Steps to Create a Storage Account, Containers and File Share in Microsoft Azure

In this blog post, I dive into the world of Azure storage, uncovering the essentials of storage accounts, containers, and file sharing. Join me as we embark on a journey to understand the intricacies of Microsoft Azure and learn how to leverage its powerful storage capabilities.

Key Highlights:

🔹 Demystifying Azure storage accounts and their significance

🔹 Exploring different redundancy options for data durability and availability

🔹 Seamlessly scaling storage capacity to meet dynamic requirements

🔹 Step-by-step guide to creating containers for efficient data management

🔹 Unveiling Azure File Share for simplified file sharing and collaboration

🔹 Practical walkthrough: Creating your own storage account, containers, and file share.

Creating a Storage Account

A storage account in Azure is a container for storing various types of data, such as files, blobs, queues, tables, and disks. It provides a scalable and durable storage solution for applications and services running in the Azure cloud environment. Here are some key points about Azure storage accounts:

1. Data Redundancy: Azure storage accounts ensure data durability and availability through redundancy options.

2. Scalability: Azure storage accounts can seamlessly scale to accommodate varying amounts of data.

3. Data Access: Azure storage accounts provide REST-based APIs for easy data access from anywhere.

4. Data Security: Azure storage accounts offer encryption, access control, and integration with Azure Active Directory for data security.

5. Storage Types: Azure storage accounts support Blob storage, Files, Queue storage, and Table storage for different data scenarios.

6. Integration and Services: Azure storage accounts integrate with other Azure services for seamless application integration.

7. Monitoring and Management: Azure storage accounts provide monitoring, logging, and management capabilities for efficient storage usage.

Basic

First search for the Storage Account

Fill in the basic details

Advanced

Initially, things are default but in Blob storage we need to go with Hot option

Networking

In Network access -> 1st option is default but In 2nd option, we can also select our Vnet but for I am going with default Enable public access from all networks.

For Network routing, Microsoft network routing is best

Data Protection

I am going with by default configuration

Encryption

I am going with by default options

Review

My Storage account is ready now

Containers (Similar like AWS S3)

Containers: Containers are a logical unit of organization within a storage account. They are used to store and manage collections of blobs (Binary Large Objects) such as files, images, videos, documents, or any other type of unstructured data. Blobs within a container can be accessed individually, and they are typically addressed using a unique URL. Containers provide a way to group related blobs and manage access permissions at the container level.

Creating Container

Right now we have made this public but if anyone wants to change it to private, in that case we need to generate SAS

• Select Permission (Read only option)

• Time

• Allowed IP

• Protocols

Uploading file

I have uploaded an image file

It's like S3 there we can upload inside the container and every uploaded item has a URL. Download and Retrieve anywhere on the web.

We can also undelete the file as per the selected backup duration

File Shares

File Shares: File shares in Azure Storage provide shared access to files through the Server Message Block (SMB) protocol. They are designed to be accessed concurrently by multiple clients, making them suitable for scenarios where shared file storage is required. Azure file shares can be mounted as network drives on Windows, Linux, and macOS systems, enabling easy file access and sharing across different platforms.

I have uploaded a file here

I am going to create 2 VMs with different regions and I am creating files inside the VMs which are synchronized with each other.

I have accessed my First VM Server-1

I am going to paste the File share script in my both the VMs

• Create the mount directory:

sudo mkdir /mnt/demoshare1

This command creates a directory named "/mnt/demoshare1" where the Azure file share will be mounted.

• Create the "/etc/smbcredentials" directory if it doesn't exist:

if [ ! -d "/etc/smbcredentials" ]; then
  sudo mkdir /etc/smbcredentials
fi

This checks if the "/etc/smbcredentials" directory exists and creates it if it doesn't.

• Create the storage account credentials file if it doesn't exist:

if [ ! -f "/etc/smbcredentials/storage80.cred" ]; then
  sudo bash -c 'echo "username=storage80" >> /etc/smbcredentials/storage80.cred'
  sudo bash -c 'echo "password=iSJFi/nx3xOUaCl2U/cIk4Zu8KuuMPLt3oxmhrfRq31MgBjtaaVyVuzfQD2FqdVFycrEQaj5ptGo+ASt5cdfxQ==" >> /etc/smbcredentials/storage80.cred'
fi

This creates the storage account credentials file "/etc/smbcredentials/storage80.cred" if it doesn't exist. It contains the username and password for accessing the Azure file share.

• Set the permissions for the credentials file:

    sudo chmod 600 /etc/smbcredentials/storage80.cred
  

This command sets the permissions of the credentials file to restrict access only to the owner.

• Add an entry to the "/etc/fstab" file for automatic mounting:

sudo bash -c 'echo "//storage80.file.core.windows.net/demoshare1 /mnt/demoshare1 cifs nofail,credentials=/etc/smbcredentials/storage80.cred,dir_mode=0777,file_mode=0777,serverino,nosharesock,actimeo=30" >> /etc/fstab'

Azure file sync agent needs to be installed on the VM for synchronization

Server-1

Server-2

I have added hello using my Server-1 (VM Central India)

I can access this in my Server-2 (VM Us East)

Azure Panel

In my Azure panel, I can see all the files

Thank you for reading my blog, and I hope you find it informative and inspiring. If you have any feedback or questions, please feel free to reach out.

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