First published on MSDN on Mar 10, 2017 One of the most popular questions I get asked is how can I get started with Windows Azure? The following is a short overview of what Azure is. In this series I will talk about the overall platform and then focus on the creation of VMs. How to Get Started on Azure on Demand Webinar - https://info.microsoft.com/UK-MSFT-WBNR-FY17-11Nov-24-HowtoGetStartedonAzure-269444_Registration.html We have also built the following presentations and Hands on Labs for getting your students familiar with Azure Cloud https://github.com/MSFTImagine/computerscience/tree/master/Workshop/1.%20Introduction In this hands-on lab, you will: Connect to the lab VM Log in to the Azure Portal View the Azure subscription associated with your account So Azure is a huge product which is having feature and services added approx every 3 weeks Here is a quick overview of the available services So Azure is principally made up of SaaS Software as a Service,  IaaS Infrastructure as Services and PaaS Platform as a Service So what is SaaS Software as a service (SaaS) allows users to connect to and use cloud-based apps over the Internet. Common examples are email, calendaring, and office tools (such as Microsoft Office 365) or Data Science tools such as Azure Jupyter Notebooks and Azure Machine Learning Studio. SaaS provides a complete software solution, users simply connect to it over the Internet, usually with a web browser. All of the underlying infrastructure, middleware, app software, and app data are located in the service provider’s data center. The service provider manages the hardware and software, and with the appropriate service agreement, will ensure the availability and the security of the app and your data as well. SaaS allows your organization to get quickly up and running with an app at minimal upfront cost. So what is IaaS IaaS is typically made up network connectivity, compute and storage Networking on Azure So how does this relate to typical on premise infrastructure Compute Compute instances on Azure come in Alphabetically Titles series types A – N at present here a quick run down of the capabilities of each instance Storage Azure offer various types of storage for IaaS typically Iaas storage is located on Azure Blob Storage and dedicated to the Azure VM. PaaS Platform as a Service Simply put Azure PaaS is a provision of services your application can use We manage, maintain, upgrade, scale and generally look after these service automatically You pay only for what you use Very much along the ideas of microservice design, serverless computing Popular Services include: •Azure App Services for web sites •Azure SQL Database for SQL Server •Azure Functions for event code Resources azure.microsoft.com is your starting place azure.microsoft.com/free for your free trial channel9.msdn.com/shows/ Cloud+Cover & channel9.msdn.com/Shows/Azure-Friday for great videos azure.microsoft.com/blog for latest news Webinar Series - These are ideal for tutorials or guest lectures Azure Big Data - https://info.microsoft.com/UK-MSFT-WBNR-FY17-11Nov-29-MicrosoftAzureBigDataArchitecturesWebinar-269417_Registration.html Bots and Conversation as a Service - https://info.microsoft.com/UK-NoGEP-WBNR-FY17-01Jan-24-AzureWebinar-BotsandConversationasaService_287413_02OnDemandRegistration-ForminBody.html Power BI: https://info.microsoft.com/UK-MSFT-WBNR-FY17-12Dec-05-MicrosoftAzureBringyourDatatoLifePowerBIWebinar-269449_Registration.html Azure Machine Learning - https://info.microsoft.com/UK-NoGEP-WBNR-FY17-02Feb-21-MicrosoftAzureMachineLearningWebinar_288270_02OnDemandRegistration-ForminBody.html