Day 27: Azure Az-900: How to set up an Azure Blob/storage account?

In this blog post, we’re going to walk through the process of setting up blob storage on Microsoft Azure. Blob storage on Azure provides a serverless storage solution, which means you don’t need to worry about managing the physical storage space or scaling it as your data grows. This makes it a fantastic option for storing large amounts of unstructured data such as videos, images, and logs.

Step-by-Step Guide

Step 1: Access Storage?Accounts

To begin, you’ll need to log into your Azure portal. Once logged in, search for “Blob Storage” in the portal’s search bar, which will lead you to the storage accounts section. This area allows you to manage all your storage-related needs.

Step 2: Create a New Storage Account

Click on the “Add” button to start creating a new storage account. You will be prompted to enter details for the new storage account:

1. Resource Group: Select an existing resource group or create a new one. For our example, let’s select “TheTin-Test”.
2. Storage Account Name: Name your storage account. Remember, this needs to be unique and all lowercase. For instance, “talibteststorage”.
3. Region: Choose the region that best suits you; typically, selecting one close to your location is best for performance. Let’s go with “US East”. Performance: Select between “Standard” and “Premium”. For general purposes, “Standard” is sufficient. Azure Premium performance storage should be chosen when your workload demands high performance and low latency. This means applications requiring a large number of input/output operations per second (IOPS) and high throughput would benefit greatly from Premium storage’s solid-state drive (SSD) infrastructure. Here’s a brief overview of how Premium storage applies to block blobs, file shares, and page blobs:

• Block Blobs (Premium Block Blob Storage): Ideal for storing large amounts of unstructured data like text or binary data. Premium block blobs offer consistent low latency and high IOPS, making them perfect for scenarios like big data analytics, media streaming, and data archiving.
• File Shares (Azure Premium Files): Designed for high-performance file sharing scenarios where multiple VMs need concurrent access to shared files. Premium file shares provide high throughput and low latency, making them suitable for content management systems, development environments, and database backups.

• Page Blobs (Premium Page Blob Storage): Primarily used for random read/write operations on large files. Premium page blobs are commonly used for virtual machine disks, requiring fast and reliable access to data for smooth operation.

4. Account Kind: Ensure you select “BlobStorage” to specifically create a blob storage account.

5. Replication: Choose a replication option that suits your budget and redundancy requirements. For simplicity, we can leave it at the default setting. For more information about each of the options, you can refer my redundancy blog here. For this example we will be selecting “LRS”.

Step 3: Review and?Create

Once all options are set, click on “Review + Create”. Azure will validate your settings. After validation, click “Create”. Azure will then deploy your storage account, and you’ll see a status indicating “Deployment underway”. This might take a few minutes.

Step 4: Create a Container

After your storage account is ready, navigate to it and find the “Containers” section. Containers help organise your blobs similarly to how folders work on your computer.

• Click on “Container” and create a new one. Let’s name it “talibilat”.

• Set the access level to “Private” to restrict access to yourself only.

Step 5: Upload a?File

Now that you have a container, it’s time to upload a file:

• Choose “Upload” and select a file from your computer. Let’s assume you have a file ready on your desktop.

• Leave the default options and click “Upload”. Your file will now be stored in your new Azure blob storage.

Step 6: Cleaning?Up

Once you’re done with testing or if you wish to remove your resources:

• Return to the main page of your storage account.
• Navigate to “Containers”, select your container, and delete it if necessary.
• Finally, delete your storage account to avoid unnecessary charges.

Congratulations! You’ve successfully set up and utilised blob storage on Azure. This guide should help you get started with cloud storage, allowing you to store large amounts of data without worrying about the underlying infrastructure. As you become more familiar with Azure, you’ll find this an invaluable tool for managing big data effectively and efficiently.

Remember, practice is key, so don’t hesitate to explore more and experiment with Azure’s capabilities!