Announcing template-based previews of Azure CLI and Azure PowerShell for Key Vault deployments

[Nori_Zhang]

We are announcing the new implementation of Azure CLI and Azure PowerShell commands to create Azure Key Vault.

 

Advantages

We leverage the ARM template mechanism to refactor the Key Vault command line. Compared with the previous implementation, calling REST API through SDKs, this implementation scheme has the following advantages that users can benefit from.

• Consistency. Ensure consistent behavior and defaults between Azure CLI, Azure PowerShell, and Portal. 
• What-If. Support a ‘what if’ option to predict the impact of a deployment before the command is executed.  
• Idempotency. Sending the same request multiple times will produce the same result, regardless of resource state.

 

What’s new 

We implemented several new features when compared to the previous version of commands. 

 

What-If

What-If is designed to show users as much information about what their deployment will do before it deploys. 

 

Progress Bar

We have implemented a progress bar to visualize the deployment.

 

Idempotency 

We are using the incremental mode of ARM deployment to create key vaults. By setting –FailOnExist as $false, we can repeatedly create the same key vault or update the existing one. 

Create a same key vault

Update the existing vault

Deep Dive 

For Key Vault creation, Azure Client Tools previously followed a different structure than Azure Portal, as shown in the following example:  

With the ARM template included, we maintain consistency and communicate directly with ARM: 

We are using template specs to make staging and sharing of ARM templates easy. 

Next Steps

We look forward to your feedback. We will evaluate the effects and risks and consider expanding the command line scope of service, module, and extension. 

Getting Started 

You can test our new version by following the instructions provided below. Your feedback will help shape the strategy of how we build the command line tools for Azure.

 

Getting started with Azure PowerShell

The PowerShell package for public preview is provided on the PowerShell Gallery.

Installation 

Copy and paste the following command to install this package using PowerShellGet: 

Install-Module -Name Az.KeyVault -RequiredVersion 4.12.0-preview -AllowPrerelease 

Quick Start

# 1. Create a Resource Group 
New-AzResourceGroup -Name $resourceGroupName -location $location 

# 2. Validate the creation of a key vault using `-WhatIf` 
New-AzKeyvault -Name $keyvaultName -Location $location -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroupName -WhatIf 

# 3. Create a key vault, observe the deployment once the command has completed 
New-AzKeyvault -Name $keyvaultName -Location $location -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroupName 

# 4. See what will happen if create a key vault in incremental mode and do a little change 
New-AzKeyvault -Name $keyvaultName -Location $location -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroupName  -FailOnExist $false -EnabledForDeployment –WhatIf 

# 5. Create the existing key vault in incremental mode  
New-AzKeyvault -Name $keyvaultName -Location $location -ResourceGroupName $resourceGroupName -FailOnExist $false 

# 6. Clean-up Azure resources 
Remove-AzResourceGroup -Name $resourceGroupName 

Getting started with Azure CLI

The CLI package for public preview is provided as MSI / whl packages: 

For MSI package Installation

Download and install the MSI package. When the installer asks if it can make changes to your computer, select "Yes". If you have previously installed the Azure CLI, make sure it has been uninstalled first. 

For whl package Installation

1. Prepare and use a separate virtual environment

   # Create a python virtual env named `testenv` with: 
   python -m venv testenv 
   
   # Activate the env (if you are using powershell): 
   .\testenv\Scripts\Activate.ps1 
   
   # Activate the env (if you are using bash): 
   source venv/bin/activate 

2. Unzip and install private .whl packages 

   # Unzip the file and install three cli whl packages (azure_cli, azure_cli_core, azure_cli_telemetry) 
   pip install azure_cli-2.53.0.post20230920063357-py3-none-any.whl azure_cli_core-2.53.0.post20230920063357-py3-none-any.whl azure_cli_telemetry-1.1.0.post20230920063357-py3-none-any.whl 

 

Quick Start

# 0 Define your variables 
let "randomIdentifier=$RANDOM*$RANDOM" 
location="eastus" 
resourceGroupName="msdocs-keyvault-rg-$randomIdentifier" 
keyvaultName = "msdocs-keyvault-name-$randomIdentifier"

# 1. Create resource group 
az group create --resource-group $resourceGroupName --location $location 

# 2. Validate the creation of a keyvault using `--what-if`  
az keyvault create --name $keyvaultName --resource-group $resourceGroupName --location $location --what-if

# 3. Create a keyvault, observe the deployment once the command has completed 
az keyvault create --name $keyvaultName --resource-group $resourceGroupName --location $location 

# 4. See what will happen if create a keyvault in incremental mode and do a little change  
az keyvault create --name $keyvaultName --resource-group $resourceGroupName --location $location --enabled-for-deployment --fail-on-exist false 

# 5. Create the existing keyvault in incremental mode 
az keyvault create --name $keyvaultName --resource-group $resourceGroupName --location $location --fail-on-exist false 

# 6. Clean-up Azure resources 
az group delete -name $resourceGroupName

For whl package clean up  

# Deactivate the virtual environment 
Deactivate 

# Delete the virtual environment folder to clean up (if you are using linux) 
rm –rf .\testenv 

Feedback

This feature is available as a preview and your feedback is extremely important.

Let us know what you think and issues you may face in our survey.