Azure Storage Service and it's use cases

A variety of data services are available with Azure Storage that can be applied to a number of different storage requirements. Five of these data services - Azure Blobs, Azure Files, Azure Queue, Azure Tables, and Azure Disks - will be examined in more detail, and their salient characteristics and use cases will be discussed in this article.

Introduction

The three storage tiers offered by Microsoft Azure Storage are cold, hot, and archive. The cheapest storage tier is referred to as cold storage or cool storage. It is designed for rarely used data, including backups or information accessed less than once a month. Since cold storage is far less expensive than the other storage tiers, it is perfect for long-term data storage that is not frequently accessed. The following tier, hot storage, is designed for frequently accessed data. This includes information that is used at least once a day or information that is necessary for your applications to run. Although hot storage is more expensive than cold storage, your data can be accessed more quickly.

The uppermost tier, archive storage, is designed for material that is infrequently accessed but must be kept for regulatory or business objectives. Regulatory archives or outdated client records could be examples of this type of data. The least expensive storage for infrequently accessed material is offered by archive storage, which is the most expensive of the three storage levels. The cost of Azure Storage is determined by the volume of data kept, and the volume of transactions carried out. Cold storage is the least expensive type of storage, whereas archival storage is the most expensive one. Azure Storage also charges for data transmission based on the volume of data moved into and out of the storage account, in addition to the storage fees.

The high availability and durability of Azure Storage are two of its primary benefits. Data is replicated across many storage sites to assure constant accessibility, and Azure Storage is designed to be highly available and durable. Along with a number of security features, Azure Storage supports industry-standard authentication mechanisms and enables encryption both in transit and at rest. For a variety of data storage requirements, Microsoft Azure Storage offers a scalable, secure, and highly available cloud storage solution. Users are able to select the ideal combination of price and performance for their unique needs, thanks to its several storage levels.

The use cases for all these Azure storage services are depicted as below:

Azure Blobs

Large amounts of unstructured data, including log files, documents, photos, videos, and audio files, are kept in Azure Blobs, a data service. Blobs can be accessed via a URL or a REST API and are arranged into "containers," which are akin to folders. Versioning capability, which enables you to maintain several versions of a blob and access them as necessary, is one of Azure Blobs' core features. This can be helpful if you need to keep track of the changes made to your data or if you want to go back to a prior version in case something goes wrong. Integration with other Azure services, like Azure Functions, Stream Analytics, and Machine Learning, is another beneficial aspect of Azure Blobs. By doing this, you can use Azure Blobs as the data source for these services, giving you the ability to manipulate, analyse, and change the data. Azure Blobs can store and handle huge volumes of unstructured data, including multimedia files, documents, and log files, depending on the use case.

As it offers high scalability and dependability, it can be particularly helpful for businesses that need to store and manage massive volumes of data. Data that must be accessed often, such pictures and videos used on a website or application, can also be stored in Azure Blobs. In the same vein, providing and storing media material is another use case for Azure Blobs. A media corporation might, for instance, utilise Blobs to store big audio or video files and then use the Blob service to stream this content to viewers as needed. It is simple to combine the Blob service with other systems, such as a content delivery network (CDN), thanks to the ability to access blobs through HTTP or HTTPS.

This enables the media organisation to distribute material fast and reliably to users all over the world. Keeping vast amounts of data for analysis is one frequent use case for Azure Blobs. Blobs can be used by a business to store data that has to be processed and evaluated, such as log files, machine learning models, or other types of data. The organisation may then obtain insights and make data-driven choices by accessing and processing this data using Azure HDInsight, Azure Databricks, or other big data and analytics services.

Use Cases: Website Hosting with Azure Blobs

Azure Files

Users can save and exchange files in the cloud using Azure Files. It offers a completely managed, scalable, and secure file storage solution that is accessible from any location and on any device. It has the same features as on-premises file servers, including support for SMB, NFS, and FTP as well as the ability to create and manage directories and files. When data must be accessed and shared by numerous users or applications, such as in a file server or network attached storage (NAS) environment, Azure Files is an excellent choice. One of Azure Files' primary advantages is that it makes it simple for users to share files with others without requiring them to manage infrastructure or deal with challenging IT procedures. This makes it the ideal option for businesses that need to share data among numerous teams or collaborate on big files.

