Forem: SethGiddy

Getting Started with Docker.

SethGiddy — Sat, 14 Sep 2024 20:37:42 +0000

Containerize Your Node.js Todo List Application with Docker.
Containerizing applications can streamline development and deployment, and it’s simpler than it seems! In this guide, we’ll walk through the process of containerizing a basic Node.js todo list manager using Docker. Don’t worry if you’re new to Docker, this guide is designed to be beginner-friendly.

Prerequisites
Before we dive in, make sure you have the following tools installed on your machine:

-Docker Desktop: This is essential for building and running Docker containers.
https://docs.docker.com/desktop/install/windows-install/

-Git Client: For cloning repositories.https://git-scm.com/downloads

-IDE or Text Editor: Docker recommends Visual Studio Code, but any editor will work. In this write up, I will be using VM workstation pro.

Getting the Application
A. Clone repo from Github

First, we need the source code for our application. We’ll be using a simple todo list manager that’s already prepared for us. To get this code, clone the repository using the command:

First, we need to get the source code for the todo list manager. Open terminal and clone the repository using: git clone https://github.com/docker/getting-started-app.git

B. Build the app’s image.

In order to containerize our application, we will need to create a Docker image using a Dockerfile. This file contains a set of instructions that Docker will use to build our container.

1. CD into the getting-started-app directory- Navigate to the getting-started-app directory and create a Dockerfile. Depending on your operating system, use one of the following commands: cd /path/to/getting-started-app

2. Create the Dockerfile
Navigate to the getting-started-app directory and create a Dockerfile. Depending on your operating system, use one of the following commands:

3. Add Instructions to the Dockerfile

Open the Dockerfile with your text editor i.e VIM and add the following content: vim Dockerfile

Here’s a brief overview of what each line does:

Here's a brief overview of what each line does:

FROM node:18-alpine: Specifies the base image with Node.js installed.
WORKDIR /app: Sets the working directory inside the container.
COPY . .: Copies the current directory contents into the container.
RUN yarn install --production: Installs the application's dependencies.
CMD ["node", "src/index.js"]: Defines the default command to run the application.
EXPOSE 3000: Informs Docker that the container will listen on port 3000.

3. Build the Docker Image

In the terminal, we will use the bellow command to build the Docker image :

This command uses the Dockerfile to create an image named getting-started. The -t flag tags the image with a name, making it easier to refer to. The . at the end tells Docker to look for the Dockerfile in the current directory.

C. Start the getting-started App Container

Now that your image is ready, we can run it as a container:

Here’s what the flags mean:

-d: Runs the container in the background.
-p 127.0.0.1:3000:3000: Maps port 3000 of the container to port 3000 on your localhost.
After running this command, we can access the todo list app by opening a browser and navigating to http://localhost:3000. The application is up and running. Without the port mapping, you wouldn’t be able to access the application from the host. Feel free to add items to your todo list and check that everything functions as expected.

D. Verify the Container

To ensure that our container is running, we will use the Docker Dashboard or run: docker ps

The out will be as below.

This will list all running containers. You should see our container with the getting-started image and port 3000 mapped correctly.

Summary

Congratulations! You’ve successfully containerized a Node.js application. By creating a Dockerfile, building an image, and running a container, you’ve taken your first steps into Docker containerization. This process not only makes your application easier to deploy but also ensures consistency across different environments. Happy containerizing!

MICROSOFT APPLIED SKILL. Guided Project

SethGiddy — Tue, 09 Jul 2024 13:03:32 +0000

:
Exercise - Provide shared file storage for the company offices. Below is the architecture of shared file storage we are creating.

The skill objective of this task is to;
-Create a storage account.
-Configure a file share and directory.
-Configure snapshots and practice restoring files.
-Restrict access to a specific virtual network and subnet.

A. CREATE A STORAGE ACCOUNT AND CONFIGURE HIGH AVAILABILITY.
1.Create a storage account for the finance department’s shared files.

-In the portal, search for and select Storage accounts.
-Select + Create.
-For Resource group select Create new. Give your resource group a name and select OK to save your changes.
-Provide a Storage account name. Ensure the name meets the naming requirements.
-Set the Performance to Premium.
-Set the Premium account type to File shares.
-Set the Redundancy to Zone-redundant storage.
-Select Review and then Create the storage account.
-Wait for the resource to deploy.
-Select Go to resource.

B. Create and configure a file share with directory.

Create a file share for the corporate office.

-In the storage account, in the Data storage section, select the File shares blade.
-Select + File share and provide a Name.
-Review the other options, but take the defaults.
-Select Create.

Add a directory to the file share for the finance department. For future testing, upload a file.

-Select your file share and select + Add directory.
-Name the new directory finance.
-Select Browse and then select the finance directory.
-Notice you can Add directory to further organize your file share.
-Upload a file of your choosing.

