DEV Community: Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻

Azure DNS - What is DNS and How to Create Azure DNS Zone

Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻 — Tue, 16 Mar 2021 15:52:58 +0000

Azure DNS

Azure DNS is one of the useful and good cloud services that Microsoft offers to its users. With Azure DNS, users especially web or Azure administrators can use it to host websites, manage DNS zones and records for your website domain’s DNS. Applications, APIs, and cloud services already hosted in the cloud, like Microsoft Azure can make use of Azure DNS for hosting. All in one place and resource group. This gives the advantage of better management of services.

Importance of DNS (Domain Name System)

Did you know that in every website address or URL you type on your web browser, there is public IP address and DNS (Domain Name System) behind it?

I remember back in the end of 90’s – 2000’s when I was studying Computer Science in the Philippines, I was fascinated learning about the World Wide Web. It was pretty new back then, now it is the Internet that is a normal thing part of our lives and daily routine. Without it, it could have been different.

Back in those good old days, I had to write HTML-syntax code to create web pages without an IDE, just notepads. There weren’t any fancy CSS nor Javascript frameworks neither. You had check every line of code to find where you missed some and wrote a wrong HTML syntax. In the old times, everything was simple. Simple websites, maybe looking boring, but creating one was so cool in those good old days. I wrote and published by first simple HTML web pages to be hosted at Lycos, which was pretty popular as search engine and web hosting in the late 90’s.

The First Website was created in 1992

Tim Berners-Lee was the man I cannot forget learning about when I was studying computer science. Who is he? He is the great mind and man behind the creation of the WWW or the World Wide Web in March 1989. That was like 32 years ago! Can you imagine how our world and digitalization would be without the invention of the Internet? I was personally fascinated of it that studying and conducting a local community survey was my first thesis in college! I wish I still have those papers.

In 1992, the first simple website on the web was created. It was plain and simple, but it marks our history and it still exists. You may visit it through this link: http://info.cern.ch/hypertext/WWW/TheProject.html

World Wide Web and the Internet

On Christmas day of 1990, Berners-Lee created the first successful communication between an HTTP client and a server. From there he designed and built the first Web browser, and the first Web page went live on August 6, 1991. While Berners-Lee is credited for the invention of the World Wide Web, he did not invent the Internet. The two are not one and the same. The Internet is a network of computer networks that spans the globe. It is the hardware and software that provides connections between multiple computers. The World Wide Web is just a service of the Internet. It's a bunch of interconnected documents and resources and their specific locations (via hyperlinks and URLs) online. - Business Insider

DNS or Domain Name System Explained

Azure DNS for Cloud Hosting

If you own or administrate a domain or website, it is pretty normal that you are familiar that setting up the DNS Zone settings and records in website domains. In every website that we visit, there is a public IP address behind it which is also called DNS (Domain Name Server). In the world of internet where we are all relying on these days, DNS technology have an important role.

Azure DNS provides a globally distributed, high-availability name server infrastructure, which you can use to host your domain. By hosting your domains in Azure DNS, you can manage your DNS records with the same credentials, APIs, tools, billing, and support as your other Azure services. Azure DNS does not currently support purchasing of domain names. If you want to purchase a domain name, you need to use a third-party domain name registrar. The registrar typically charges a small annual fee. The domains can then be hosted in Azure DNS for management of DNS records. See Delegate a Domain to Azure DNS for details. - Microsoft Documentation for Azure DNS

Creating a DNS Zone in Azure

A DNS zone is used to host the DNS records for a particular website domain.

For example, my website “jonahandersson.tech” contains some of DNS records for my mail server and for my website. So, if I were to host my existing domain in Azure, I would need to make use of the Azure DNS service. The service would allow me to host my DNS zone and manage my DNS records, and provides name servers. The name services are used for DNS queries.

To create a DNS Zone in Azure, you would need to be an Azure Admin or Azure User with valid subscription. Create a new resource and search for DNS Zone. Select the right Azure Subscription, Resource Group and for the Instance Details, you would need to choose and fill in the desired DNS Zone name like my example below and set up your resource location.

