Category: VMWare / Cloud Computing

The management infrastructure includes Azure resources and resource groups, subscriptions, and accounts. Understanding the hierarchical organization will help you plan your projects and products within Azure.

Azure resources and resource groups

A resource is the basic building block of Azure. Anything you create, provision, deploy, etc. is a resource. Virtual Machines (VMs), virtual networks, databases, cognitive services, etc. are all considered resources within Azure.

Resource groups are simply groupings of resources. When you create a resource, you’re required to place it into a resource group. While a resource group can contain many resources, a single resource can only be in one resource group at a time. Some resources may be moved between resource groups, but when you move a resource to a new group, it will no longer be associated with the former group. Additionally, resource groups can’t be nested, meaning you can’t put resource group B inside of resource group A.

Resource groups provide a convenient way to group resources together. When you apply an action to a resource group, that action will apply to all the resources within the resource group. If you delete a resource group, all the resources will be deleted. If you grant or deny access to a resource group, you’ve granted or denied access to all the resources within the resource group.

When you’re provisioning resources, it’s good to think about the resource group structure that best suits your needs.

For example, if you’re setting up a temporary dev environment, grouping all the resources together means you can deprovision all of the associated resources at once by deleting the resource group. If you’re provisioning compute resources that will need three different access schemas, it may be best to group resources based on the access schema, and then assign access at the resource group level.

There aren’t hard rules about how you use resource groups, so consider how to set up your resource groups to maximize their usefulness for you.

Azure subscriptions

In Azure, subscriptions are a unit of management, billing, and scale. Similar to how resource groups are a way to logically organize resources, subscriptions allow you to logically organize your resource groups and facilitate billing.

Using Azure requires an Azure subscription. A subscription provides you with authenticated and authorized access to Azure products and services. It also allows you to provision resources. An Azure subscription links to an Azure account, which is an identity in Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) or in a directory that Azure AD trusts.

An account can have multiple subscriptions, but it’s only required to have one. In a multi-subscription account, you can use the subscriptions to configure different billing models and apply different access-management policies. You can use Azure subscriptions to define boundaries around Azure products, services, and resources. There are two types of subscription boundaries that you can use:

• Billing boundary: This subscription type determines how an Azure account is billed for using Azure. You can create multiple subscriptions for different types of billing requirements. Azure generates separate billing reports and invoices for each subscription so that you can organize and manage costs.
• Access control boundary: Azure applies access-management policies at the subscription level, and you can create separate subscriptions to reflect different organizational structures. An example is that within a business, you have different departments to which you apply distinct Azure subscription policies. This billing model allows you to manage and control access to the resources that users provision with specific subscriptions.

Create additional Azure subscriptions

Similar to using resource groups to separate resources by function or access, you might want to create additional subscriptions for resource or billing management purposes. For example, you might choose to create additional subscriptions to separate:

• Environments: You can choose to create subscriptions to set up separate environments for development and testing, security, or to isolate data for compliance reasons. This design is particularly useful because resource access control occurs at the subscription level.
• Organizational structures: You can create subscriptions to reflect different organizational structures. For example, you could limit one team to lower-cost resources, while allowing the IT department a full range. This design allows you to manage and control access to the resources that users provision within each subscription.
• Billing: You can create additional subscriptions for billing purposes. Because costs are first aggregated at the subscription level, you might want to create subscriptions to manage and track costs based on your needs. For instance, you might want to create one subscription for your production workloads and another subscription for your development and testing workloads.

Azure management groups

The final piece is the management group. Resources are gathered into resource groups, and resource groups are gathered into subscriptions. If you’re just starting in Azure that might seem like enough hierarchy to keep things organized. But imagine if you’re dealing with multiple applications, multiple development teams, in multiple geographies.

If you have many subscriptions, you might need a way to efficiently manage access, policies, and compliance for those subscriptions. Azure management groups provide a level of scope above subscriptions. You organize subscriptions into containers called management groups and apply governance conditions to the management groups. All subscriptions within a management group automatically inherit the conditions applied to the management group, the same way that resource groups inherit settings from subscriptions and resources inherit from resource groups. Management groups give you enterprise-grade management at a large scale, no matter what type of subscriptions you might have. Management groups can be nested.

Management group, subscriptions, and resource group hierarchy

You can build a flexible structure of management groups and subscriptions to organize your resources into a hierarchy for unified policy and access management. The following diagram shows an example of creating a hierarchy for governance by using management groups.