C. Configure and test snapshots.

Similar to blob storage, you need to protect against accidental deletion of files. You decide to use snapshots.

-Select your file share.
-In the Operations section, select the Snapshots blade.
-Select + Add snapshot. The comment is optional. Select OK.
-Select your snapshot and verify your file directory and uploaded file are included.

Practice using snapshots to restore a file.

-Return to your file share.
-Browse to your file directory.
-Locate your uploaded file and in the Properties pane select Delete.
-Select Yes to confirm the deletion.
-Select the Snapshots blade and then select your snapshot.
-Navigate to the file you want to restore,
-Select the file and the select Restore.
-Provide a Restored file name.
-Verify your file directory has the restored file.

C. Configure restricting storage access to selected virtual networks.

This tasks in this section require a virtual network with subnet. In a production environment these resources would already be created. -Search for and select Virtual networks. -Select Create. Select your resource group. and give the virtual network a name. -Take the defaults for other parameters, select Review + create, and then Create. -Wait for the resource to deploy. -Select Go to resource.

In the Settings section. -Select the Subnets blade. -Select the default subnet. -In the Service endpoints section choose Microsoft.Storage in the -Services drop-down. -Do not make any other changes. -Be sure to Save your changes.

The storage account should only be accessed from the virtual network you just created. Learn more about using private storage endpoints..

-Return to your files storage account.
-In the Security + networking section, select the Networking blade.
-Change the Public network access to Enabled from selected virtual networks and IP addresses.
-In the Virtual networks section, select Add existing virtual network.
-Select your virtual network and subnet, select Add.
-Be sure to Save your changes.

-Select the Storage browser and navigate to your file share.
-Verify the message not authorized to perform this operation.
You are not connecting from the virtual network.

Simple steps on how to create a Windows 11 Virtual machine that is highly available, with a free tier azure account.

SethGiddy — Tue, 09 Jul 2024 11:36:52 +0000

In this short post I will explore creation of a highly available windows 11 virtual machine. Below are the steps to creating a windows 11 virtual machine. High availability refers to the ability of a system or application to remain operational and accessible even in the face of disruptions or failures. This is achieved through a combination of redundancy, failover mechanisms, and automatic recovery processes. Any or a combination of the following components will ensure high availability of azure cloud resources, to mention a few.
-Availability Sets
-Load Balancing
-Virtual Machine Scale Sets
-Backup and Restore
I will discuss these concepts in a different post

PART A

STEP 1. This is involves creating a free tier account on azure portal (https://azure.microsoft.com/en-gb/free) The free tier azure account comes with a $200 subscription credit from azure.
STEP 2. Create Virtual machine. Search for the resources to be created (Virtual machine) from the search box on azure portal. Another way to get to the resources is by clicking all service.
STEP 3. Select the correct subscription (free tier in this article), An Azure subscription is a logical container used to provision related business or technical resources in Azure. Choose an existing resource group or create a new one. A resource group is a container that holds related resources for an Azure solution. Add a create a name for the virtual machine. Select the number of availability zones desired. You can select up to 3 availability zones, this process will create multiple virtual machines.

STEP 4. Input all other necessary details require on the basic tab. The image for this write is Windows 11, memory size is the free tier. Complete the Administrator account section. Select SSH public key for the authentication type. Create a username for the virtual machine. For the public inbound ports select Allow selected port. Select RDP and for inbound ports.

STEP 5. Click next button to disks, Networking, Management, Monitoring, Advanced, Tags review as desired and add resources if so desired. click Review + create, once validation passed click create.

STEP 6. The progress for creation of the virtual machine in 2 availability zones is shown below.

STEP 7.The newly created virtual machine will appear just like so. Click go to resource to access the virtual machine.

STEP 8. Click connect button and click connect from the drop down. I will be using RDP to connect to the virtual machine on my local machine. Click download RDP after the native RDP is configured. Enter admin name and password to connect.

STEP 9. Below is the virtual machine.

STEP 10. After connecting to the virtual on the local machine. We have to stop/delete the virtual machine depending on the purpose of usage and other factors. Stopping virtual machine will deallocate the resource.

In this write up I used just one component to make my resource highly available which is creating my virtual machine in 2 separate availability zones. I will be discussing the components of high availability in another post.

Lastly, always remember to delete resources you are not currently using.

This is not an exhaustive step to creating a high availability resource i.e virtual machine using to RDP connect.

Thank you.

MICROSOFT APPLIED SKILL. Guided Project:

SethGiddy — Thu, 20 Jun 2024 22:47:56 +0000

This is exercise 2b of the Microsoft Applied skill guided project.