Create a DNS Zone resource on Azure Portal

The DNS Zone shows the DNS information like name services and records after its creation

Creating A-Record and DNS Record Sets

When the DNS zone was created, some DNS record sets are also necessary to be added. Especially the first and primary record set for the DNS, A-record.

A-record is the primary record to be create first.

So what is A-record?

A-record is the record contains the pairing between the IP address and the domain name. It can have more than one entries usually known as record sets. In record sets, the domain name remains constant, while the IP addresses are different. Learn more about DNS Record and Aliases.

Verifying Azure DNS Zone Configuration

In my example above, I do not have the real domain like www.wideworldimportsjonahandersson.com yet, but I could create the DNS Zone in Azure to start with as a demo and learning example.

In practical and real life situation, you would need to update the NS (Name Server) records of the domain-name registrar, to delegate the domain to Azure after you created a DNS Record.

So, even without any registered domain name officially registered yet, it is possible to if you did your Azure DNS configuration correctly. One of the ways to verify it is using the NSLookup tool directly using the command line tool in the cloud like Azure CLI on Azure Portal.

Using the nslookup command below with your DNS Zone name and one of your Name Servers, you will be able to verify if your configuration for the Azure DNS zone was correct. You should be getting back the IP address you set up when you started.

Adding Alias Record Set for Public IP

After adding the A-record, you would also need to add an Alias record for your public IP. This is necessary so that you can access your DNS over the Internet on any web browser.

Assuming that you have an existing application hosted already in Azure with an Azure Virtual Machine with NICs , VNet, an assigned public IP adress, you can associate that public IP address in your new Alias record set in your DNS Zone settings.

To add a new record set, click add Record Set + and complete the necessary information like the example below.

Create another record set for public IP with Alias Type Resource

Check your existing Public IP address for your application hosted in a VM (Example)

Access the application using the DNS IP Address that was set as a DNS alias

Learning Resources

What is Azure DNS?
Azure DNS Documentation by Microsoft
Azure DNS YouTube Video by Intellipat – Azure DNS | What is DNS Server | How DNS Server works

I hope you learned something and interested to learn more.
If you like this article, please re-share the knowledge!

Feel free to leave feedback and ask questions.

About Author:
Jonah Andersson is a Filipina-Swedish Software Developer who codes full stack system development in C# .NET/NET Core. She currently works as a Software Developer Consultant at Forefront Consulting in Sweden. Jonah is passionate about continuous learning, developing and sharing knowledge about Microsoft Azure cloud technologies. She one of the #AzureHeroes in Sweden. A woman who codes in tech who enjoys writing, advocating gender equality in the tech industry through mentorship and by being role model on her spare time.

Follow me Twitter, connect via my LinkedIn and visit my website

NOTE: This article was originally and first published on my website https://jonahandersson.tech

Inspiring Story of Software Developer, Microsoft MVP, and Inclusive Leader Jonah Andersson in Sweden - #SheCoded

Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻 — Mon, 08 Mar 2021 15:33:00 +0000

Wow! Today is International Women's Day. I am glad that this day officially exist to give value and honor to all the women in the world who are making great difference.

I would like count myself in for making a difference and also to my mother who is not with me in this world today.

About Me :)

My name Jonah Andersson a Filipina-Swedish Software Developer currently working at Forefront Consulting in Sweden.

I studied Computer Science in the Philippines and then Agile System Development i C# .NET and Java Programming in Sweden.

I had a childhood dream of being an architect or civil engineer but due to life circumstances, I ended up studying about the science of computers and programming, and definitely, I didn’t regret that! In fact, I enjoy being a programmer and love learning new things in tech all the time!😊

I enjoy solving challenging complex problems, coding back-end and has great interest in developing applications full-stack in C# .NET using new technologies such as Microsoft Azure.

From time to time on my spare time, I volunteer and share my technical knowledge at some virtual conferences and user groups events.

I used to teach programming to kids in schools and there I saw the gender gap and inequality problem already. I realized something needs to be done about it. I need to do something about it!

I volunteer to mentor and to help make a difference by inspiring tech to young women. I like to connect with other developers, share my technical skills with others, my experience, lessons learned and personally helping out with gender diversity and inclusion in my workplace.

