Templates for Azure Resource Manager (ARM)
Templates for Azure Resource Manager (ARM) are an effective way to manage resources on Azure. Declarative JSON files let you specify and implement your infrastructure. You may version your infrastructure in the same manner that you version your code by checking these templates into source control.
Read More: Azure IaC Tools
You may deploy, update, and remove any resource for your solution in one seamless action by using ARM templates. It is possible to make templates that configure many environments, including production, staging, and testing.
Automating Azure
You can automate Azure administration operations and coordinate actions across external systems with Azure Automation, a cloud-based automation and configuration tool. It gives customers a means of automating a great deal of the manual work that is frequently done in cloud and business environments.
Update management, configuration features, and process automation are all included in Azure Automation. When it comes to workload and resource deployment, operations, and decommissioning, Azure Automation offers total control.
Blue Bicep
A domain-specific language (DSL) for declarative Azure resource deployment is called Azure Bicep. With a clearer syntax, more type safety, and greater support for modularity and code reuse, it seeks to make IaC authoring easier.
An abstraction over ARM templates is called Bicep. This implies that Bicep can do any action that an ARM template can. The ARM Template JSON files are generated by transpiling the Bicep code.
Terraforma
HashiCorp developed the open-source IaC tool Terraform. It lets users utilize a declarative configuration language to create and provide data center architecture.
You can manage resources like virtual machines, scale sets, CosmosDB, and more using Terraform’s Azure provider. You may control a variety of Azure services using Terraform thanks to its straightforward yet effective syntax.
Pulumi
For the purpose of building, deploying, and administering infrastructure on well-known cloud platforms such as Azure, Pulumi is an open-source Infrastructure as Code (IaC) tool. Common programming languages used by Pulumi include Python, Go, JavaScript, TypeScript, and.NET.
A large range of Azure services are supported by Pulumi, and it can handle Azure resources that are packaged as Helm Charts or Kubernetes YAML files.
Ansible
Ansible is an open-source technology that facilitates IaC through configuration management, application deployment, and software provisioning. It has the ability to configure Windows-based computers as well as Unix-like platforms.
Ansible is simple to install since it doesn’t require any agents or specialized security architecture. Moreover, it makes use of Ansible Playbooks, a very basic language (YAML) that lets you define and modify automation processes.
Transplane
Across vendors, clusters, and clouds, you can manage your infrastructure and apps using Crossplane, an open source multicloud control plane. For businesses looking to implement a multicloud approach or stay away from vendor lock-in, it’s a great tool.
With Crossplane, you can use the same set of APIs to setup, deploy, and manage apps and infrastructure from different vendors. Crossplane extends the Kubernetes API to manage cloud services.
IaC on Azure: Best Practices for Implementation
The following recommended practices will assist you in successfully implementing IaC on Azure:
Automate using Azure Pipelines: To automate testing, building, and deployment processes, use Azure Pipelines for continuous integration and delivery (CI/CD). This expedites processes and lowers human error.
Git version control: Use Git to keep track of changes made to your codebase over time. In this manner, you may simply go back to a prior condition in case something goes wrong.
Put automated testing into practice: Before deploying infrastructure components into production settings, confirm that they function as intended.
Utilize Azure Policy to enforce standards: Azure Policy may be used to uphold compliance and conform to company guidelines. Azure Policy assists in guaranteeing that configurations adhere to particular guidelines or limitations.
Make everything modular: Divide complicated infrastructure into more manageable, smaller components that may be applied to other projects or settings.