A. CREATE A STORAGE ACCOUNT AND CONFIGURE HIGH AVAILABILITY.
1.Create a storage account for the internal private company documents.

In the portal, search for and select Storage accounts.
Select + Create.
Select the Resource group created in the previous lab.
Set the Storage account name to private. Add an identifier to the name to ensure the name is unique.
Select Review, and then Create the storage account.
Wait for the storage account to deploy, and then select Go to resource.

2.This storage requires high availability if there’s a regional outage. Read access in the secondary region is not required. Configure the appropriate level of redundancy.

In the storage account, in the Data management section, select the
Redundancy blade.
Ensure Geo-redundant storage (GRS) is selected.
Refresh the page.
Review the primary and secondary location information.
Save your changes.

B. CREATE A STORAGE CONTAINER, UPLOAD A FILE, AND RESTRICT ACCESS TO THE FILE.
1.Create a private storage container for the corporate data.

In the storage account, in the Data storage section, select the Containers blade.
Select + Container.
Ensure the Name of the container is private.
Ensure the Public access level is Private (no anonymous access).
As you have time, review the Advanced settings, but take the defaults.
Select Create.

For testing, upload a file to the private container. he type of file doesn’t matter. A small image or text file is a good choice. Test to ensure the file isn’t publicly accessible.

Select the container.
Select Upload.
Browse to files and select a file.
Upload the file.
Select the uploaded file.
On the Overview tab, copy the URL.
Paste the URL into a new browser tab.
Verify the file doesn’t display and you receive an error.

An external partner requires read and write access to the file for at least the next 24 hours. Configure and test a shared access signature (SAS). Learn more about Shared Access Signatures.

Select your uploaded blob file and move to the Generate SAS tab.
In the Permissions drop-down, ensure the partner has only Read permissions.
Verify the Start and expiry date/time is for the next 24 hours.
Select Generate SAS token and URL.
Copy the Blob SAS URL to a new browser tab.
Verify you can access the file. If you have uploaded an image file it will display in the browser. Other file types will be downloaded.

C. CONFIGURE STORAGE ACCESS TIERS AND CONTENT REPLICATION.

To save on costs, after 30 days, move blobs from the hot tier to the cool tier. Learn more how manage the Azure Blob storage lifecycle.

Return to the storage account.
In the Overview section, notice the Default access tier is set to Hot.
In the Data management section, select the Lifecycle management blade.
Select Add rule.
Set the Rule name to move-to-cool.
Set the Rule scope to Apply rule to all blobs in the storage account.
Select Next.
Ensure Last modified is selected.
Set More than (days ago) to 30.
In the Then drop-down select Move to cool storage.
As you have time, review other lifecycle options in the drop-down.
Add the rule.

The public website files need to be backed up to another storage account.[Learn more about object replication.

In your storage account, create a new container called backup. Use the default values. Refer back to Lab 02a if you need detailed instructions.

Navigate to your publicwebsite storage account. This storage account was created in the previous exercise.
- In the Data management section, select the Object replication blade.
- Select Create replication rules.
- Set the Destination storage account to the private storage account.
- Set the Source container to public and the Destination container to backup.
- Create the replication rule.
- Optionally, as you have time, upload a file to the public container.
- Return to the private storage account and refresh the backup container. Within a few minutes your public website file will appear in the backup folder.

MICROSOFT APPLIED SKILL. Guided Project: Provide storage for the IT department testing and training

SethGiddy — Thu, 20 Jun 2024 17:14:28 +0000

This is exercise 1 of the Microsoft Applied skill guided project.

What is Azure storage account

An azure storage account is a container that groups a set of Azure Storage services together. Only data services from Azure Storage can be included in a storage account.
Below are the 4 types of azure storage account

1.Azure Blobs. 2. Azure Files. 3.Azure Queues. 4. Azure Tables.

How to create an azure storage account Azure portal.
There are 4 different tools to create storage account with, depending on whether an organisation want GUI and automation.

Azure portal
Azure CLI (Command-line interface)
Azure PowerShell
Management client libraries

But in this write up we will be exploring the use of Azure portal to complete exercise.

A. CREATE A STORAGE ACCOUNT WITH HIGH AVAILABILITY

1.On the Basics tab, enter the required details, subscription, resource group, Storage name. From Performance select Standard and from Redundancy Select Locally redundant storage (LRS) to safe cost for now.

It takes a couple of minutes for the deployment to complete, select Go to resource to view Essential details about your new storage account.

3.This storage requires high availability if there’s a regional outage. Additionally, enable read access to the secondary region, Learn more about storage account redundancy.

This storage requires high availability if there’s a regional outage. Additionally, enable read access to the secondary region, Learn more about storage account redundancy. -In the storage account, in the Data management section, select the Redundancy blade. -Ensure Read-access Geo-redundant storage is selected. -Review the primary and secondary location information.