My Inspiring Story To Tech and Software Engineering

My journey to starting a career to the tech industry is a long, challenging and inspiring story.

It all started in the Philippines where I grew up. When I was a young girl, I got to watch a story about the amazon women documentary in South America. It was back then when I was a kid, they were used to be known to be fierce female warriors. I wasn’t sure if they really existed but I liked and admired the characteristics of those women - Different, Strong and Brave!

When I was growing up, I wanted to be different and strong like the amazon women I saw on TV. However, I was not as brave when I was a young girl. I was shy and was scared to be in the crowd. My mother used to encourage me to face that fear.

My choice of dream job and education were influenced by my dreams and what I wanted myself to be - to be different, brave, and strong. That somehow influenced me.

I had a dream to become a civil engineer because I liked drawing and the idea of building something useful. Back then being a civil engineer was known to be a men-dominated job wherever you are.

That dream job didn’t happen because of life circumstances and economic reasons.

In the Philippines, getting a good degree in a good college or a university is not free. We don’t have that privilege of free university education like in some countries. However, we have scholarship programs supported by private organizations or the government.

Since my parents could not afford to send me to college and take the civil engineering degree that I dreamed of, I took the initiative of taking a government scholarship that was offered in my high school back then.

I really wanted to go to the university and to chase my dreams. So, when I was finishing high school, there was a scholarship exam offered locally in my city. I took the scholarship exam, I passed it and I did it. I got the scholarship! I could go to a private university or college for free.

Although I did not have the option to study civil engineering in my scholarship program, but I was really glad. I had the opportunity to study Computer Science at a private college Asian College of Science and Technology in the Philippines. I studied a degree in Computer Science as a scholar and graduated in 2004. It was also the toughest year in my life when my mother (also my best-friend mom) died of stage IV breast cancer.

I just turned 18 years old then. When my mother died, as the eldest child in the family, I had to take the responsibility of being the breadwinner of the entire family. Instead of finding a job within the programming field, I took the first job as technical support that I could have back then to earn a living and to support my younger siblings.

When I moved from the Philippines to Sweden about 10 years ago, I decided to pursue my passion and dream to work with software engineering. I studied more about software development in programming languages C# and Java for another 3 years until I got my full-time job as a full-stack software developer in Sweden.

So, I may not be building great physical buildings but I am creating, building and maintaining useful IT systems!

Volunteering - Mentorship and Being A Role-Model To Fix Gender Diversity Problem

Last December 2020, I was invited to speak at Virtual Azure Community Day. One of the topics I proposed talking was about Gender Inequality Problem in Tech. The proposal was the result of my personal deep reflections of why we need to be more gender equal, diverse and inclusive, especially in tech industry.

In that talk, I presented to the public the list of reasons, what I think we should do and what I am doing myself to fix it. You can watch my talk about it on Gender Inequality in Tech - Why Is it a problem and How can we fix it?

The things I've learned working as a woman in tech and working in software engineering field

Although I am a programmer who is expected to think logically, I am also a deep thinker and a reflective person. I have learned a lot in life and through the years so far working as a woman in tech.

I have learned to keep learning from whatever challenges I face.

If you are mistreated because you are a woman, speak up and never let others belittle who you are, your dreams and your plans.

To think outside the box. To learn how to see things in a bigger perspective yet understand what small details help build the whole spectrum.

To never take things personally if there are people who drag me down and belittles my ability.

To be myself, be unique and to never pretend to be a better person - just to prove myself to others expectations. Be genuine and accept imperfections.

To be open and true to yourself and work towards your goals - not for others, but for your best self.

My Advice to all women and anyone who belongs to underrepresented groups who want to work in Tech Industry

To dare speak up and never give up! It is not easy to be underrepresented, but listen to your good inner voice, follow your heart and your dreams.

To find a good mentor and good role models.

Follow the desires of your heart and what you want to achieve. Never let anyone or anything stop you. It is ok to stumble and fall, but don’t stay stumbled, stand up and try again.

Go for a job you will love and enjoy!

To never surrender and give up when everything seems hopeless. I myself I’ve had sleepless nights and were close to giving up but I didn’t - I choose being brave.

