Learn Azure - tips and resources
I love this photo (credit to Gregory Hubbs). It accurately reflects how I felt numerous times this year on my learning journey, which is why I wanted to share a recent post from the Azure blog with tips on keeping your resolution to learn Azure.
That is such a massive feat in itself - to challenge yourself to learn the entirety of the platform. While it’s definitely possible, I love the approach in this blog. Instead of giving yourself this gargantuan task of learning an entire Cloud platform (because really, what does it mean to ‘learn Azure’?) - challenge yourself to learn something new about it every day. First step - create a free Azure account. This gives you £150 to use for a month to get stuck in and start building things!
Learning Resources
I began with some excellent courses on edX which gave me a really good foundation on which to start building out my knowledge further. If you’re new to Cloud computing, I highly recommend starting out with some infrastructure courses to get an understanding of concepts such as Virtual Machines, Networking and Storage. A bunch of the Azure courses are due to start Jan 1st - perfect timing!
Microsoft Azure Virtual Machines
Microsoft Azure Virtual Networks
From there, my advice would be - do what you’re interested in. If you’re really into data or interested in artificial intelligence, take some Azure Machine Learning courses or try out the Professional Program in Data Science. If you’re a developer (or budding developer!) learn more about App Servicesand Serverless.
Most importantly, just do. You will learn a lot by getting into the Azure portal (or command line and PowerShell!) to create and deploy resources. Here are a few examples you can try:
Create an ASP.NET website with an Azure SQL DB
Create a Mobile App with offline sync, authentication, and push notification functionality
Build a Chat Bot and train it with LUIS
Have fun!!