5.Information on the public website should be accessible without requiring customers to login.
-In the storage account, in the Settings section, select the Configuration blade.
-Ensure the Allow blob anonymous access setting is Enabled.
-Be sure to Save your changes.

B. CREATE A BLOB STORAGE CONTAINER WITH ANONYMOUS READ ACCESS

The public website has various images and documents. Create a blob storage container for the content. Learn more about storage containers. -In your storage account, in the Data storage section. -Select the Containers blade. -Select + Container. -Ensure the Name of the container is public. -Select Create.

C. PRACTICE UPLOADING FILES AND TESTING ACCESS.
1.For testing, upload a file to the public container. The type of file doesn’t matter. A small image or text file is a good choice.
-Ensure you are viewing your container.
-Select Upload.
-Browse to files and select a file. Browse to a file of your choice.
-Select Upload.
-Close the upload window, Refresh the page and ensure your file was uploaded.

2.Determine the URL for your uploaded file. Open a browser and test the URL.
-Select your uploaded file.
-On the Overview tab, copy the URL.
-Paste the URL into a new browser tab.
-If you have uploaded an image file it will display in the browser. Other file types should be downloaded.

D.CONFIGURE SOFT DELETE
1.It’s important that the website documents can be restored if they’re deleted. Configure blob soft delete for 21 days. Learn more about soft delete for blobs.
-Go to the Overview blade of the storage account.
-On the Properties page, locate the Blob service section.
-Select the Blob soft delete setting.
-Ensure the Enable soft delete for blobs is checked.
-Change the Keep deleted blobs for (in days setting is 21.
-Notice you can also Enable soft delete for containers.
-Don’t forget to Save your changes.

2.If something gets deleted, you need to practice using soft delete to restore the files.
-Navigate to your container where you uploaded a file.
-Select the file you uploaded and then select Delete.
-Select OK to confirm deleting the file.
-On the container Overview page, toggle the slider Show deleted blobs. This toggle is to the right of the search box.
-Select your deleted file, and use the ellipses on the far right, to Undelete the file.
-Refresh the container and confirm the file has been restored.

CONFIGURE BLOB VERSIONING
1.It’s important to keep track of the different website product document versions. Learn more about blob versioning.
-Go to the Overview blade of the storage account.
-In the Properties section, locate the Blob service section.
-Select the Versioning setting.
-Ensure the Enable versioning for blobs checkbox is checked.
-Notice your options to keep all versions or delete versions after.
-Don’t forget to Save your changes.

2.As you have time experiment with restoring previous blob versions.
-Upload another version of your container file. This overwrites your existing file.
-Your previous file version is listed on Show deleted blobs page.

Exercise 2 Next. Stay tuned

Thanks

Simple Cloud terminologies for Beginners.

SethGiddy — Sat, 11 May 2024 15:12:35 +0000

Virtualisation. This is the an abstract version of physical computer components. Virtualisation allows software to create non-physical computer (virtual machine) on a physical computer. The created non-physical computer is referred to as virtual machines. The virtual machines share the components on the physical hardware - such as processors, memory and storage—into multiple virtual machines (VMs). One major advantage of virtualisation is that it allows companies to o partition a single physical computer or server into several virtual machines. Each virtual machine can then interact independently and run different operating systems or applications while sharing the resources of a single host machine. Virtualisation is made possible by what is called the hypervisor.

2.Scalability. This is the ability of organisations to increase or decrease cloud resources to meet customer demands.In certain times organisations experience huge traffic or increase usage of their cloud resources, such that the resource could crash if the demand or traffic is too much. Scalability will help improve customer's experience and help organisations fulfil customers demands as required. There are 2 types of scalability ; Vertical scalability (scale-up/scale-down) requires adding more more CPU,RAM OR Storage to an existing server or reducing the listed resources. Horizontal scalability involves adding more servers or computers to an already existing resource instead of increasing the component of the servers. Horizontal scalability can scale-in or scale-out.

3.Agility allows organisation to allocation or deallocate, develop, test or launch cloud-based resources easily and quickly.

4.High Availability is one of the benefits of cloud computing, it ensures organisations enjoy non-interuptions of services in the face of disruptions or failures. High availability ensures business continuity and business scalability.This is achieved through a combination of redundancy, failover mechanisms, and automatic recovery processesThis is made possible.

5.Fault Tolerant is the ability of a system (computer, network, cloud resource, storage etc) to continue operating without interruption even if one or more of its components fail. Configuration or system is duplicated in and that takes over for the main configuration in case there is an outage

6.Global Reach. Cloud services has enabled organisations to provide niche goods and services to their customers in any part of the world.

I will right about individual concept in subsequent write ups. Thanks for reading