Skill 2.1: Configure access to storage
An Azure storage account is a resource that you create that is used to store data objects such as blobs, files, queues, tables, and disks. Data in an Azure storage account is durable and highly available, secure, massively scalable, and accessible from anywhere in the world over HTTP or HTTPS.
Create and configure storage accounts
Azure storage accounts provide a cloud-based storage service that is highly scalable, available, performant, and durable. Within each storage account, a number of separate storage services are provided:
- Blobs Provides a highly scalable service for storing arbitrary data objects such as text or binary data.
- Tables Provides a NoSQL-style store for storing structured data. Unlike a relational database, tables in Azure Storage do not require a fixed schema, so different entries in the same table can have different fields.
- Queues Provides reliable message queueing between application components.
- Files Provides managed file shares that can be used by Azure VMs or on-premises servers.
- Disks Provides a persistent storage volume for Azure VM that can be attached as a virtual hard disk.
There are three types of storage blobs: block blobs, append blobs, and page blobs. Page blobs are generally used to store VHD files when deploying unmanaged disks. (Unmanaged disks are an older disk storage technology for Azure virtual machines. Managed disks are recommended for new deployments.)
When creating a storage account, there are several options that must be set: Performance Tier, Account Kind, Replication Option, and Access Tier. There are some interactions between these settings. For example, only the Standard performance tier allows you to choose the access tier. The following sections describe each of these settings. We then describe how to create storage accounts using the Azure portal, PowerShell, and Azure CLI.
Storage account names
When you name an Azure storage account, you need to remember these points:
- The storage account name must be globally unique across all existing storage account names in Azure.
- The name must be between 3 and 24 characters and can contain only lowercase letters and numbers.
Performance tiers
When creating a storage account, you must choose between the Standard and Premium performance tiers. This setting cannot be changed later.
- Standard This tier supports all storage services: blobs, tables, files, queues, and unmanaged Azure virtual machine disks. It uses magnetic disks to provide cost-efficient and reliable storage.
- Premium This tier is designed to support workloads with greater demands on I/O and is backed by high-performance SSD disks. Premium storage accounts support block blobs, page blobs, and file shares.