PowerShell error “Run Login-AzureRmAccount to login.” in AzureRM when already logged in

12th of July, 2016 / / 5 Comments

Usually when I’m writing PowerShell scripts I do it from a development virtual machine with a known environment state. However, yesterday I was trying to do something simple and quick and was writing it on my everyday laptop.

My script was using Windows Management Framework 5.0 and I was creating a new burn environment in AzureRM. I was authenticated and could query and enumerate most of my AzureRM environment, however I was getting erroneous responses on some cmdlets and was unable to create a new resource group.… [Keep reading] “PowerShell error “Run Login-AzureRmAccount to login.” in AzureRM when already logged in”

Enterprise Application platform with Microservices – A Service Fabric perspective

21st of June, 2016 / / No Comments

An enterprise application platform can be defined as a suite of products and services that enables development and management of enterprise applications. This platform should be responsible of abstracting complexities related to application development such as diversity of hosting environments, network connectivity, deployment workflows, etc. In a traditional world, applications are monolithic by nature. A monolithic application is composed of many components grouped into multiple tiers bundled together into a single deployable unit. Each tier here can be developed using a specific technology and will have the ability to scale independently.… [Keep reading] “Enterprise Application platform with Microservices – A Service Fabric perspective”

Creating self-signed certs using OpenSSL on Windows

12th of June, 2016 / / 4 Comments

ssl

Working with Linux technologies exposes you to a huge number of open source tools that can simplify and speed up your development workflow. Interestingly enough, many of these tools are now flooding into the Windows ecosystem allowing us to increase the portability of our development assets across multiple operating systems.

Today I am going to demonstrate how easy it is to install OpenSSL on Windows and how simple it is to quickly create self-signed certificates for our development TLS needs that will work on a range of operating systems.… [Keep reading] “Creating self-signed certs using OpenSSL on Windows”

Using Microsoft Azure Table Service REST API to collect data samples

9th of June, 2016 / / No Comments

Sometimes we need a simple solution that requires collecting data from multiple sources. The sources of data can be IoT devices or systems working on different platforms and in different places. Traditionally, integrators start thinking about implementation of a custom centralised REST API with some database repository. This solution can take days to implement and test, it is very expensive and requires hosting, maintenance, and support. However, in many cases, it is not needed at all.… [Keep reading] “Using Microsoft Azure Table Service REST API to collect data samples”

Azure WebJobs with .NET Core RC2

8th of June, 2016 / / 2 Comments

With .NET Core RC2, publishing Azure WebJob is a little bit different from the traditional(?) way, even it’s different from what RC1 does. In this post, we’ll walk through how to publish Azure WebJob using a .NET Core RC2 console application.

Sample code can be found at https://github.com/devkimchi/.NET-Core-for-Azure-WebJob-Sample.

Sample Hello World Console Application

OK. First thing’s first. Let’s create a console app using .NET Core RC2. Take the latest copy from the repository above and build it on your local machine.… [Keep reading] “Azure WebJobs with .NET Core RC2”

Azure multi-factor authentication (MFA) cheat sheet.

3rd of June, 2016 / / 23 Comments

Last year I had the pleasure of possibly being one of the first in Australia to tinker with Azure multi-factor authentication tied into Office 365 and Office when ADAL was in private preview. That was a great proof of concept project at the time.

I’m currently working on a solution for a client that’s selecting from one of the Azure MFA options: either Azure MFA Cloud, Azure MFA Server or enabling certificate or token MFA strictly on AD FS 3.0 (the latter is what I had used last year in that private preview proof of concept project at Staples Australia).

Today I want to share two tables that outline information that I brought together from various Azure documentation pages and Office 365 documentation pages to review for the client that I’m working on an Azure MFA solution at the moment. In working out what the imperatives / inputs / requirements for the solution, I found it easier to put everything into a table to visually see what options I could look to for this solution.

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Access Azure linked templates from a private repository

22nd of May, 2016 / / 1 Comment

I recently was tasked to propose a way to use linked templates, especially how to refer to templates stored in a private repository.  The Azure Resource Manager (ARM) engine accepts a URI to access and deploy linked templates, hence the URI must be accessible by ARM.  If you store your templates in a public repository, ARM can access them fine, but what if you use a private repository?  This post will show you how.

In this example, I use Bitbucket – a Git-based source control product by Atlassian.  … [Keep reading] “Access Azure linked templates from a private repository”

Inside Azure – Deployment workflow with Fabric Controller and Red Dog Front End

5th of May, 2016 / / 1 Comment

Abstracting complexities around developing, deploying and maintaining software applications have diminished the importance of understanding underlying architecture. While this may work well for today’s aggressive delivery cycles, at the same time, it impacts the ability of engineers to build an efficient, optimal solution which aligns with the internal architecture of the hosting platform. Architects and engineers should be cognizant of the architecture of the hosting environment to better design a system. The same holds good for Microsoft Azure as a hosting provider.… [Keep reading] “Inside Azure – Deployment workflow with Fabric Controller and Red Dog Front End”

WORKAROUND / FIX: Login to Azure with certificate as Service Principal

3rd of May, 2016 / / 3 Comments

This blog post describes my recent experience with an Azure AD service principal authentication with a certificate. The process is well documented and seemed quite straightforward, however this was not my experience.

The issue

I was able to successfully follow the process to setup Azure AD service principal until the step where I granted the service principal with a role (using PS cmdlets). When I tried to login as the service principal, I encountered the issue below.… [Keep reading] “WORKAROUND / FIX: Login to Azure with certificate as Service Principal”