Since the beginning of Microsoft Azure with the initial General Availability in February 2010, then Azure Portal has always been a Web Application. It’s gone through a couple of different HTML5 / Javascript versions, including a Silverlight version back in the early days. One things has been constant the entire time, and that is that the Azure Portal has always been a Web Application. That is until now! The Azure Portal is now available as a native mobile application for your mobile devices.

Many people have asked over the years, “Why doesn’t Microsoft make a native app for the Azure Portal?” There was a time when I even thought it was logical that Microsoft would build a Windows Store app for the Azure Portal. However, then I gave up that idea and started rationalizing the benefits of a Web Application over going Native.

While the Azure Portal has always been usage from a mobile device, after all it is an HTML5 / Javascript web application, it’s been a little clunky and cumbersome to use on a small screen. To our delight, Microsoft has decided to practice what they are preaching about mobile development and build a native, mobile application experience for the Microsoft Azure Portal.

Azure Portal Mobile App

For what may be surprising to some, and not to others, Microsoft has now announced at the Build 2017 conference this week that the Azure Portal is coming to your mobile devices as a Native app. It will support viewing all your Resources, Resource Groups, and allow you to toggle between Azure Subscriptions when logged in. This new Azure Portal native mobile application will allow you to stay connected at all times, stay informed about your workloads at all time, and most importantly stay in control of your workloads at all times.

To install the Azure Portal mobile application, you just need to go to your mobile app store on your device, and download the Microsoft Azure app listed there. You can download the App currently on iOS and Android; with Windows Phone support coming soon.

 

 

Microsoft Azure Mobile App Features

While the Microsoft Azure mobile app (at the time of writing this article) is in a Preview release, it doesn’t support the full feature set it all once it’s GA (Generally Available). However, it does support many Azure services and features currently, and it’s certain more will get added as app updates in the coming weeks and months. For now, here’s a brief list of the apps capabilities:

• Suspend and resume Analysis Services servers
• Open the API Management portal in the browser
• Start, Stop, and Restart App Service web apps and deployment slots
• Start and Stop App Service environments
• Restart all App Service web apps in a plan or environment
• Open App Service web apps and deployment slots in the browser
• Start and Stop Content Delivery Network (CDN) endpoints
• Start, Stop, and Swap Cloud Service slots
• Open the HDInsight portal in the browser
• Open Log Analytics workspaces in the OMS app
• Enable and Disable Logic App workflows
• Enable and Disable Scheduler job collections
• Start and Stop Stream Analytics jobs
• Start, Stop, and Restart Virtual Machines (VMs)
• Connect to Windows virtual machines using the RDP app
• Start, Stop, and Restart Virtual Machine Scale Set instances
• Open Visual Studio Team Services accounts in the browser

Another, really amazing feature coming soon in support for the Azure Cloud Shell directly within the Microsoft App app on your mobile device. Currently, the Azure Cloud Shell is available within the Azure Portal on the web, and it brings with it a Bash command-line experience where you can easily use the Azure CLI (both 1.0 and 2.0 versions) right within the browser. This provides zero reason to spin up a VM or install the tools on your local PC. Plus, the Microsoft Azure app is bringing this amazing new feature to you where ever you are. Imagine you’ve just sat down to watch the latest Star Wars movie the just came out, and you forgot to start or stop a service or some other action. All you need to do is pull out your Smartphone, open the app, and get scripting right there. Amazing, right?!

To view more information about the Microsoft Azure mobile app, I encourage you to read the official announcement blog post from Microsoft.

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