Value your good contacts. Connect and network with great inspiring people in tech.

Dare speak up your thoughts and what is not fair, even if you feel uncomfortable and probably means taking the risks.

Get out of your comfort zone because when we surpassed out of it, magic happens and you will be surprised how it can change you to be a better you!

Check out my video interview sharing my inspiring story at FTWConf.com event today.

Thanks for reading my story and I hope you got inspired!

Feel free to connect!

How to Deploy and Run Containers Using Microsoft Azure Container Instances

Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻 — Sat, 06 Mar 2021 16:07:37 +0000

What is a Container and What is it with Containers on the Cloud?

Container technology was initially from the Linux world.
Lately, containers are nowadays commonly used in Windows environments. One of the widely used implementations of container technology is the use of Docker containers.

The word Container actually describes itself. It is like a container box with all your stuff in it.

In software development and in cloud development, containerizing applications have been trending these days, especially as an alternative to using Virtual Machines as Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS).

Image Credit: AKFPartners

If we talk about software engineering, what is a container then?

A container is a piece of software that packages your application, all your source code, and all its dependencies in a single box or package. Just like when you pack up everything you need to move to a new house or another location. So, this box, package or known as "container" can be run and executed directly by any computer systems or environment - for example on environments Linux or Microsoft Windows.

How does containers work? Why is it better than using Virtual Machines?

Practical questions like these are worth asking for. Using Virtual Machines or Containers depend on what kind of business requirements or technical problems you want to solve. Just like anything, there are pros and cons. Virtualization and container technologies are both great! It is really up to what is it that needs to be built!

Containers vs. Virtual Machines

Unlike Virtual Machines, Containers run differently. When you execute a container, it only uses that read-only copy of the operating system's shared libraries that your application source code needs to run. Because of this, the required amount of resources are reduced and are lesser compared to running your applications on a virtual machine. Which means that containers give the benefits of portability, flexibility if you want to consider multi-cloud or multi-platform, it is also lightweight and platform independent.

Microsoft Azure Container Instances - Containers on the Cloud!

There are many container providers to choose from these days. If you have your applications running in Azure, then there are some cloud container services available for its users.

The following are some of the Azure Services for container development:

Azure Kubernetes Services (AKS)
Azure Service Fabric
Azure Web Apps for Containers
Azure Container Registry
Azure Container Instances

On this article, I will go through briefly Azure Container Instances and show a simple example on how to deploy a docker container image using Azure Portal and Azure CLI.

Azure Container Instances

Azure Container Instances offers the fastest and simplest way to run a container in Azure, without having to manage any virtual machines and without having to adopt a higher-level service.
Azure Container Instances is a great solution for any scenario that can operate in isolated containers, including simple applications, task automation, and build jobs. For scenarios where you need full container orchestration, including service discovery across multiple containers, automatic scaling, and coordinated application upgrades, we recommend Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS).
-Source Credit: Microsoft Documentation

How to Deploy and Run Container Image to Azure Container Instances using Azure Portal and Azure CLI

Prerequisites

Microsoft Azure Subscription
Resource Group
Azure CLI Command Tools
VS Code

Step #1: Login to your Azure Account using Azure CLI. Login via web browser and set subscription you want to use

az login

Step #2: Set the right and active Azure Subscription that you want to use

az account set --subscription "<Name of Your Azure Subscription Account>"

Step #3: Deploy a container image from a public registry. Below example, Hello world ACI

az container create \
    --resource-group <name-of-your-resource-group>\
    --name psdemo-hello-world-cli \
    --dns-name-label psdemo-hello-world-cli \
    --image mcr.microsoft.com/azuredocs/aci-helloworld \
    --ports 80

Step #4: Verify the creation of your container image creation by verifying on Azure Portal

Click on the Azure Container Instance that was created using the Azure CLI command you just executed then you will find that the container image is in it.

Step #5: Go back to your VS Code and using Azure CLI command below to check your container information

az container show --resource-group '<name-of-your-resource-group>' --name 'psdemo-hello-world-cli'

Step #6: You can also verify if your container image is publicly active and exposed to port 80 by using the URL on FQDN address on the Azure Container Instance on Azure Portal. You can either use the Public IP address or the URL.

