Azure: Data Store Deployment

How-to create and register

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Prerequisites

  1. You are an admin in Azure (for step 1).
  2. You are an Account Owner (for step 2).

This guide outlines how to setup a Data Store for storing troubleshooting and temporary data in your Azure cloud.

Steps

1. Create a Storage Account and Container

  1. Use the Azure Portal, CLI or favorite IaC tool to create a new Storage account in your Azure account with no public access. Note that registration (step 2) will fail if the bucket is publicly accessible.

    We strongly recommend you do not use an existing storage account or share with other jobs as Monte Carlo might overwrite existing data. And we also recommend the following settings:

    • Requiring secure transfer for REST API operations and enabling encryption.
    • Setting Expiration lifecycles. 90 days or less for all objects in the following prefixes:
    custom-sql-output-samples/
    rca
    idempotent
    
  2. Then under Data storage for the Storage Account you created in step #1, select "Containers" and create a private Container.

  3. Finally, under Security + networking for the Storage Account you created in step #1, select "Access keys" and retrieve the "Connection string" for either key. Please keep this safe. You will be using it during the registration.

2. Register the Data Store

After creating the storage account and container you can register either via the Monte Carlo UI or CLI.

After this step is complete all integrations that you add to this collection service will automatically use this container for storing troubleshooting and temporary data. You can add these integrations as you normally would using Monte Carlo's UI wizard or CLI.

UI

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If you are onboarding a new account, you can also register by following the steps on the onscreen


  1. Navigate to settings/integrations/agents and select the Create button.
  2. Follow the onscreen wizard for the "Azure" Platform. The "Container name" and "Connection string" are from step one.
Azure Data Store Registration Wizard

Azure Data Store Registration Wizard

CLI

Use the command montecarlo agents register-azure-blob-store to register.

For reference on this command please see here. And see here for how to install and configure the CLI.

The "container-name" and "connection-string" are from step one. For instance:

montecarlo agents register-azure-blob-store \
  --container-name artemis \
  --connection-string -1

FAQs

Can I further constraint access to this Data Store (Azure Storage Account)?

Absolutely! By default this is done via the connection string, but if you prefer you can further restrict requests via an IP allowlist. For instance you can:

  1. Please refer to the documentation for the list of IP addresses that need to be allowlisted for your platform version.
  2. Create a Storage Account and Container. You can do this by following the steps here.
  3. Navigate to the Storage Account created in step #2 and select "Networking".
  4. Update the Public network access option to "Enabled from selected virtual networks and IP addresses" and under Firewall add the IP address from step #1 alongside any other IP addresses you want to allow. Select "Save" when you're done.
  5. Continue with registration.

Note that this constraint will prevent the use of certain features and functionality that rely on pre-signed URLs, such as the Data Explorer, unless you also include the client IPs.

You also have the option to use private endpoints if you prefer.

For more information on connectivity, please refer to our Network Connectivity documentation.

Can I use private endpoints to configure inbound access (ingress) to the data store?

Yes, please refer to the documentation for more details.

How do I check the reachability between Monte Carlo and the Data Store?

Reachability is automatically validated during registration, but you can also use this CLI command or "test" button on the UI to test anytime.