Some examples of how you could use management groups might be:

• Create a hierarchy that applies a policy. You could limit VM locations to the US West Region in a group called Production. This policy will inherit onto all the subscriptions that are descendants of that management group and will apply to all VMs under those subscriptions. This security policy can’t be altered by the resource or subscription owner, which allows for improved governance.
• Provide user access to multiple subscriptions. By moving multiple subscriptions under a management group, you can create one Azure role-based access control (Azure RBAC) assignment on the management group. Assigning Azure RBAC at the management group level means that all sub-management groups, subscriptions, resource groups, and resources underneath that management group would also inherit those permissions. One assignment on the management group can enable users to have access to everything they need instead of scripting Azure RBAC over different subscriptions.

Important facts about management groups:

• 10,000 management groups can be supported in a single directory.
• A management group tree can support up to six levels of depth. This limit doesn’t include the root level or the subscription level.
• Each management group and subscription can support only one parent.

Physical infrastructure

The physical infrastructure for Azure starts with datacenters. Conceptually, the datacenters are the same as large corporate datacenters. They’re facilities with resources arranged in racks, with dedicated power, cooling, and networking infrastructure.

As a global cloud provider, Azure has datacenters around the world. However, these individual datacenters aren’t directly accessible. Datacenters are grouped into Azure Regions or Azure Availability Zones that are designed to help you achieve resiliency and reliability for your business-critical workloads.

The Global infrastructure site gives you a chance to interactively explore the underlying Azure infrastructure.

Regions

A region is a geographical area on the planet that contains at least one, but potentially multiple datacenters that are nearby and networked together with a low-latency network. Azure intelligently assigns and controls the resources within each region to ensure workloads are appropriately balanced.

When you deploy a resource in Azure, you’ll often need to choose the region where you want your resource deployed.

Some services or virtual machine (VM) features are only available in certain regions, such as specific VM sizes or storage types. There are also some global Azure services that don’t require you to select a particular region, such as Azure Active Directory, Azure Traffic Manager, and Azure DNS.

Availability Zones

Availability zones are physically separate datacenters within an Azure region. Each availability zone is made up of one or more datacenters equipped with independent power, cooling, and networking. An availability zone is set up to be an isolation boundary. If one zone goes down, the other continues working. Availability zones are connected through high-speed, private fiber-optic networks.

To ensure resiliency, a minimum of three separate availability zones are present in all availability zone-enabled regions. However, not all Azure Regions currently support availability zones.

Use availability zones in your apps

You want to ensure your services and data are redundant so you can protect your information in case of failure. When you host your infrastructure, setting up your own redundancy requires that you create duplicate hardware environments. Azure can help make your app highly available through availability zones.

You can use availability zones to run mission-critical applications and build high-availability into your application architecture by co-locating your compute, storage, networking, and data resources within an availability zone and replicating in other availability zones. Keep in mind that there could be a cost to duplicating your services and transferring data between availability zones.

Availability zones are primarily for VMs, managed disks, load balancers, and SQL databases. Azure services that support availability zones fall into three categories:

• Zonal services: You pin the resource to a specific zone (for example, VMs, managed disks, IP addresses).
• Zone-redundant services: The platform replicates automatically across zones (for example, zone-redundant storage, SQL Database).
• Non-regional services: Services are always available from Azure geographies and are resilient to zone-wide outages as well as region-wide outages.

Even with the additional resiliency that availability zones provide, it’s possible that an event could be so large that it impacts multiple availability zones in a single region. To provide even further resilience, Azure has Region Pairs.

Region pairs

Most Azure regions are paired with another region within the same geography (such as US, Europe, or Asia) at least 300 miles away. This approach allows for the replication of resources across a geography that helps reduce the likelihood of interruptions because of events such as natural disasters, civil unrest, power outages, or physical network outages that affect an entire region. For example, if a region in a pair was affected by a natural disaster, services would automatically fail over to the other region in its region pair.

Not all Azure services automatically replicate data or automatically fall back from a failed region to cross-replicate to another enabled region. In these scenarios, recovery and replication must be configured by the customer.

Examples of region pairs in Azure are West US paired with East US and South-East Asia paired with East Asia. Because the pair of regions are directly connected and far enough apart to be isolated from regional disasters, you can use them to provide reliable services and data redundancy.

Additional advantages of region pairs:

• If an extensive Azure outage occurs, one region out of every pair is prioritized to make sure at least one is restored as quickly as possible for applications hosted in that region pair.
• Planned Azure updates are rolled out to paired regions one region at a time to minimize downtime and risk of application outage.
• Data continues to reside within the same geography as its pair (except for Brazil South) for tax- and law-enforcement jurisdiction purposes.

