Microsoft Azure Advanced: Powershell

Name: Microsoft Azure Advanced: Powershell
Author: Steven Burnley

Learn how to perform Azure administration tasks using the Azure command line interface and PowerShell

Preview the first lesson free — get full access to all 3 lessons.

Course: On-Demand

Hello. In this lesson, we will see the difference between creating resources with the Azure CLI syntax versus the Azure PowerShell syntax. We will also then learn how to install PowerShell on our local administrator workstations, which could allow us to do Azure command -line administration from our workstations without using the Azure portal. You can see we're currently logged into the Azure portal. Let's pull up the Cloud Shell. You can do this by clicking on the Cloud Shell icon at the top of the screen located next to the search box. Once the Cloud Shell initializes, you will see at the left -hand side of the menu bar that we can switch between Bash and PowerShell. Let's first do an example administration of an Azure resource using Azure command -line interface syntax here in the Bash prompt. Let's create a virtual machine with script. Here you can see the syntax that's been entered into the Bash prompt to create a virtual machine. Let's make the screen a little bigger and look at the details. Here you can see we are going to run a single line of Azure CLI code to create a virtual machine called MyVM. It's going to create this virtual machine in a resource group called DemoOrg. It's also going to use the Windows 2022 edition of the Windows software. Let's execute this command. You will see that the username azureuser was provided, but we are going to enter in a password without people being able to view it. Let's do that now. You can see that the passwords match, so Azure in the background is now creating a virtual machine. This is the same virtual machine that could be created using the visual tools in the Azure portal by navigating the appropriate web pages. You can see the advantage of creating these resources at the command prompt. You can see that all of the information that would normally be provided in the screens has been provided through the concept of parameters to the azvmcreate statement. This allows administrators to build scripts that can be executed by others or be executed by automation tools in order to provide a consistent environment regardless of who does the creation. That's because no screens have to be navigated and it eliminates human error to a certain extent. Now, let's look at a similar capability of creating a virtual machine with scripts. But this time, we will do it through the alternative syntax, which is Azure PowerShell. In order to write a script in PowerShell, we're going to convert our terminal from Bash to PowerShell. We do this with the menu item on the left -hand side. After confirming that we would like to make the switch, it now opens up a blue background screen showing us that it now has the interpreter in place for PowerShell. Let's create a virtual machine with a PowerShell command. Here you can see the syntax for creating a virtual machine using PowerShell. The syntax is very similar. You can see that the parameters that need to be provided to build a virtual machine are the same. It still needs the machine name, the resource group, the location, etc. The syntax though is slightly different. As you can see, it starts with the phrase new AZVM, which is a single keyword. Let's execute the statement to create a virtual machine in our subscription using PowerShell syntax. Now you can see we are prompted for the username. We'll type that in now. We're now prompted for the password. You can now see that Azure is using PowerShell to create the virtual machine in the background. Again, this is faster than navigating the individual screens in the web portal, plus it provides an extra level of consistency. Once this process is complete, we will go into our collection of virtual machines to validate their installation. Let's close the Azure command prompt. We can now click on virtual machines at the top of the screen to view the virtual machines in our Azure subscription. Here you can see we now have three virtual machines, the demo VM from a previous example, and the two virtual machines that we just created, myVM and myVM2. There is no difference between virtual machines created in the graphical portal or virtual machines created at the command prompt. Because the Azure PowerShell is such a powerful way to manipulate and view resources in your cloud subscription, it is very popular for existing Windows administrators who have PowerShell experience to download and install the Azure PowerShell tools to their local machine. You could do this on servers or workstations where you would like to be able to log in and administer Azure without having to visit the graphical portal. This is also important in environments where you do not have access to the graphical portal through HTTPS, which is common in environments such as server hosting environments. You can see if you download and install the PowerShell module on your local machine, you will be able to use the PowerShell command prompt on a Windows workstation or Linux or Mac workstation in order to execute these appropriate commands. Thanks for watching.

Advanced Provider : Steven Burnley 3 Lessons · 18m in Arabic, German, English, Spanish, French, Portuguese, Chinese

Course Description

Most administrative tasks for your Azure subscription can be done using the browser-based web portal. There are scenarios where administrators must perform routine actions or want to run scripts to perform consistent or multistep operations. For these scenarios, Azure allows administration through two command-line interfaces. The Azure CLI is a dedicated command interpreter specifically designed for Azure administration. It can be used from a command prompt within the browser-based portal using a cloud shell. PowerShell is a common interface for administering Microsoft resources, and it has an extension to provide access to Azure resources. Administrators can choose between the Azure CLI and PowerShell for many tasks. So how do you use these tools?

In this course, you will learn how to perform administrative tasks from the command prompt. Using the command prompt to perform administrative tasks provides an alternative tool for administrators.

What You'll Learn

Explore common scenarios for performing administrative tasks at the command prompt
Review the Azure CLI and PowerShell interfaces for administering Azure resources
Perform administrative tasks using the Azure CLI and PowerShell
Use cloud shell within the Azure browser-based portal
View Azure resources using PowerShell
Modify Azure resources using PowerShell

Key Takeaways

Most administrative tasks for an Azure subscription can be done using the browser-based web portal, but the command line offers an alternative for running scripts and multistep operations.
Azure provides administration through two command-line interfaces: the Azure CLI and PowerShell.
The Azure CLI is a dedicated command interpreter designed specifically for Azure administration and can be run from a cloud shell within the browser-based portal.
PowerShell is a common interface for administering Microsoft resources and has an extension that provides access to Azure resources.
Administrators can choose between the Azure CLI and PowerShell for many tasks, including viewing and modifying resources.

Frequently Asked Questions

What does this course cover?

This course teaches how to perform Azure administrative tasks from the command prompt, covering the Azure CLI and PowerShell interfaces, the Azure cloud shell, and using PowerShell to view and modify resources.

Who is this course for?

It is aimed at administrators who want to perform routine actions or run scripts for consistent or multistep operations on an Azure subscription, as an alternative to the browser-based web portal.

What is the difference between the Azure CLI and PowerShell?

The Azure CLI is a dedicated command interpreter designed specifically for Azure administration, while PowerShell is a common interface for administering Microsoft resources that has an extension providing access to Azure resources. Administrators can choose between them for many tasks.

What skills will I gain from this course?

The course develops skills in Azure Automation, the Azure Command-Line Interface (Azure CLI), Cloud Administration, Command Prompt, and Microsoft Azure, and is associated with the Microsoft Certified: Azure Administrator Associate.

What lessons are included?

The course includes three lessons: Azure Cloudshell, Using Powershell to View Resources, and Using Powershell to Modify Resources.