AZ-104 Exam EP 27: Azure Traffic Manager

Introduction

This tutorial covers the Azure Traffic Manager, a crucial tool for managing traffic to your applications across multiple locations. Understanding how to use Traffic Manager effectively can optimize your cloud resources, enhance performance, and improve user experience. This guide will walk you through the key routing methods available in Azure Traffic Manager.

Step 1: Understanding Azure Traffic Manager

• Azure Traffic Manager is a DNS-based traffic load balancer.
• It helps distribute traffic to various endpoints, such as Azure web apps, cloud services, or external websites.
• Key benefits include improved availability and performance by directing users to the nearest or best-performing endpoint.

Step 2: Exploring Traffic Manager Routing Methods

Azure Traffic Manager offers several routing methods to optimize traffic management. Here are the primary routing techniques:

Step 2.1: Priority Routing

• Definition: Directs traffic to a primary endpoint until it becomes unavailable, after which traffic is routed to secondary endpoints.
• Use Case: Ideal for applications requiring failover capabilities.
• Setup:
  1. Define your endpoints.
  2. Assign a priority level to each endpoint (lower numbers indicate higher priority).

Step 2.2: Performance Routing

• Definition: Routes traffic based on the lowest network latency to the endpoints.
• Use Case: Best for applications with users distributed globally, ensuring they connect to the closest endpoint.
• Setup:
  1. Enable performance routing in Traffic Manager settings.
  2. Monitor and adjust endpoints periodically based on performance metrics.

Step 2.3: Geographic Routing

• Definition: Directs users to specific endpoints based on their geographic location.
• Use Case: Useful for compliance with data residency regulations or to enhance regional performance.
• Setup:
  1. Create geographic regions for your endpoints.
  2. Specify which endpoint serves each geographic area.

Step 2.4: Weighted Routing

• Definition: Distributes traffic across multiple endpoints based on assigned weights.
• Use Case: Allows gradual rollout of new features or services by directing a percentage of traffic to specific endpoints.
• Setup:
  1. Assign weights to each endpoint.
  2. Adjust weights as needed to control traffic distribution.

Conclusion

Understanding and implementing Azure Traffic Manager's routing methods can significantly enhance your application's performance and availability. By selecting the appropriate routing strategy—whether it's priority, performance, geographic, or weighted—you can ensure that your users receive the best possible experience.

For further exploration, consider setting up a Traffic Manager profile in your Azure portal and experimenting with each routing method to see how they affect your application's traffic management.