Most directions are paired in two directions, meaning they are the backup for the region that provides a backup for them (West US and East US back each other up). However, some regions, such as West India and Brazil South, are paired in only one direction. In a one-direction pairing, the Primary region does not provide backup for its secondary region. So, even though West India’s secondary region is South India, South India does not rely on West India. West India’s secondary region is South India, but South India’s secondary region is Central India. Brazil South is unique because it’s paired with a region outside of its geography. Brazil South’s secondary region is South Central US. The secondary region of South Central US isn’t Brazil South.

Sovereign Regions

In addition to regular regions, Azure also has sovereign regions. Sovereign regions are instances of Azure that are isolated from the main instance of Azure. You may need to use a sovereign region for compliance or legal purposes.

Azure sovereign regions include:

• US DoD Central, US Gov Virginia, US Gov Iowa and more: These regions are physical and logical network-isolated instances of Azure for U.S. government agencies and partners. These datacenters are operated by screened U.S. personnel and include additional compliance certifications.
• China East, China North, and more: These regions are available through a unique partnership between Microsoft and 21Vianet, whereby Microsoft doesn’t directly maintain the datacenters.

What is the Azure free account?

The Azure free account includes:

• Free access to popular Azure products for 12 months.
• A $200 credit to use for the first 30 days.
• Access to more than 25 products that are always free.

The Azure free account is an excellent way for new users to get started and explore. To sign up, you need a phone number, a credit card, and a Microsoft or GitHub account. The credit card information is used for identity verification only. You won’t be charged for any services until you upgrade to a paid subscription.

azure.microsoft.com/free

What is the Microsoft Learn sandbox?

Many of the Learn exercises use a technology called the sandbox, which creates a temporary subscription that’s added to your Azure account. This temporary subscription allows you to create Azure resources during a Learn module. Learn automatically cleans up the temporary resources for you after you’ve completed the module.

When you’re completing a Learn module, you’re welcome to use your personal subscription to complete the exercises in a module. However, the sandbox is the preferred method to use because it allows you to create and test Azure resources at no cost to you.

Switch between PowerShell CLi and bash CLI in the Azure Cloud Shell easily.

Once initialized, you can use the arrow keys or tab to help complete your commands. Interactive mode is set up specifically for Azure, so you don’t need to enter az to start a command (but you can if you want to or are used to it). Try the upgrade or version commands again, but this time without az in front.

Leave Interactive mode with the exit command.

Create VM in the Sandbox

Any exercise that uses the sandbox will require you to activate the sandbox subscription first. Once activated, you can login to the Azure portal and create resource without being billed for it by choosing the learn subscription during resource creation.

Troubleshooting The Sandbox

This error occurs when the subscription button on the learn.microsoft.com page either hasn’t been clicked on or has timed out. Re-click the subscription acceptance button, usually at the top of the page for the exercise you’re doing.

When comparing IT infrastructure models, there are two types of expenses to consider. Capital expenditure (CapEx) and operational expenditure (OpEx).

CapEx is typically a one-time, up-front expenditure to purchase or secure tangible resources. A new building, repaving the parking lot, building a datacenter, or buying a company vehicle are examples of CapEx.

In contrast, OpEx is spending money on services or products over time. Renting a convention center, leasing a company vehicle, or signing up for cloud services are all examples of OpEx.

Cloud computing falls under OpEx because cloud computing operates on a consumption-based model. With cloud computing, you don’t pay for the physical infrastructure, the electricity, the security, or anything else associated with maintaining a datacenter. Instead, you pay for the IT resources you use. If you don’t use any IT resources this month, you don’t pay for any IT resources.

This consumption-based model has many benefits, including:

• No upfront costs.
• No need to purchase and manage costly infrastructure that users might not use to its fullest potential.
• The ability to pay for more resources when they’re needed.
• The ability to stop paying for resources that are no longer needed.

With a traditional datacenter, you try to estimate the future resource needs. If you overestimate, you spend more on your datacenter than you need to and potentially waste money. If you underestimate, your datacenter will quickly reach capacity and your applications and services may suffer from decreased performance. Fixing an under-provisioned datacenter can take a long time. You may need to order, receive, and install more hardware. You’ll also need to add power, cooling, and networking for the extra hardware.

In a cloud-based model, you don’t have to worry about getting the resource needs just right. If you find that you need more virtual machines, you add more. If the demand drops and you don’t need as many virtual machines, you remove machines as needed. Either way, you’re only paying for the virtual machines that you use, not the “extra capacity” that the cloud provider has on hand.

Compare cloud pricing models

Cloud computing is the delivery of computing services over the internet by using a pay-as-you-go pricing model. You typically pay only for the cloud services you use, which helps you:

• Plan and manage your operating costs.
• Run your infrastructure more efficiently.
• Scale as your business needs change.

