. Try customizing that “other” cloud portal. Won’t happen so easily
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- Azure PowerShell. You must have the latest version to get all the richness of the latest azure portal capabilities in PowerShell.
- Got Visual Studio? Don’t give me that “I don’t do dot net
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The new portal which is based on Azure Resource Manager (ARM) lives by deploying things with JSON templates. Even with the “free” versions of Visual Studio, you can leverage the automatic JSON template capabilities with the latest SDK below. And if you don’t know me, I am “Allergic to Code”, and I have and use Visual Studio to create and modify templates. It is just that darn simple for a Cave Man Infrastructure guy like me! Want a little more help on creating templates? See Authoring Azure Resource Manager templates and also World Class ARM Templates Considerations and Proven Practices. - Got your SDKs? OK, so you’re not allergic to code? Dive in my friend and just be happy. There is something for every platform and CLI to choose.
- Quick Start Templates. Don’t want to make your own ARM templates? There are a ton of these already out there. But caveat emptor. This is where the “tweaking” comes in. While there are many excellent templates out there, what I often find is that they are written with a blank slate. What I mean is that they assume that you have almost nothing. Therefore, most templates will create your storage account and virtual networks as part of the template. But in the real world, Networks are carved out, and storage accounts are planned. You DO plan your storage, right? So if those do exist, then you may have to modify the template. Again, you can do that even with notepad, but trust my IaaS hands….much easier to do with Visual Studio and the latest SDK added to it.
- Template Deployment. Although I wanted to avoid all the dozens of items in the portal, this is another nugget that many never find. When in the Azure Portal, just click N and type Template Deployment and then select it when it pops up just beneath where you typed it. Whether you created a template from scratch, used Visual Studio, or got one from a vendor (it happens), you simply copy that JSON file contents, and paste that into the “Edit Template” window, once you’ve expanded Template Deployment. It doesn’t get much easier to test a template than this.
- Azure Resource Explorer. This is a Gem that many not only don’t know about, but if they did, didn’t also know that this is now baked into the new portal. Look back at #1 above and you can actually browse for it. The beauty of this online tool is that you can browse through all the templates and JSON throughout your entire subscription. Magical!
Oh, you want all the rest of those nifty Azure Portal Keyboard Shortcuts? When in the Azure Portal, just type ?. That was easy, eh?
Azure Value Added Tools
More Coming soon…..
- EA Portal. This is for those that literally own the subscription with an Enterprise Agreement. If you are not an administrator there, stay out. It won’t let you in anyways. But if you are admin, do not let many people in. Remember separation of duties applies here. New Subscriptions can be created here. So for good governance the process should work like this. A. The administrator of the EA Portal creates a New Subscription. B. They go in and change the name in the Accounts portal (below) and C. Then, they login to the Azure Portal, and create a Co-Administrator for the new subscription. From that point, you have a new subscription and a new co-admin to go along with that, so there is no need for that admin to be an admin in the EA portal. Unless maybe she is a CFO
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- Accounts Portal…
- PowerBI