Introduction to Microsoft Azure: A Beginner’s Guide

Microsoft Azure is essential for anyone pursuing a career in cloud computing. As most organizations today use cloud technologies, Azure is applicable across various industried. This blog will provide an Introduction to Microsoft Azure: A Beginner’s Guide to Cloud Computing. 

What is Microsoft Azure?

Microsoft Azure is a cloud computing platform created by Microsoft. It helps businesses organizations and developers to build, deploy, and manage their applications. Azure offers various services like computing, storage, networking, and AI solutions, making it a crucial tool for modern IT and business operations.

Core Azure Services

In this section, we will cover some of the important services in Azure. 

Compute: Azure provides scalable and flexible computing resources over the internet, rather than using our local servers we will use remote servers and services to run applications, store data, and manage workloads. For example, if we build a website that can handle 100 requests at a time. But unfortunately, we have 200 requests, which means double our capacity. In this, if we are using local servers, our website may crash as it is unable to handle the load. But if we are using Azure services, it will automatically assign another server, through which we can handle the load. Some key benefits of using Azure are cost, scalability, etc. By using Azure, we can run applications without managing infrastructure (IAAS).

Storage: If we launch our website using Azure, we need storage to save user data. To serve that purpose, Azure offers different types of storage such as Blob Storage for unstructured data, Disk Storage for virtual machines, and SQL Database for relational data management. Based on our requirements, we need to choose storage. Learn about Azure Data Lake, a repository of structured and unstructured data.

Networking: By using Azure networking techniques, we can connect and secure cloud resources. Azure’s networking services include Virtual Networks for creating private networks, Load Balancers for handling traffic, Azure CDN for faster content delivery, and Azure Firewall for ensuring security. By using Azure networking, we can create private and isolated networks (Not available to the public), which will add a security layer for Azure resources.

AI and Machine Learning: Azure offers some pre-built AI models for vision, speech, and language tasks, we can use these services directly. If we want to build some custom models also, Azure offers tools for that purpose.

Real-World Applications of Azure

Business Intelligence: Azure has a lot of advantages in real-time. For example, if an organization wants to make any decision, they can use Azure Synapse Analytics which collects data from various sources, and analyses data using queries and analytical techniques. And then we can use Power BI to visualize data. Based on those visualizations, organizations can make decisions.

IoT Solutions: We can use Azure for building IoT solutions also. Azure offers Azure IoT Hub and Azure Digital Twins to build and manage IoT applications. Azure IoT Hub is a cloud service that provides secure connection between IoT applications, and the devices connected to them. Azure Digital Twins is a platform for creating digital representations of real-world environments. By using these tools, we can manage and analyze data from various devices.

AI Integration: Azure offers Azure Cognitive Services and Azure Machine Learning. By using these we can automate processes and gain insights. By using Azure Cognitive Services, we can perform tasks like image and speech recognition, etc. And by using Azure machine learning, we can build, train, and deploy custom machine learning models.

Security and Compliance

Azure offers various features to protect your data from various threats. These features include Azure Security Center for security alerts, continuous monitoring, etc., Azure Active Directory for Authentication purposes, Azure Firewall for managing traffic, and Azure Key Vault for encryption.

Cost Management

Azure offers a pay-as-you-go pricing model, which means you only pay for the resources you use. For example, if you are using two servers, you will pay for those only and if you have four servers for one hour you will only pay for four servers for one hour only. With the Azure Pricing Calculator, we can estimate costs.

Getting Started with Azure

To start using Azure, follow these steps:

Azure Account Creation: To gain hands-on experience with Azure, visit Azure’s website and sign up for an account. You’ll receive free credits to explore Azure’s services but be aware that these credits are valid for only 30 days. We have limited access to resources using free credits. It’s important to use them wisely to avoid unexpected charges once they expire.

How to create a Microsoft Azure Account: A Step-by-Step Guide