Azure VM Authentication & Access Control Considerations

By Ashwin Venugopal -

 




Azure VM Authentication, Authorization, & Access Control

Active Directory for on-premises can be easily extended to serve as the authentication mechanism through an Azure deployed domain controller especially in cross-premises scenarios. Microsoft Azure Active Directory offers only a subset of the traditional on-premises AD features that includes identity and access management but doesn't have the full AD schema or services that many third party application take advantage of.

Advantage of Azure AD can be taken to enable single-sign-on (SSO) to your S/4 HANA Fiori Launchpad. SAP HANA, and SAP NetWeaver-based applications. Control Access to resources by using a centralized identity management system at all levels:

  • Provide access to Azure resources through role-based access control (RBAC).
  • Grant access to Azure VMs through LDAP, Azure AD, Kerberos or another system.
  • Support access within the app themselves through the services that SAP provides or use OAuth 2.0 & Azure AD. 

Azure VM Licensing, Pricing, & Support Considerations

Azure VM Licensing & Support

Customers should have appropriate licenses for SAP software to be deployed to Azure. also the pricing for Azure resources and licensing of non-SAP software is according to the standard Azure pricing as well as licensing rules.

SAP on Microsoft Azure supports prerequisites which states that while operating SAP systems on Microsoft Azure VMs, customers have two possible support actions, they are:

  • professional Direct which offers the bare minimum support level, and it is appropriate if you only require support from Microsoft for Azure itself.

  • Microsoft Premier Support, which is recommended if SAP workloads are based on Windows Server and/or SQL Server. This one provides the best enterprise-level support for Azure, Windows and/or SQL Server. 

Pricing Azure VM-Based Solutions

If you want to identify the cost of Azure Resources included in your design, you can use the following tools:
  • Azure Pricing Calculator https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/calculator/
  • Azure TCO Calculator https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/pricing/calculator/




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