Browse to the public IP-address and you will see a running Azure Container Instance.

Step # 7: Finally, clean up if you are just testing and trying out or continue with your development! :)

To clean up, delete the entire resource group for your hands-on and delete the local docker container images on your machine

az group delete --name <"Name of Your Resource Group"> --yes
docker image rm <"Name of Docker Image for Container Instance To Remove">
docker image rm <"Name of Docker Image To Remove">

Getting Started Guide and Learning Resources

To learn more about Azure Container Instances and how to continue developing containers with it, Azure Container Registry and Azure Kubernetes, check out Microsoft's Documentation for Azure Container Instances

I hope you learned something and interested to learn more.
If you like this article, please re-share the knowledge!

Feel free to leave feedback and ask questions.

About Author:
Jonah Andersson is a Filipina-Swedish Software Developer who codes full stack system development in C# .NET/NET Core. She is a Microsoft MVP for Azure, MCT, and founder/organizer of Azure User Group Sundsvall Sweden. She currently works as a Software Developer Consultant at Forefront Consulting in Sweden. Jonah is passionate about continuous learning, developing and sharing knowledge about Microsoft Azure cloud technologies. She one of the #AzureHeroes in Sweden. A woman who codes in tech who enjoys writing, advocating gender equality in the tech industry through mentorship and by being role model on her spare time.

Follow me Twitter, connect via my LinkedIn and visit my website

Azure Mobile App - Microsoft Azure Administration on the Go!

Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻 — Sun, 28 Feb 2021 11:29:49 +0000

INFO This blog article was originally written and published from my personal tech blog https://jonahandersson.tech.
I'm publishing a copy here to share with the DEV Community.

Azure Mobile App – Manage Your Azure Services On the Go

Azure Mobile App is one of my favorite essential iOS mobile apps on my iPhone. It helps me perform essential tasks to manage my Azure cloud services on the go!

As a Software Developer creating, learning and developing cloud services in Microsoft Azure, accessing the Azure Portal is part of the routine. Aside from using resources for development, it is important for me to check on the statuses of my subscriptions on my Azure account.

Microsoft Azure have Cost Management features that enable me (the account administrator) to set the spending limit of my cloud resources and send me cost alerts. I like using the Azure Mobile app as an extra add-on. It is comes handy when needed.

Azure Mobile App - Features and Limitations

The mobile app for Microsoft Azure have some good features but it does not have the full capabilities as accessing it via a web browser. It should not be misunderstood as a replacement of the Azure Portal.

Some of the things you can do on the mobile app are viewing important alerts, stopping or enabling your App Services, Azure Virtual Machines, and other existing Azure resources.

On the other hand, there are some limitations on the mobile app. Such limitations include the feature to add new cloud services, new resources, new subscriptions, or new resource groups. But hey who wants to do all those stuff that on mobile? As an Azure Developer or Azure Administrator, working on bigger screen is always better especially when you have to use Azure for development and cloud administration.

The Azure Mobile app (as of date) is not designed to exactly simulate the management of Azure Subscriptions and cloud services like Azure Portal, which is accessed on a web browser. However, I personally consider the app very useful for on-the-go operations and administration. Operational tasks that you need to do last minute or you forgot to do after you logged off your computer. Perhaps, you want to monitor and check on the statuses of your Azure services while you are away from home or office. Or a need to use Microsoft Azure when you have limited and temporary access to a computer.

Benefits of Azure Mobile App

Check the status of Azure Subscriptions
Track and monitor the health and status of Azure resources
Quickly diagnose and fix issues
Run commands on Cloudshell to manage Azure resources on mobile
Access via Mobile is secured and encrypted
Important Alerts or Notifications

Check Status of Your Azure Subscriptions and Resources
Using the Azure Mobile App, you can check the current state of your subscriptions, resource groups and cloud resources in it. You can view the details of your subscriptions, latest activity logs, important alerts, check out your Access Control (IAM) and more.

Track Status of Azure Resources

Since I am monitoring my spending limit for my personal Azure subscriptions, tracking the status of my existing Azure Resources on the go is convenient.

