Meet Azure Files, your new

Swiss Army Knife

Sandrino Di Mattia (@sandrinodm)

Microsoft Azure Consultant at RealDolmen

Author at JustAzure.com

http://fabriccontroller.net

“Shared Drive”-as-a-ServiceAZURE FILES

Agenda

1)Azure Storage and Azure Files2)Using Azure Files3)Comparing to Azure Blobs4)Comparing to Azure Disks5)Scenarios & Demos

Azure StorageAbstractions: Blobs, Tables, Queues and now Files

5

Azure Storage Account (500 TB)

FilesBlobs

Queues

Tables

Drives (PaaS)

Disks (IaaS)

Page

Block

6

Distributed Replication Layer

Massive Scale Out & Auto Load Balancing Index Layer

Blob HeadTable Head

File Share Head

REST REST REST RESTSMB 2.1

Queue Head

Using Azure Files

8

Azure Files

West-Europe

VM

Web Site

REST

SMB 2.1RESTSMB 2.1

REST

Cloud Service

9

Azure Files

West-Europe

Other Region

Cloud Service

VM

Web Site

REST

Contoso (On-Premises)

REST

10

PowerShell

•Creating a share

$c = New-AzureStorageContext <acc> <key>New-AzureStorageShare <share> -Context $ctx

11

AzCopy

•Recursive copy

AzCopy G:\Backups\ https://acc.file.core.windows.net/share/ /DestKey:key /s

12

SMB•Creating a mapped drive

net use Z: \\acc.file.core.windows.net\share /u:acc key==

• Persisting credentials

cmdkey /add:acc.file.core.windows.net /user:acc /pass:key

13

SMB• In Code (P/Invoke)

WNetAddConnection2 (Mpr.dll)

• In Code (Using RedDog.Storage)

CloudFileShare share = client.GetShareReference("reports");share.Mount("P:");

14

SMB

•Credentials: persisted per user•Mapped drives: persisted per user context•User can have 1 normal context•User can have 1 elevated context (administrator)

•Use /runas to store credentials and map drives for other users

15

REST• Using the Storage Client Library

var fileClient = storageAccount.CreateCloudFileClient();var share = fileClient.GetShareReference("reports");if (share.Exists()){ var dir = share.GetRootDirectoryReference(); var file = dir.GetFileReference("report.txt") var content = await file.DownloadTextAsync();}

Comparing to Azure BlobsDifferences between Azure Files and Azure Blobs

17

Attribute Azure Blobs Azure Files

Durability options LRS, ZRS, GRS (and RA-GRS for higher availability)

LRS, GRS

Accessibility / Connectivity REST APIs – Worldwide REST APIs – WorldwideSMB 2.1 - Within region

Endpoints http://myaccount.blob.core.windows.net/mycontainer/myblob

\\myaccount.file.core.windows.net\myshare\myfile.txt

http://myaccount.file.core.windows.net/myshare/myfile.txt

Directories Flat namespace True directory objects

Case sensitivity of names Case sensitive Case insensitive, but case preserving

Comparing to Azure Blobs

18

Attribute Azure Blobs Azure Files

Capacity Up to 500TB containers 5TB file shares

Throughput Up to 60 MB/s per block blob Up to 60 MB/s per share

Object size Up to 200GB/block blobUp to 1TB/page blob

Up to 1 TB/file

Billed capacity Based on bytes written Based on file size

Shared Access Signatures Yes No

Client libraries Multiple languages Multiple languages

Comparing to Azure Blobs

Comparing to Azure DisksDifferences between Azure Files and Azure Disks

20

Attribute Azure Data Disks Azure Files

Scope Exclusive to a single virtual machine

Shared access across multiple virtual machines

Snapshots and Copy Yes No

Configuration Connected at startup of the virtual machine

Connected after the virtual machine has started

Authentication Built-in Set up with net use

Caching Support Yes No

Access using REST Files within the VHD cannot be accessed when Virtual Machine is running

Files stored in a share can be accessed

Comparing to Azure Disks

21

Attribute Azure Data Disks Azure Files

Max Size 1TB Disk 5TB File Share and 1TB file within share

Max 8KB IOps 500 IOps 1000 IOps

Throughput Up to 60 MB/s per Disk Up to 60 MB/s per File Share

I/O traffic Uses the Virtual Disk Driver Uses network bandwidth (same interface as your applications)

Limit Maximum 16 disks (depending on VM size: Small = 2, Medium = 4, …)

Limited to available drive letters on your VM

Comparing to Azure Disks

Scenarios & DemosLift and shift, hybrid applications, …

23

Scenarios• Lift and Shift• CMS (media folder)• Central Logging• Remote Backup (MySQL, …)• ISO / Software Repository• Centralized Configuration / IIS Shared Configuration• Lucene (Near Real Time Search)• NServiceBus (FileShareDataBus)• On-Premises Replication• High-Available FTP Server

24

Service Account

Lift and Shift

ASP.NET Web Application

Local Disk DFS

Service Account

ASP.NET Web Application

Azure Files

Storage Account Credentials

25

On-Premises Replication to Azure Files

Sync Engine (File System Watcher / ...)

Local Disk DFS

Virtual Machine

Azure Files

SMB

REST

On-PremisesWest Europe

26

High-Available FTP Server

VM 1

Azure Files

SMB

Cloud Service

VM 2

21

10000-10050 20000-20050

Links

28

Links

• Introducing Microsoft Azure File Servicehttp://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsazurestorage/archive/2014/05/12/introducing-

microsoft-azure-file-service.aspx

•Comparing with Azure Blobs and Azure Driveshttp://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/library/azure/dn790517.aspx

•Persisting connections to Microsoft Azure Fileshttp://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsazurestorage/archive/2014/05/27/persisting-connections-to-microsoft-azure-files.aspx

29

Links•Azure Files on Linux

http://channel9.msdn.com/Blogs/Open/Shared-storage-on-Linux-via-Azure-Files-Preview-Part-1

•Using the Azure File Service in your Cloud Services (Web and Worker Roles)http://fabriccontroller.net/blog/posts/using-the-azure-file-service-in-your-cloud-services-web-roles-and-worker-role/

•Cloud Portamhttps://app.cloudportam.com/

• Passive FTP and Windows Azure Virtual Machineshttp://fabriccontroller.net/blog/posts/passive-ftp-and-dynamic-ports-in-iis8-and-windows-azure-virtual-machines/

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