To put it another way, cloud computing is a way to rent compute power and storage from someone else’s datacenter. You can treat cloud resources like you would resources in your own datacenter. However, unlike in your own datacenter, when you’re done using cloud resources, you give them back. You’re billed only for what you use.

Instead of maintaining CPUs and storage in your datacenter, you rent them for the time that you need them. The cloud provider takes care of maintaining the underlying infrastructure for you. The cloud enables you to quickly solve your toughest business challenges and bring cutting-edge solutions to your users.

Part or all of the cost and responsibility of hosting and managing your own corporate IT infrastructure can be shared with a Cloud Service Provider.

Whereas On Premise Infrastructure is entirely your own responsibility, Infrastructure, Platform and/or Software can all be hosted in the Cloud and procured as an on-demand, rented service, with shared responsibility.

You’ll always be responsible for:

• The information and data stored in the cloud
• Devices that are allowed to connect to your cloud (cell phones, computers, and so on)
• The accounts and identities of the people, services, and devices within your organization

The cloud provider is always responsible for:

• The physical datacenter
• The physical network
• The physical hosts

Your service model will determine responsibility for things like:

• Operating systems
• Network controls
• Applications
• Identity and infrastructure

The cloud models define the deployment type of cloud resources. The three main cloud models are: private, public, and hybrid.

Private cloud

Let’s start with a private cloud. A private cloud is, in some ways, the natural evolution from a corporate datacenter. It’s a cloud (delivering IT services over the internet) that’s used by a single entity. Private cloud provides much greater control for the company and its IT department. However, it also comes with greater cost and fewer of the benefits of a public cloud deployment. Finally, a private cloud may be hosted from your on site datacenter. It may also be hosted in a dedicated datacenter offsite, potentially even by a third party that has dedicated that datacenter to your company.

Public cloud

A public cloud is built, controlled, and maintained by a third-party cloud provider. With a public cloud, anyone that wants to purchase cloud services can access and use resources. The general public availability is a key difference between public and private clouds.

Hybrid cloud

A hybrid cloud is a computing environment that uses both public and private clouds in an inter-connected environment. A hybrid cloud environment can be used to allow a private cloud to surge for increased, temporary demand by deploying public cloud resources. Hybrid cloud can be used to provide an extra layer of security. For example, users can flexibly choose which services to keep in public cloud and which to deploy to their private cloud infrastructure.

Multi-cloud

A fourth, and increasingly likely scenario is a multi-cloud scenario. In a multi-cloud scenario, you use multiple public cloud providers. Maybe you use different features from different cloud providers. Or maybe you started your cloud journey with one provider and are in the process of migrating to a different provider. Regardless, in a multi-cloud environment you deal with two (or more) public cloud providers and manage resources and security in both environments.

Azure Arc

Azure Arc is a set of technologies that helps manage your cloud environment. Azure Arc can help manage your cloud environment, whether it’s a public cloud solely on Azure, a private cloud in your datacenter, a hybrid configuration, or even a multi-cloud environment running on multiple cloud providers at once.

Azure VMware Solution

What if you’re already established with VMware in a private cloud environment but want to migrate to a public or hybrid cloud? Azure VMware Solution lets you run your VMware workloads in Azure with seamless integration and scalability.

If you’ve downloaded the vCenter Server Appliance .iso file, unpacked it to a folder on your Linux workstation, then hit a problem during installation reading the .ovf file during deployment to your VMWare ESXi hypervisor

./vcsa-ui-installer/lin64/installer

The end of the installation log will read something like this

There were a couple additional steps I had to do in order to get it to run from my filesystem, rather than from a mounted .iso.

firstly, chmod -R 777 the whole lot, e.g. if you’ve unpacked the iso into a folder called /vCentre-deployment then chmod -R 777 /vCentre -deployment

You will likely have to chmod +x the  ./vcsa-ui-installer/lin64/installer file too.  I didn’t need to run it using sudo since the installation is to a remote ESXi host on the network, not the local machine.

Upon re-running the installer, you should progress past the point where the installer throws the error shown above and see the following screen.

Note that even for a “tiny” deployment, 10GB of RAM is required on the ESXi host.  A frankly obscene minimum requirement and hence where this blog post subsequently ends.

You may find that your ESXi web-based UI frustratingly times out after a few minutes during attempted uploads of large files to your Datastore, such as .iso’s.

You can disable the time out altogether.

Click on the little drop down over on the far, right hand side…

Settings, Application timeout, Off.