Getting Started With Azure Files

Cloud storage options such as Amazon S3, Google Cloud Storage and Azure Storage, offer scalability, flexibility, and excellent performance. On the other hand, sometimes it is difficult to access your files without programming, scripts, or client tools.

Azure Storage has a service known as File Storage, where cloud storage is accessible through the Server Message Block (SMB) protocol. SMB is the native "language" that Windows systems and programs (such as Windows Explorer) talk about. You can open your storage and files directly in File Explorer or by mapping a network drive.

There's no need to worry about security; your files won't be open to the public. First, storage is not accessible without a user and password. In addition, Azure will transparently encrypt and decrypt your data as it is accessed. The SMB 3.0 protocol requires the data be transmitted in encrypted form.

1. To start using Azure Files, first access the Azure Portal through https://portal.azure.com
2. Then, we’ll create a new Azure Account.
   
   
   
   
3. In the following blade, let’s enter a unique name for the storage account, as well as choosing an existing resource group, or let’s set a name for a brand new one, and press the "Create" button.
   
   
   

4. Once the storage account is ready to use, let’s jump to the Overview blade and select the “Files” option.
   
   
   
   
5. After that, let’s click over to  the “File Share” button and set the name for the file share. You can also define a quota of up to 5TB for this file share, and hit the “OK” button.
   
   
   
   

6. Once it’s created, let’s access this file share.
   
   
   

7. By clicking over the “Connect” button, we can get the command to connect directly to this file share using the SMB protocol.
   
   
   

8. Also, you can use your Windows Explorer and map it to a network drive,
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   
   

But where can I use this feature?

If you have more than one virtual machines in Azure, and you want to share files between them, you just map a network drive pointing to your Azure Files, and the problem is solved!  

This feature can also be used to expand legacy applications (which require SMB file sharing) in cloud storage or to easily archive data files from a server.

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