For example, checking the status of Azure Virtual Machines running or not after a demo or Dev/Test development.

Develop and Run Commands on Cloudshell – Azure Bash and Azure Powershell on Mobile

You can manage and develop using Azure Cloudshell – Bash or Powershell regardless if you have the commands by heart or not. The Azure Mobile App allows you to quickly manage the Azure services when necessary via mobile.

You do not need to be an expert in Azure CLI nor Azure Powershell commands because there’s always our superhero command “az help” which helps and gives a list of accepted commands in managing your Azure resources.

Where to Download Azure Mobile App?

It is free to download for both iPhones and Android. There are few ways to download the Azure Mobile App.

Via Azure’s Website
iOS, just search for Azure in the App Store
Android, search Azure in Google Play

Small Live Demo – On my iPhone

Azure Mobile App on my iPhone

I hope you learned something and became interested to learn more.
If you like this article, please re-share the knowledge!

Feel free to leave feedback and ask questions.

About Author: Jonah Andersson is a Filipina-Swedish Software Developer who codes full stack system development in C# .NET/NET Core. She currently works as a Software Developer Consultant at Forefront Consulting in Sweden. Jonah is passionate about continuous learning, developing and sharing knowledge about Microsoft Azure cloud technologies. She one of the #AzureHeroes in Sweden. A woman who codes in tech who enjoys writing, advocating gender equality in the tech industry through mentorship and by being role model on her spare time.

Follow me on Twitter, connect via my LinkedIn and visit my website

Virtualization and Deploying Azure Virtual Machines Using Powershell

Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻 — Sat, 27 Feb 2021 16:34:38 +0000

Virtualization Technology and Virtual Machines

Hypervisor technology is one of the greatest inventions in the world of virtualization tech. In fact, the cloud computing platforms that we have these days like Microsoft Azure, Google Cloud Platform, AWS, other cloud providers are using virtualization technologies.

Without the technology of virtualization, we would not be able to create Virtual machines, which are the software emulations of physical computers.

A Virtual Machine includes components like virtual processors, memory, storage, and networking resources.

Virtual Machines allow us to virtualize and create a virtual computer with an operating system (also known as Virtual Machine Image) that we want. In a Virtual Machine, you have the capability to install, add software, add-ons, manage and run it like a normal computer. The only difference is that you have more benefits especially if it is hosted in the cloud!

VMs can be remote acessed using remote desktop clients, SSH, or Bastion depending on the type of image you choose.

What are Azure Virtual Machines?

Azure Virtual Machines (VM) is one of several types of on-demand, scalable computing resources that Azure offers. Typically, you choose a VM when you need more control over the computing environments like the server infrastructure. Azure virtual machines can be used in various ways. Read more of Microsoft's Documentation for Azure Virtual Machines

Azure Virtual Machines are one of the the Azure Compute cloud services which are considered as IaaS or Infrastructure as a Service.

There are many benefits of using Azure VMs especially if your business requirements require that you or your organization have better control with your infrastructure. It is also ideal if you have existing infrastructure or old existing applications that you want to migrate to the cloud without doing spending more time in refactoring your applications, integrations and redesigning your systems architecture. It is one of the challenges many organizations experience. Cloud adoptation is not a Quick-fix. Learn more about Azure Cloud Adoptation Framework and Azure Migrate

Azure VM Manage Instances allow users to create, load-balance and auto-scale multiple Azure VMs in the cloud.

Microsoft Azure users or administrators with subscriptions can just create and provision virtual machines in the cloud for few minutes. However, there are some other ways to provision Azure VMs to Azure.

Creating and Deploying Azure Virtual Machines Programmatically

To programmatically provision Azure VMs are ideal if you want to automate the processes of the creation. Also if you want to save time and costs from starting from scratch. Of course if you want developer productivity. Think of the DRY-principle (Don't Repeat Yourself). Below are some of other ways to provision Azure Virtual Machines.

Azure CLI
Cloud Shell on Azure Portal
Powershell
Programmatically Code it REST API
ARM Templates

How to Deploy Azure Virtual Machine using Powershell

Below are some steps in deploying an Azure Virtual Machine using Powershell. The example Powershell script will deploy a VM image of Windows Server Data Center 2019.

