Welcome to Azure Functions Serverless Tutorials

This section provides a comprehensive guide to developing, deploying, and managing serverless applications using Azure Functions. Serverless computing allows you to build and run applications and services without thinking about infrastructure. With Azure Functions, you can write and manage code without maintaining the underlying infrastructure, and pay only for the resources you consume.

What You'll Learn:

  • Understanding the core concepts of serverless and Azure Functions.
  • Creating your first Azure Function using various triggers and bindings.
  • Developing event-driven applications with Functions.
  • Deploying and managing Functions in production.
  • Integrating Functions with other Azure services.
  • Best practices for serverless development.

Getting Started with Azure Functions

Core Concepts

Azure Functions is a serverless compute service that lets you run code on demand without explicitly provisioning or managing infrastructure. Key concepts include:

  • Functions: Small pieces of code that perform a specific task.
  • Triggers: Events that cause a function to execute (e.g., an HTTP request, a timer, a message arriving in a queue).
  • Bindings: Declarative ways to connect functions to other Azure services without writing complex integration code.
  • Hosting Plans: Different ways to run your functions, from Consumption (pay-per-execution) to Premium and App Service plans.

Your First Azure Function

Let's create a simple HTTP-triggered Azure Function. This is a common starting point to understand the development flow.

Example: A Simple HTTP Trigger Function (JavaScript)

This function will return a greeting message when a GET request is made to its endpoint.


module.exports = async function (context, req) {
    context.log('JavaScript HTTP trigger function processed a request.');

    const name = (req.query.name || (req.body && req.body.name));
    const responseMessage = name
        ? "Hello, " + name + ". This HTTP triggered function executed successfully!"
        : "This HTTP triggered function executed successfully. Pass a name in the query string or in the request body for a personalized response.";

    context.res = {
        status: 200,
        body: responseMessage
    };
};

To run this:

  1. Install the Azure Functions Core Tools.
  2. Create a new function project.
  3. Add this code to an index.js file within an HTTP trigger function folder.
  4. Run the local development server: func start.
  5. Make a GET request to the local endpoint (e.g., http://localhost:7071/api/yourFunctionName?name=World).

Common Triggers and Bindings

Explore how to use different triggers and bindings to make your functions more powerful:

  • HTTP Trigger: For building web APIs and webhooks.
  • Timer Trigger: For running code on a schedule.
  • Blob Trigger: To run code when a blob is added or updated in Azure Blob Storage.
  • Queue Trigger: To process messages from an Azure Storage Queue.
  • Cosmos DB Trigger: To react to changes in a Cosmos DB collection.
  • Service Bus Trigger: To process messages from Azure Service Bus.

Next Steps

Ready to dive deeper? Check out the following tutorials: