Unlocking Azure Data with Splunk Cloud Platform

By leveraging the power of Splunk Cloud Platform, you can unlock the full potential of your Azure data. With Splunk's robust search and analytics capabilities, you can quickly and easily extract valuable insights from your Azure logs and metrics.

Splunk Cloud Platform provides a scalable and secure platform for collecting, indexing, and analyzing large volumes of data from Azure sources. It supports various data formats, including Azure Monitor logs, Azure Storage logs, and Azure Active Directory logs.

By integrating Splunk Cloud Platform with Azure, you can gain real-time visibility into your Azure environment and identify potential issues before they become major problems. This proactive approach enables you to optimize your Azure resources, improve performance, and reduce costs.

Azure Functions offer big benefits to development teams that just want a place to run their code without having to worry about anything else.

Splunk is the first vendor to deliver a truly real-time monitoring solution that matches the speed, scale, and variety of data coming from your modern stack.

You can try Splunk Infrastructure Monitoring for your Azure Functions to see how it can help streamline your workflow.

Splunk Infrastructure Monitoring is designed to keep up with the fast-paced environment of Azure Functions, providing a seamless and efficient experience.

To configure and set up Azure Splunk, you'll need to complete the following steps. First, create an Application Registration on Microsoft Azure by going to Azure Active Directory > App Registrations > New Registration.

You'll need to enter a name for the Application Registration, leave the Application type at the default value, and click Register. Note the application ID value, which you'll use later as the Client ID.

Create an application secret by going to Certificates & secrets, clicking New client secret, and entering a name for the secret. Select the Never radio button under the Expires field and click Add. Copy the secret key value, as it will only display once.

To grant the application registration read access to resources in your subscription, click Subscriptions, choose the subscription, and click Access control (IAM) > Add > Add role assignment. Select Reader from the Role dropdown menu and click Save.

Once you've completed these steps, you can configure the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Cloud Services. Open the app from the list of available apps and go to Configuration > Add Azure App Account. Enter a name for the Microsoft Azure App account and the Client ID, Key (Client Secret), and Tenant ID values.

Click Add and then click the Inputs tab to configure the inputs. Click Create New Input > Azure Audit, enter a name for the input, and select the account you created earlier. Enter the Subscription ID value and leave the start time value as the default value. For the index, select the azure-activity index you created earlier.

To configure authentication and data ingestion for your Splunk Cloud Platform instance, you'll need to follow a few steps. First, you'll need to create an Application Registration on Microsoft Azure.

This will give your Splunk instance read access to your Azure resources. To create the Application Registration, go to Azure Active Directory > App Registrations > New Registration in your Azure portal. Enter a name for the registration and leave the default values for Application type and Supported account type.

Note the application ID value, which you'll need later. You can think of this as a user ID that maps to the Client ID field in Splunk. Next, create an application secret, which is like a password or key. To do this, go to Certificates & secrets and click New client secret.

Enter a name for the secret and select the Never radio button under the Expires field. Click Add, and copy the value for the secret key as it will only display once. You'll need this value later when you configure the add-on to connect to Microsoft Azure.

To grant your application registration read access to resources in your subscription, go to Subscriptions and choose the subscription from which you want to ingest data. Click Access control (IAM) > Add > Add role assignment, and select Reader from the Role dropdown menu.

In the Assign Access to field, leave the default value, and in the select field, type the name of the Application Registration you just created. Click Save to complete this step.

Here are the steps to configure the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Cloud Services:

To configure the inputs, click the Inputs tab and click Create New Input > Azure Audit. Enter a name for the input, and from the dropdown menu, select the account you created earlier. In the Subscription ID field, enter the Azure Subscription ID, which you can find in the Azure Portal by going to All services > Subscriptions.

To set up Microsoft Azure data in your Splunk Cloud Platform instance, you'll need to meet certain administrator requirements.

You'll need permissions to make changes in your Microsoft Azure environment. This is crucial for the setup process to work smoothly.

To confirm you have the necessary permissions, check if you have access to activity logs and subscriptions in your Microsoft Azure environment.

If you're unsure about these requirements or don't have the necessary permissions, collaborate closely with your organization's Microsoft Azure administrator to complete these steps.

In addition, note that customers are responsible for the setup, configuration, and maintenance of third-party services and resources, including payment.

Splunk offers a range of features and benefits that make it an ideal choice for monitoring your Azure functions.

You can get immediate access to prebuilt Azure-specific dashboards once the data is coming into Splunk.

Splunk's advanced analytics capabilities allow you to use that data in custom charts, set up real-time alerts, and automate processes using instant webhooks.

Data indexing and searching are essential features of Splunk, enabling you to store and analyze large amounts of data from various sources.

Splunk's AI and machine learning capabilities help you detect and investigate unusual changes, and its unified security feature provides comprehensive security and compliance.

Visualization tools and customized monitoring are also key features of Splunk, allowing you to create interactive dashboards and monitor your applications in real-time.

Here are some of the essential features of Splunk:

With Splunk, you can proactively find and fix complex issues in seconds, reducing noise with integrated workflows and accurate outlier detection.

Splunk's predictive problem detection capabilities help you identify and resolve issues quickly, and its built-in data science capabilities enable you to detect and investigate unusual changes fast.

Splunk's real-time cloud monitoring capabilities allow you to consolidate tools, optimize spend, and get the most from Azure.

By using Splunk, you can improve uptime, reliability, and performance, and reduce the risk of major issues impacting your customers.

Monitoring and Logging is a crucial aspect of Azure Splunk. Splunk Application Performance Monitoring solves problems faster in monoliths and microservices by immediately detecting problems from new changes.

Azure Monitor provides a comprehensive platform for monitoring various aspects of your Azure resources, and Log Analytics is a component of Azure Monitor that provides advanced log analysis capabilities. Splunk Observability goes beyond just monitoring.

You can surface high value custom metrics for deep root cause analysis by using Splunk Observability. This allows you to analyze performance across hundreds of thousands of Azure components, multiple deployment environments, different application versions, and billions of events.

To access data, you can use add-ons, specifically the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Cloud Services and the Microsoft Azure Add-on for Splunk, which make it easy to get Azure data into Splunk.

These add-ons are the key to unlocking Microsoft Azure data in Splunk, allowing you to tap into a vast amount of valuable information.

Microsoft makes Azure data available through various types of data, including logs and metrics, which can be accessed and analyzed using these add-ons.

Microsoft's Azure Monitor and Azure Log Analytics are just a couple of the services that provide this data, and with the right add-ons, you can bring it all into Splunk for further analysis.

By using these add-ons, you can unlock the full potential of your Azure data and gain valuable insights into your system's performance and activity.

Azure Monitor and Log Analytics are related services in the Azure platform, but they are different. Azure Monitor provides a comprehensive platform for monitoring various aspects of your Azure resources.

Azure Monitor is used for real-time monitoring, alerting, and analytics capabilities that are essential for ensuring uptime and performance. It gives deep insights into the health and performance of applications, enabling quick identification and resolution of issues.

Log Analytics is a component of Azure Monitor that provides advanced log analysis capabilities. This is useful for surface high value custom metrics for deep root cause analysis.

In fact, Azure Monitor and Log Analytics are used together to provide a unified view of all Azure resources, making it easier to monitor and troubleshoot applications. This is according to David Blank-Edelman, Principal Cloud Advocate, Microsoft.

Microsoft Integration is a crucial aspect of Azure Splunk. You can integrate Azure with Splunk using the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Cloud Services or the Microsoft Azure Add-on for Splunk.

The Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Cloud Services integrates with Event Hubs, storage accounts, and the activity log. This allows you to collect and analyze activity data, authentication data, NSG flow logs, web application and app insights.

The Microsoft Azure Add-on for Splunk, on the other hand, integrates with various REST APIs. This enables you to collect resource data, authentication data, cost and consumption, and metrics.

To configure the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Cloud Services, you need to complete several steps. First, you need to open the app from the list of available apps. Then, you need to go to Apps > Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Cloud Services, and from there, select Configuration > Add Azure App Account.

Here are the key steps to configure the Splunk Add-on for Microsoft Cloud Services:

Once you've completed these steps, you can verify that data is flowing to your Splunk Cloud Platform instance.