If you want to create Linux and other images, kindly check out the learning resources links at the end of this article for some guide.

Prerequisites: Make sure that you have a working and active Azure Subscription
Create a Resource-Group in Azure to save all your resources for the Azure VMs

New-AzResourceGroup -Name myResourceGroup -Location EastUS

Connect to Azure Subscription account via browser using your Azure Subscription Name

Connect-AzAccount -SubscriptionName '<<Name of Azure Subscription Account>>

Verification of the right selection of Azure Subscription

Set-AzContext -SubscriptionName <<Name of Azure Subscription Account>>

Create a credential to use in the VM creation NOTE: Please change the username, password with security in mind RECOMMENDED to use Azure Key Vault!

$username = '<Your Desired VM admin Name here>' 
$password = ConvertTo-SecureString '<Your Secure Password Here>' -AsPlainText -Force
$AzVMWindowsCredentials = New-Object System.Management.Automation.PSCredential ($username, $password)

Create a Windows Virtual Machine based on desired VM Image, ex. Windows Server 2019 Datacenter

New-AzVM 
    -ResourceGroupName '<Your Resource Group Name here>' #example rg-azurevm-demo-powershell
    -Name 'azvmdemo-powershell-w2019dc' 
    -Image 'Win2019Datacenter' 
    -Credential $AzVMWindowsCredentials 
    -OpenPorts 3389

Get the Public IP Address to be able to remote access it via internet using RDP Client

Get-AzPublicIpAddress 
    -ResourceGroupName '<Your Resource Group Name here>' #example rg-azurevm-demo-powershell
    -Name 'azvmdemo-powershell-w2019dc' | Select-Object IpAddress

Run Powershell script via your command line
After running your Powershell script, access your new Azure VM using Remote Desktop via RDP Client from your computer. Login using Public IP address and the admin user credentials you set up for your VM

*If you are just testing and doing hands-on, make sure you clean up the resources to prevent charges for the services.

#Clean up after if only testing for hands-on or demo purposes 

Remove-AzResourceGroup -Name 'rg-azurevm-demo-powershell'

You will find the complete example Powershell script on one my GitHub repositories here Create Azure VM using Powershell

Azure Durable Functions - Developing Serverless Stateful Workflow

Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻 — Fri, 26 Feb 2021 15:56:09 +0000

Knowledge Sharing Azure Durable Functions at my workplace

I had an opportunity to share technical knowledge with my colleagues at Forefront Consulting during our monthly meeting in our division Technology. I was glad to share insights and knowledge about the basics of one of my favorite Azure cloud services, Azure Durable Functions. Interesting questions came up that are worth checking out more.

What is Serverless and What are Azure Durable Functions?

Well, if you have not worked with Azure development or is not familiar with Azure technologies, probably this article is jargon to you. It would be hard to understand right away what it is. However, if you are curious what it is and how it can help solve some of your application development problems, this cloud service (if you are working with Azure) is worth checking out!

I hope that this article will enlighten you and give you the basics of it. I personally like to share that this great Serverless technology exists!

What is Serverless?

Serverless Computing is starting to gain its popularity these days, especially in the world of cloud development.

Serverless computing (or serverless for short), is an execution model where the cloud provider (AWS, Azure, or Google Cloud) is responsible for executing a piece of code by dynamically allocating the resources. And only charging for the amount of resources used to run the code. The code is typically run inside stateless containers that can be triggered by a variety of events including http requests, database events, queuing services, monitoring alerts, file uploads, scheduled events (cron jobs), etc. The code that is sent to the cloud provider for execution is usually in the form of a function. Hence serverless is sometimes referred to as “Functions as a Service” or “FaaS”. Following are the FaaS offerings of the major cloud providers:
AWS: AWS Lambda
Microsoft Azure: Azure Functions
Google Cloud: Cloud Functions
While serverless abstracts the underlying infrastructure away from the developer, servers are still involved in executing our functions.(Source:Serverless-Stack.com)

So, Serverless is not really without servers. The infrastructure exists - there are servers behind "Serverless". The only big difference is that the cloud provider like Microsoft Azure takes care of it for you so that you, your organization and development team can focus on solving and creating solutions with these cloud services like Durable Functions.

