We're just starting out with Microsoft Azure, and I'm reading through the Azure infrastructure services implementation guidelines (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/virtual-machines-infrastructure-services-implementation-guidelines/). The document talks about Cloud Resources and Cloud Services, but I've found myself confused by the difference between these - (and couldn't find anything much when trying to Google this!). Can someone please enlighten!
Thanks in Advance
Cloud Services are ways to combine a set of stateful virtual machines (or web/worker role instances, which are stateless virtual machines) into its own private network, sitting behind a public virtual IP address. The Cloud Service also provides optional load-balancing between the virtual machines). Cloud Services have been around since the beginning of Azure, and are considered part of the "classic" compute model. All classic virtual machines (whether stateful or stateless) live within a Cloud Service.
I don't know what you mean by Cloud Resources, but... Azure now has the Azure Resource Manager (ARM), which is a newer way to create virtual machines. There is no notion of a Cloud Service with ARM; the approach is to build out a set of resources (such as virtual machines, networks, NICs, IP addresses, etc) and dependencies, as a single managed set of resources.
The Azure site has documentation for classic Cloud Services here.
And documentation for ARM is here.
Azure service is simply a computing 'service' provided through the internet (cloud) than on-premises servers.
Docs:
Simply put, cloud computing is the delivery of computing
services—servers, storage, databases, networking, software, analytics,
intelligence and more—over the Internet (“the cloud”)...
Webopedia
A cloud service is any service made available to users on demand via
the Internet from a cloud computing provider's servers as opposed to
being provided from a company's own on-premises servers
Azure resource is an instance of the Cloud service(Or its components.) When you pay for a service and use it for something it becomes a 'resource' for you.
Docs
A manageable item that is available through Azure.
You can also see the difference on the Azure portal when you click 'Azure Services' (It lists what they can provide) and 'All Resources' (It lists what you already have)
Azure gives you services like Compute, Networking, Storage etc.
Within each service are resource types, such as Virtual Machine, Virtual Network, Storage Accounts etc
When you create a Virtual Machine, it is a Resource.
Related
In the context of virtual network service endpoints, the documentation states:
Endpoints work with any type of compute instances running within that subnet.
What exactly is meant by compute instances? It's clear that this includes virtual machine instances, but does this also include e.g. an app service with vnet integration? How about Azure functions? What other services/azure resources are able to talk to service endpoints?
Yes, you already named a few there. Without completeness:
VMs
AKS (which is VMs...)
App Services and Functions (same platform)
Container Instances
Databricks
#silent has already listed the services, I would like to add that most of the services make use of the compute instances in some form or the other.
Clients that are deployed inside of a subnet or are connected/integrated with a subnet can connection to Service Endpoint enabled destinations.
You could also add App Service Environment to the list. Though its App Services, it is a different offering compared to regular App Services.
My Cloud Service (hosted in USEast) is pretty sluggish when used by customers who are not US based. I am looking for some quick win, that do not include deploying to multiple regions.
A quick google returned a document instructing I could Optimize network throughput for Azure virtual machines by using Accelerated Networking.
I would like to enable this option on my Cloud Service VMs, however I am not sure this is even possible as I do not really control the VMs, the network, or even the NICs.
Has anyone successfully enabled Accelerated Networking for their Cloud Service?
Yes it's possible.
Accelerated Networking (or Dynamic Network Acceleration) is essentially a CDN without the caching. It can be pointed at any web service, and it will provide the benefits of the Azure Network for all requests, not just requests suitable for caching.
Simply set the CDN origin to the Cloud Service's endpoint url.
What is difference between Traffic manager(classic) and Traffic manager in Azure?
Essentially, it is the one service, it is using different dev models. There are two development models in Azure called Azure Service Management (classic) and Azure Resource Management. The ARM is the new one, which is the one you mentioned as a second.
It is recommended to use the new one, but it does not have yet the full functional parity with the classic one. More about that, chapter "Comparison with the Azure Traffic Manager Service Management API".
If I create a node on Azure through the Docker Cloud Service, will the Azure vm be managed for me? For example, will I have to manage security on the VM (firewalls etc), and updates?
Every virtual machine created in Azure will be secured by Microsoft by various ways. But here it would be helpful to know what you mean by the security - some of features are enabled as a service.
There is Azure Trust Center where you can find what Microsoft does for the security.
Basic information, including some Security-Features-As-a-Service, can be found on the Azure VMs landing page.
We are on the process of choosing a Cloud provider to run our VMs, and we would like to better understand the differences between AWS and the new Azure.
Does anyone know if Azure Cloud (IaaS) have an equivalent for the AWS Route53 and Elastic Load Balancer?
If it has, how does it work? Do they also have several different zones across the globe capable of providing High-Availability with minimum impact on the latency?
Thank you
Microsoft doesn't have a DNS service like Route53. But does support common DNS operations such as c-name routing/forwarding to various Windows Azure services. As for zones, there are currently 8 locations that MSFT offers for hosting of Windows Azure, 2 in Europe, 2 in Asia, 4 in the US, and Fujistsu offers hosting of some Windows Azure services in Japan. With the possible exception of Fujitsu (I don't know the details of their SLA), all Windows Azure Services are at least 99.9% (the definition of "highly available" is subjective). Additionally, Microsoft has the Content Delivery Network with more than 24 nodes spread across the globe to help speed delivery and reduce the latency of content being delivered to almost any geography.
For the most part yes, there is equivalence. Windows Azure has always had a load balancer on any external endpoint (exposed over the VIP). It is not a super programmable firewall at this point (you cannot do more than simply remove yourself from rotation), but it works very well for web farm scenarios.
Cloud Traffic Manager works very well for geo-locating your services in Windows Azure. Just deploy your service in multiple datacenters, configure a few settings in traffic manager, and you are done. Most folks use it for 'best performance' (i.e. closest DC to customer), but also you can use it for 'failover'.
In terms of DNS, there is no equivalent service today for handling external DNS names. You handle DNS today with your own servers. That is one point where AWS is ahead.