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| [image source: Amazon.com] |
Thanks to Divya Aravind for the very kind invitation to review this book.
Microsoft Azure in Action, by Lars Klint
https://www.amazon.com//dp/1617299650
A concise introduction and overview of Microsoft Azure
This is a good book if you are new to Microsoft Azure - and it is appropriate for leadership teams, managers, delivery teams, infrastructure folks, networking staff, cybersecurity, operations personnel, and architects of all types. Everyone for whom Azure is new - will gain beneficial insights, for their respective roles, by reading this book.
While trying to comprehensively tackle Azure in a single book (in less than 370 pages) is an impossible task for anyone - this book provides an excellent means for IT staff to quickly get oriented and familiarized with much of the core Azure concepts, services, and best practices.
A few words about the quality that has gone into the writing of this book:
First, the content is well organized.
Second, the writing is concise.
Third, the selected material is the most relevant information to impart to the reader - to get them hands-on, soonest.
From the Forward, I agree with this sentiment:
"I first met Lars at TechEd Sydney in 2014, where he was doing what he does best: making complex technology feel approachable and energizing. ... Lars doesn’t just explain what Azure can do; he offers a hands-on guide"
-- Scott Gutherie
From the Preface, note the author's goals for the book: "hands-on", "straight to the point", "practical examples", and "relatable".
These objectives are well met by this book.
One of the best aspects of the author's writing - is the patient step-by-step detailed guidance - that includes the WHY of many decision decisions - and the REASON for choosing particular configuration options.
Four parts of the book - that I think the majority of folks will find most interesting - in particular, include:
Chapter 4 (Networking in Azure)
Chapter 6 (Security)
Chapter 8 (Serverless) - re: touching on API Gateway usage
Chapter 10 (Relational databases) - re: 10.5 Disaster Recovery
I'm giving this book a solid 4 Stars - as I believe it is a worthwhile book to have on your bookshelf.
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During my background research for this review, I found a number of additional resources that readers of the book might find of possible interest:
Official Microsoft Azure resources:
- Azure Documentation
- Azure Updates
- Azure subscription and service limits, quotas, and constraints
- Microsoft Azure Pricing calculator
- Microsoft Cloud Adoption Framework
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/
- Architecture
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/browse/
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/guide/
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/icons/
- Functions
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-functions/
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/azure-functions/supported-languages
- https://github.com/Azure/functions-action
- Kusto Query Language (KQL)
- Azure for Rust Developers
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/developer/rust/
- https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/developer/rust/what-is-azure-for-rust-developers
- Security
- Azure Example Resources
- Azure Developer Community
- https://azure.github.io/dev-community/
- https://azure.github.io/dev-community/awesome-azure/
- https://azure.github.io/awesome-azd/
- Azure Community Space
- Microsoft Q&A > Azure
Other non-Microsoft Azure resources:
- stackoverflow - Microsoft Azure Collective
- Meetups:
- Microsoft Tech Groups
- Microsoft Azure Community User Group (London, UK)
- GitHub Azure-related Awesome lists
- https://github.com/lukemurraynz/awesome-azure-architecture
- (updated ~2 weeks ago)
- https://github.com/johnlokerse/awesome-azure-devops
- (updated ~4 months ago)
- https://github.com/kmcquade/awesome-azure-security
- (2 years since last update)
- https://github.com/Azure-Samples/azure-ai
- (2 years since last update) \