What are Azure Durable Functions?

Azure Durable Functions is an extension of Azure Functions

Azure Functions - a serverless solution that allows you to write less code, maintain less infrastructure, and save on costs. Instead of worrying about deploying and maintaining servers, the cloud infrastructure provides all the up-to-date resources needed to keep your applications running. You focus on the pieces of code that matter most to you, and Microsoft Azure Functions handle the rest.

Azure Durable Functions on the other hand are built on top of Azure Functions. It does more than standard Azure Functions can do, especially when you have to develop a serverless long-running stateful workflow from the code along with the Azure Functions in a serverless environment.

Major Benefits of Using Azure Durable Functions

Define and write workflows by code
Create long-running tasks
Solves the need to work with multiple Azure Functions
Create serverless stateful workflows that require human interaction, wait for external events, monitoring, aggregation and more
Solve the need to make sure that the status of your workflow is consistent
Focus on developer productivity
Auto-scaling capabilities
Pay only for what you use (Check out Azure Pricing Calculator)
Integration with other cloud services and APIs

Azure Durable Task Framework - The Technology Behind

Behind the scenes, the Durable Functions extension is built on top of the Durable Task Framework, an open-source library on GitHub that's used to build workflows in code.
Like Azure Functions is the serverless evolution of Azure WebJobs, Durable Functions is the serverless evolution of the Durable Task Framework. Microsoft and other organizations use the Durable Task Framework extensively to automate mission-critical processes. It's a natural fit for the serverless Azure Functions environment.

Major Components in Azure Durable Functions

Client functions are the entry point for creating an instance of a Durable Functions orchestration. They are the starting point of the entire process. Client Functions in Azure Durable Functions can run in response to an event from several sources, an event message posted to queue, HTTP request, or event stream event triggers, and more. Client functions can be written in different programming languages available and supported.

Below is an example of an HTTP Trigger Client that kick starts the orchestrator.

Orchestrator functions describe how actions are executed. It is an important part of Durable Functions. The workflow of actions should be in the order in which they are to run. When you write the orchestration logic in code, it is important that these functions are deterministic.

One great thing about the orchestrator is that it sleeps!
When it sleeps you do not get charge for the service. Stateful workflows solve some problems that normal Azure Functions cannot.
For function chaining pattern for example, the orchestrator sleep while the current activity is doing its tasks. When it is finished, then orchestrator wakes up to start the next activity and so on.

Here is my example of how a simple workflow code looks in an orchestrator.

Learn more about Deterministic APIs

Activity functions are the basic units of work in a durable function orchestration. An activity function contains the actual work performed by the tasks being orchestrated.

Entity functions define operations for reading and updating small pieces of state, known as durable entities.

Entity Functions is a recent addition to Azure Durable Functions. Although these feature is only available in Durable Functions 2.0 and above. They are currently supported in .NET and JavaScript (as of this date this articles publication).

Entity functions define operations for reading and updating small pieces of state, known as durable entities. Like orchestrator functions, entity functions are functions with a special trigger type, the entity trigger. Unlike orchestrator functions, entity functions manage the state of an entity explicitly, rather than implicitly representing state via control flow. Entities provide a means for scaling out applications by distributing the work across many entities, each with a modestly sized state. Read more about Entity Functions.

Durable Functions Patterns

Durable Functions have different known patterns that are worth checking out.

Function Chaining
Fan out/Fan in
Async HTTP APIs
Monitor
Human Interaction

Read more about it in depth Azure Durable Functions Patterns

Best Practices of Developing Durable Functions (Orchestrator)

There are important things to consider when designing and creating your stateful workflows with Durable functions. As mentioned, orchestrator workflows must be deterministic.

Check out the DOs and DONTs when coding your workflow in your orchestrator function.

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Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻 — Tue, 29 Dec 2020 09:54:29 +0000

I've read a lot of great articles on this website and finally decided to sign up for an account here on Dev.to. Looking forward to create great contents here!

DEV Community: Jonah Andersson 👩🏻‍💻

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First Post on Dev.to