Introduction
Azure Arc is a hybrid cloud platform offered by Microsoft that allows businesses to manage their resources and applications across multiple environments, including on-premises, edge, and multiple cloud providers, from a single control plane.
What is Azure Arc?
Azure Arc is a hybrid and multi-cloud management service offered by Microsoft Azure that allows organizations to extend and centrally manage their Azure services, applications, and data across multiple environments, including on-premises, multi-cloud, and edge environments. It enables organizations to operate and manage their diverse infrastructure as if it were all running in Azure, providing a consistent and unified experience across all environments.
One of the primary roles of Azure Arc is to bridge the gap between on-premises and cloud environments, allowing organizations to maximize the benefits of cloud computing without completely abandoning their existing infrastructure investments. It provides the flexibility and scalability of the cloud while still allowing organizations to leverage their on-premises resources.
At its core, Azure Arc is a control plane that provides a single point of management for all connected resources, regardless of their location. This enables centralized management and governance across diverse environments, allowing organizations to have a holistic view and control over all their resources, no matter where they are located.
Additionally, Azure Arc enables organizations to take advantage of Azure’s advanced capabilities, such as automated patching, security monitoring, and compliance reporting, for their entire infrastructure, even if it is spread across multiple environments. This helps to ensure consistency and adhere to regulatory compliance requirements.
Moreover, Azure Arc also enables organizations to deploy and manage Azure services, such as Azure App Services, Azure SQL databases, and Azure Kubernetes Service, on any infrastructure, including on-premises servers and VMs, as well as non-Azure cloud platforms. This provides a consistent deployment and management experience across all environments and eliminates the need for separate tools and processes for different environments.
Key Components of Azure Arc
1. Azure Arc-enabled servers:
Azure Arc-enabled servers allow organizations to extend the management and control capabilities of Azure to their on-premises servers. This enables organizations to manage and monitor their on-premises servers, virtual machines, and physical machines through the Azure portal. This includes features such as monitoring, centralized policy management, and inventory tracking for these servers. Azure Arc also enables organizations to deploy Azure services such as Azure Monitor and Azure Security Center to their on-premises servers, providing a unified management and security experience.
2. Kubernetes:
Azure Arc also allows organizations to manage and monitor their Kubernetes clusters running on any infrastructure, including on-premises or other clouds. This enables organizations to deploy, scale, and manage workloads across different environments, while maintaining a consistent experience and governance policies. Through Azure Arc, organizations can leverage features such as Azure Monitor, Azure Policy, and Azure Security Center for their Kubernetes clusters, providing a unified management and security experience.
3. Data Services:
Azure Arc also enables organizations to extend their data services, such as SQL Server and PostgreSQL, to any infrastructure. This allows organizations to manage and monitor their data and databases across multiple environments through a centralized interface. Azure Arc also provides features such as automated patching, backup, and disaster recovery for these data services, ensuring consistent management and compliance across environments.
Deploying Azure Arc
Prerequisites for deploying Azure Arc:
Azure Account: A valid Azure account is required to deploy Azure Arc on your infrastructure.
An Azure Arc subscription is required to register and connect multiple on-premises servers, Kubernetes clusters, and AI infrastructure to Azure.
Azure Arc supports a wide range of infrastructure, including on-premises physical or virtual servers, virtual machines, and Kubernetes clusters. The infrastructure should also be running one of the supported operating systems, such as Windows, Linux, or Kubernetes distribution.
Before deploying Azure Arc, the Azure Arc agent must be installed on the target servers or Kubernetes clusters. The agent is responsible for connecting the infrastructure to Azure and managing the resources.
The infrastructure where the Azure Arc agent is installed must have internet connectivity to communicate with Azure. This is necessary for managing resources and receiving updates from Azure.
Requirements for deploying Azure Arc:
To manage and apply policies to the connected resources, Azure AD integration is required. This allows for secure authentication and authorization for managing the resources.
The firewall on the target infrastructure must be configured to allow communication with Azure services. This is important for the Azure Arc agent to establish and maintain a connection with Azure.
The Azure AD user account used to deploy Azure Arc must have the necessary ARM permissions to create and manage resources in the Azure subscription.
Supported platforms and configurations for Azure Arc implementation:
Operating Systems: Azure Arc supports both Windows and Linux operating systems. This includes Windows Server, Ubuntu, Red Hat Enterprise Linux, and many others.
Virtualization: Azure Arc can be deployed on both physical and virtual machines, including those running on VMware, Microsoft Hyper-V, and Citrix XenServer.
Kubernetes Distribution: Azure Arc supports popular Kubernetes distributions, such as Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE), and Red Hat OpenShift.
Cloud Platforms: Azure Arc can be deployed on various cloud platforms, including Azure, AWS, and Google Cloud Platform.
Configuration Management Tools: Azure Arc integrates with popular configuration management tools like Chef, Puppet, and Ansible, allowing for a consistent management experience across all connected resources.
Hybrid Deployments: Azure Arc can be used to manage resources across hybrid environments, including on-premises and cloud infrastructure. This enables organizations to have a single control plane for managing their entire infrastructure.
Step-by-Step Deployment Guide
Step 1: Prepare the on-premises environment
Before deploying Azure Arc, make sure you have a supported operating system (Windows or Linux) and valid Azure subscription.
Install the Azure CLI tool on the machine that will be used to run the deployment.
Ensure that your on-premises environment meets the system requirements for Azure Arc.
Step 2: Create an Azure Arc enabled server resource
To deploy Azure Arc, you need to create an Azure Arc enabled server resource in your Azure subscription.
In the Azure portal, navigate to Azure Arc enabled servers and click on “Add”.
Then choose the subscription you want to use and provide a name for the resource.
Select the appropriate Operating System (Windows or Linux) for your on-premises environment and click “Review + create”.
Step 3: Generate registration script
Once the resource is created, click on it to open its details page.
Click on the “Download agent for Windows/Linux” button to download the registration script.
Save the script on the machine where you have Azure CLI tool installed.
Step 4: Run the registration script
Open a command prompt on the machine where the script is saved.
Login to your Azure subscription using the command “az login” and provide your credentials.
Then run the registration script by using the command “azcmagent register -resource-group <resource_group_name> -location <location> -name <resource_name>”.
This will connect the on-premises server to your Azure subscription and register it with Azure Arc.
Step 5: Verify registration
After running the registration script, go back to the Azure Arc enabled server resource in the Azure portal.
Under the “Connectivity” section, you should see the status as “Connected” and all the relevant information about the on-premises server.
This confirms that the server has been successfully registered with Azure Arc.
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