Showing all posts tagged: 'devops'

A 15-post collection

Enforcing TLS version on Azure WebApps with Resource Manager Policies

Azure Policies are an amazing, albeit well-hidden, feature that allow subscription administrators to define and enforce specific rules on how Azure Resources should be deployed. [Azure Policies](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-policy/azure-policy-introduction" target="_blank) have been around for a long time, however they only became a first-class feature on Azure recently by getting a dedicated section in the portal. Therefore, when working with Azure Policies in the portal these days, you can now see all the definitions and assignments in one central place, making it easier to manage infrastructure and set explicit rules to enforce …[read more]

Working with the latest .NET Core version in VSTS

Working with the latest and greatest is always exciting. As developers, we tend to download new software and SDKs in order to try it and, in some cases, benefit from early fixes or early access to new features. .NET Core 2.1 which was announced at Build is one such example. The first thing I did after the conference announcement was to go on my machine and download it so I could take it for a spin. However, as developers, we're not restricted to our machines. Eventually, the code is pushed into source control and from there the CI/CD …[read more]

Continuous Integration and Deployment of Java web apps to Azure with VSTS

Azure WebApps is one of the best services on Azure. I bet you heard me say this for every Azure service I write about. But, considering my first experience working with Azure was developing and deploying web apps, I have a special love for WebApps. I've been using the service since the early days when it was just Azure WebSites only to see it grow and mature to an awesome PaaS (Platform as a Service) offering. A fully managed service that allows you to run various apps, from basic small size websites all the way to multi-node, load balanced e-commerce …[read more]

Secure Azure ARM templates with Key Vault and VSTS

Azure ARM templates are the recommended way for standardising and automating resource deployments to Azure. The resource manager engine that drives the current portal and is also responsible for managing your infrastructure, where everything is a resource (VMs, WebApps, CosmosDB etc). ARM templates are JSON files that describe what your infrastructure looks like and comes with some great benefits: Infrastructure as Code Idempotent Source Control Tool flexibility Tighter security and control For this post, I would like to focus a bit on security and show you how to leverage some of the built-in Azure features to improve your overall Azure …[read more]

Introduction to Azure Functions Deployment Slots

Deployment slots have been an invaluable feature for Azure Web Apps for a long time. To find out how to create slots for Azure Web Apps, you can visit the official documentation [here](https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/app-service-web/web-sites-staged-publishing" target="_blank). So what makes deployment slots so useful? I summarize some of the benefits below but this is by no means the exhaustive list: [Testing in Production - A/B Testing](GHOST_URL/azure-websites-testing-in-production/" target="_blank) Hot deployments that allow deployment to production with no downtime UAT testing targeting a near live environment Easy …[read more]

Monitoring applications and infrastructure on Microsoft Azure

Microsoft's cloud service, Azure, provides a plethora of services to choose from when it comes to running your solutions on the cloud. By now, most of us are aware of the PaaS, IaaS and SaaS variances. The image below provides a good summary, in case you're new to this. The trick with the cloud is how to choose the right service or combination of services to make your solution as flexible, scalable and performant as possible while cutting down on costs. However, if there's one thing you need to be careful about is that you should avoid the "lift …[read more]

Getting started with DevOps

DevOps, micro-services, containers, Agile etc. All these terms are widely (ab)used in the developer circles and for many developers they are the norm. There's no tech conference today that doesn't have a track on at least one of these and for a good reason. They are the new and, almost, established way of working with code. Some of them have been around for a while, so they are well established. Others are just getting into the enterprise world - think of containers here. DevOps is definitely not new. If you're a developer, you've been doing DevOps for a long …[read more]

Deploying Functions with ARM templates and inline code

Last week I started a mini-series that focused on [Azure Functions and DevOps. The tooling is still being worked and in the interim we need a solution in order to do proper CI/CD with Azure Functions. In this post we're looking into how to deploy Azure Functions using ARM Templates only. That's correct. This is a one stop solution but requires that you include your function code inline to the ARM JSON template. This is somewhat undocumented and I had to figure out how do it with help from the Azure PG (product group). The good parts Obviously this …[read more]