01-what-is-cloud_cloud-gui.md

Azure Cloud web interface

The goal: take a first look at Azure Cloud.

1. Find resources

   

   In most cases needed resource could be found with help of free-text-search texbox at the top of the screen 1.

   You can also use a hamburger menu at the top-left corner to oped All services view via steps 2 and 3. All services groups all available services into categories and also gives a Filter option.

   If most of the time you work with a subset of services, you can add them to Favorites 4. To accomplish that, find a service in All services view, hover the mouse on it and wait for pop-up to appear, then press star icon:

   

2. Marketplace

   Azure offers third-party suppliers and central place to showcase their offerings - Marketplace.

   

   When you search item in a search-box, Azure also suggests marketplace-offerings.

   You can also open just a Marketplace to see grouped by category all the available applications.

3. Create resource

   Press + button at Home page or at any resource-type page to create a new resource:

   

   Create a new Event Hub Namespaces: generate new resource group, choose pricing tier Standard to enable auto-inflate (on Features tab):

   

   Note, some resources should be unique across the entire Azure Cloud, some - across your subscription only.

   Note, during deployment you can get pre-generated ARM template.

4. Show created resource

   Open created resource:

   

   1. Essentials view often highlight the most important and most used parts of resoruce description. Note, when you hover mouse on, it suggest copy-to-clipboard.

   2. Below are often located monitoring dashboards. Note, if you click on chart, it allows editing.

   3. Activity log highlights what users/entities did any action with your resource.

   4. Access control (IAM) allows to edit who can do what with resource and check your roles within this resource scope.

   5. Shared access policies creates/edits secrets/keys to access the resource.

   6. Scale allows to scale the resource without re-creating it.

   7. Networking configures firewalls, network access.

   8. Properties contains system information which is often needed for cli commands or automation scripts.

   9. Locks could block resource from changes or deletion.

   10. Resource level entities. In case of Event hub namespace it can manage Event Hubs (e.g. kafka topic) and Schema Registry.

   11. Monitoring tabs: query logs, visualize metrics, define alerts.

5. Show subscription

   In subscription view there are a lot of views and data, but let's focus on two:

   

   1. Cost Management gives a tool to monitor your spendings, set alerts and define budget.

   2. Resource groups and Resources gives a quick path to resources inside this single subscription.

6. Support Request and troubleshooting

   All resources have Support + troubleshooting tab. If you define your issue criteria, Azure portal might suggest documentation, dashboards, troubleshoot steps. If you have paid support, you can also leave a support-request.