Operational excellence pillar in Azure - Mini Project: Build & Apply

Implementing Operational Excellence Pillar in Azure

📖 Scenario: You are working as a cloud engineer for a company that wants to improve its cloud operations on Microsoft Azure. The company wants to follow the Operational Excellence pillar of the Azure Well-Architected Framework to ensure reliable and efficient cloud infrastructure management.Your task is to create a simple Azure Resource Manager (ARM) template that sets up a storage account with monitoring enabled. This will help the company track and improve their cloud operations.

🎯 Goal: Build an ARM template that creates an Azure Storage Account with diagnostics settings enabled to send logs to a Log Analytics workspace. This setup supports operational excellence by enabling monitoring and alerting.

📋 What You'll Learn

Create an Azure Storage Account resource with the name opexstorageacct.

Create a Log Analytics workspace resource with the name opexlogworkspace.

Configure diagnostics settings on the storage account to send logs to the Log Analytics workspace.

Use ARM template syntax and best practices for resource dependencies.

💡 Why This Matters

🌍 Real World

This project shows how to set up monitoring and logging in Azure to follow operational excellence best practices, helping teams maintain reliable and efficient cloud infrastructure.

💼 Career

Cloud engineers and architects use ARM templates to automate resource deployment and enable monitoring, which is essential for operational excellence in cloud environments.

1

Create the basic ARM template structure with Storage Account

Create an ARM template JSON with a resources array containing a Storage Account resource named opexstorageacct. Use Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts as the resource type and 2022-09-01 as the API version. Set the sku to Standard_LRS and kind to StorageV2. The location should be eastus.

Azure

{
  "$schema": "https://schema.management.azure.com/schemas/2019-04-01/deploymentTemplate.json#",
  "contentVersion": "1.0.0.0",
  "resources": [
    {
      "type": "Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts",
      "apiVersion": "2022-09-01",
      "name": "opexstorageacct",
      "location": "eastus",
      "sku": {
        "name": "Standard_LRS"
      },
      "kind": "StorageV2",
      "properties": {}
    }
  ]
}

# Your code here

Need a hint?

Remember to include the resources array and define the storage account resource with the exact name opexstorageacct.

2

Add a Log Analytics workspace resource

Add a Log Analytics workspace resource to the resources array. Use Microsoft.OperationalInsights/workspaces as the resource type with API version 2021-06-01. Name the workspace opexlogworkspace and set its location to eastus. Set the sku name to PerGB2018.

Azure

{
  "$schema": "https://schema.management.azure.com/schemas/2019-04-01/deploymentTemplate.json#",
  "contentVersion": "1.0.0.0",
  "resources": [
    {
      "type": "Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts",
      "apiVersion": "2022-09-01",
      "name": "opexstorageacct",
      "location": "eastus",
      "sku": {
        "name": "Standard_LRS"
      },
      "kind": "StorageV2",
      "properties": {}
    },
    {
      // Add Log Analytics workspace resource here
    }
  ]
}

# Your code here

Need a hint?

Make sure the Log Analytics workspace resource is added inside the resources array alongside the storage account.

3

Add diagnostics settings to send storage logs to Log Analytics workspace

Add a diagnostics settings resource of type Microsoft.Insights/diagnosticSettings with API version 2021-05-01-preview. Name it storageDiagSettings. Set its dependsOn to the storage account resource opexstorageacct. Configure it to send StorageRead, StorageWrite, and StorageDelete logs to the Log Analytics workspace opexlogworkspace. Use the workspace resource ID reference [resourceId('Microsoft.OperationalInsights/workspaces', 'opexlogworkspace')].

Azure

{
  "$schema": "https://schema.management.azure.com/schemas/2019-04-01/deploymentTemplate.json#",
  "contentVersion": "1.0.0.0",
  "resources": [
    {
      "type": "Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts",
      "apiVersion": "2022-09-01",
      "name": "opexstorageacct",
      "location": "eastus",
      "sku": {
        "name": "Standard_LRS"
      },
      "kind": "StorageV2",
      "properties": {}
    },
    {
      "type": "Microsoft.OperationalInsights/workspaces",
      "apiVersion": "2021-06-01",
      "name": "opexlogworkspace",
      "location": "eastus",
      "sku": {
        "name": "PerGB2018"
      },
      "properties": {}
    },
    {
      // Add diagnostics settings resource here
    }
  ]
}

# Your code here

Need a hint?

Ensure the diagnostics settings resource depends on the storage account and references the Log Analytics workspace ID correctly.

4

Add tags for operational excellence and finalize template

Add a tags property to both the Storage Account and Log Analytics workspace resources. Use the tag key OperationalExcellence with the value Enabled. This helps identify resources related to operational excellence.

Azure

{
  "$schema": "https://schema.management.azure.com/schemas/2019-04-01/deploymentTemplate.json#",
  "contentVersion": "1.0.0.0",
  "resources": [
    {
      // Add tags property to Storage Account here
    },
    {
      // Add tags property to Log Analytics workspace here
    },
    {
      "type": "Microsoft.Insights/diagnosticSettings",
      "apiVersion": "2021-05-01-preview",
      "name": "storageDiagSettings",
      "dependsOn": [
        "Microsoft.Storage/storageAccounts/opexstorageacct"
      ],
      "properties": {
        "workspaceId": "[resourceId('Microsoft.OperationalInsights/workspaces', 'opexlogworkspace')]",
        "logs": [
          {
            "category": "StorageRead",
            "enabled": true
          },
          {
            "category": "StorageWrite",
            "enabled": true
          },
          {
            "category": "StorageDelete",
            "enabled": true
          }
        ]
      }
    }
  ]
}

# Your code here

Need a hint?

Add the tags property inside both the Storage Account and Log Analytics workspace resource objects.