Introduction to Azure and Cloud Service Models

It is a cloud computing platform that provides services to meet your business goals. Azure supports Software as a Service (SaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Infrastructure as a Service computing. Azure services include maintaining a virtual machine in the cloud, and managing databases including advanced services such as artificial intelligence with machine learning and IoT.

Azure provides a feature to pay as you go, which means that you will only pay for the computing time that you utilize. Apart from the virtual machines and databases, Azure provides a scalable hosting platform for the developers to build, manage and deploy web-based applications using popular frameworks.

Another modern technology that Azure provides is Azure Functions which will help you create web-driven serverless applications without any need for code. The powerful Artificial Intelligence and Machine Learning services allow developers and data scientists to build, maintain and deploy machine learning models in the cloud. 

Deploy Machine Learning Models in the Cloud – Azure

The regional data centers allow you to distribute your application globally so you can locate them where they are needed the most that improve the user experience for your customers.

Azure Portal

It is a unified web-based easy-to-use interface that helps you to manage your Azure services and subscriptions. The portal lets you adjust the settings for your Azure account by letting you implement security policies, active user directories, and schedule backups. The pay-as-you-go service is also maintained through the Azure portal where you can start or stop the services that you use. You can also add or remove services according to your requirements. The portal provides the functionality to monitor the health of your application, provides an in-depth analysis report, and manages your service charges that can help you to identify errors such as System_Application_Force_Next_0007 and fix them using built-in troubleshooter. You can also personalize your dashboard so that you can only see the services that interest you the most.

Azure Services

There are so many services that Azure provides that we cannot go through them all individually but just to put it into the perspective here we have the following categories in the Azure services. But these categories are a small fraction of the services that Azure provides.

Compute

Azure helps you to scale up the computing power of your application by paying only for the services that you use. You can add as many virtual machines as you need or scale the company app services. The addition of computing power according to your requirement is one of the main reasons companies switch to Azure.

Networking

Another major component of Azure is networking, it helps you connect the cloud services to the on-premises infrastructure to bring the best possible user experience for the customers. A few examples of Azure networking are Virtual Private Network (VPN), Load balancer, Azure CDN, and many more.

Storage

One crucial problem that app owners face is storing large data on-premises storage. But now with Azure, we can store the data in the cloud. The disks, files, BLOB storage, and archival storage help you to scale up the app storage needs in a secure format. The data stored in the cloud is highly secure through encryption and accessible from anywhere in the world.

Mobile

With the Azure mobile services, you can easily build and deploy a cross-platform application. You can use cognitive services to build a smart application for any mobile device. This will include data synchronization, broadcasting push notifications, and connectivity to on-premise data.

Database

Azure provides a variety of open-source database engines to bring your current databases to the cloud. You can use tools to manage SQL, Cosmos DB, MySQL, and many other data services.

Web

Azure Web Services will help you build, manage and deploy web applications. These services include creating a web app, publishing an API to your services, or using Azure map.

IoT

The ability of a device to garner and provide information for data analysis is known as IoT. You can use these services to connect, monitor, and manage all your IoT assets as soon as they arrive from the sensors and take respective actions.

Big Data

The data from the weather system, communication system, or imaging platforms are sometimes so huge that the traditional analysis is no longer appropriate. When you have huge clusters of data, Azure open source cluster services will help you run analytics and aid in making decisions with complex queries. 

Artificial Intelligence

The commonly used form of cloud computing in the light of AI is Machine Learning. It is a concept of using existing databases to produce future behavior without being explicitly programmed. By using machine learning services you can easily build, train and deploy machine learning models to the cloud.

DevOps

It is a concept that brings together people, processes, and technologies by automating software delivery. Azure DevOps will help you create, build and release pipelines by continuous integration, delivery, and deployment of your applications.

Cloud Service Models

IaaS

The Infrastructure as a Service provides hardware capacities for the user to maintain their application. In this service, the cloud service provider will keep the hardware up to date but you have to manage the operating system maintenance and network configuration. This service is beneficial as it is easier to set up a virtual machine than physical servers.

PaaS

Platform as a Service is completely similar to IaaS but it provides additional facilities too. This service is a cloud hosting environment where the cloud provider manages the virtual machines and networking resources and the user deploys their applications in the managed environment. By using this service, the user who is deploying the application does not have to worry about the hardware and software requirements.

SaaS

Software as a Service is a complete package that includes the functionalities of both IaaS and PaaS. With SaaS, the cloud service provider manages all the aspects of the application including virtual machines, networking resources, databases, and applications. The user just has to provide the data.

Final Thoughts

The cloud solutions provided by Azure have helped the business achieve infrastructure optimization and cost efficiency in the process to launch their applications. There could not be a more optimal solution than Azure. Now, it depends on the business to take a big leap and save their time by months.