Because of its built-in redundancy and automatic failover features, Azure Files also provides excellent availability and durability. This implies that even if a server goes down or there is an outage, users can be sure that their files will be accessible whenever they need them. Azure Files has a wide variety of use cases that it can be put to use in. For instance, it can be used to store and distribute enormous items, such video files or CAD drawings, that are too large to send by email. Files from on-premises applications, such as file servers or line-of-business programmes, can likewise be stored there and accessed using this method. Additionally, Azure Files can be used to transfer files between various departments or teams within a company, facilitating teamwork and collaboration.

This is especially helpful for businesses with scattered or remote teams because it enables file access and sharing from any location and on any device. In general, Azure Files is a strong and adaptable data services product that may assist businesses with storing, sharing, and accessing files in the cloud. It is the perfect choice for enterprises of all sizes since it provides high availability, durability, and scalability. Azure Files can help you share huge files, access files from on-premises apps, and interact with teams.

Use cases: Mount Azure File sharing in Windows 11 File Explorer

Azure Queue

Users can store and retrieve a lot of messages using Azure Queue. The goal of this service is to make it simple for programmers to create dependable and scalable applications that need to store and analyse data asynchronously. Azure Queue's capacity to manage a large number of messages is one of its key benefits. This makes it perfect for use cases requiring parallel data processing, such as handling numerous transactions or producing reports from big data sets. Azure Queue's capacity to handle a variety of programming languages and platforms is another important aspect. In spite of using .NET, Java, Python, or any other well-known programming language, this makes it simple for developers to integrate Azure Queue into their current applications.

Azure Queue is an appealing choice for developers due to its scalability and flexibility as well as a number of additional features. For instance, Azure Queue offers a variety of monitoring and management tools that make it simple to keep an eye on the performance of apps that use Azure Queue, as well as built-in security protections that help secure data from unwanted access. E-commerce is one of the primary use cases for Azure Queue. Retailers can offer their consumers a seamless and effective shopping experience by using Azure Queue to handle huge volumes of orders and transactions in real-time. In addition, data analytics in Azure Queue enables data scientists to store and process massive amounts of data in real-time, enabling them to gain insights and predict consumer behaviour and market trends.

Azure Tables

Microsoft Azure offers Azure Tables, a NoSQL cloud data storage solution. Large amounts of organised and unstructured data can be stored using this system at a low cost. The Azure Tables service, which is a component of the Azure Storage service, offers a schema-less data format that enables flexible and dynamic data storing. Additionally, it offers automatic data replication across many areas for increased resilience, and it is extremely available. Azure Tables' capacity to manage significant volumes of data with low-latency access is one of its main advantages. This makes it perfect for IoT solutions, data analytics, online and mobile applications, and other applications that need real-time data access and excellent performance. Additionally, Azure Tables has a number of essential characteristics that make it a desirable alternative for data storage.

Among these include the ability to support various data formats, perform indexing and querying, and integrate with other Azure services like Azure Functions and Azure Stream Analytics. Azure Tables can be used in a variety of situations. Typical illustrations include: - Keeping user profiles, preferences, and activity logs for web and mobile applications. - Managing and storing a lot of sensor data from IoT devices, including location, humidity, and temperature information. - Storing and processing massive datasets for business intelligence and data analytics objectives. - Giving applications that must deal with a high volume of data in real-time a scalable and adaptable data storage solution.

Azure Disks

Users can store and manage their data in the cloud with Azure Disks, a data storage service provided by Microsoft Azure. It provides a variety of disc types, including premium SSDs, regular SSDs, and regular HDDs, to satisfy various performance and pricing needs. Scalability is one of the main advantages of adopting Azure Disks. Users do not need to be concerned about the underlying infrastructure because they can easily adjust the size and performance of their discs as their storage requirements change. This makes Azure Disks a fantastic choice for applications like databases, web servers, and video streaming services that need high availability and performance.

The integration of Azure Disks with other Azure services is another benefit. Users may quickly add discs to virtual machines to serve as the operating system or data discs. They can also use Azure Backup to regularly backup and restore their data from discs, protecting it. Azure Disks are a practical and dependable option for managing data in the cloud as a result. To secure the availability and integrity of customers' data, Azure Disks additionally provides a number of data protection techniques in addition to these functionalities. This includes data encryption both in transit and at rest to prevent illegal access, as well as automatic data replication across various storage locations to prevent data loss.