Ready to have a quick revision for the AZ-104 exam? This cheat sheet will provide a recap for the AZ-104 exam with all the essential details and required resources to crack the exam. It is quite common that sometimes it gets confusing during the last minute preparation time for where to start and where not to. For clearing out this confusion, we have created this cheat for AZ-104 in such a way, that you will be able to revise everything in a sequential manner. And, the other big advantage of this cheat is that it is divided into sections starting with the basic exam requirements and ending with the essential AZ-104 study guide so that everything will not get mixed up.
However, in order to get a full understanding of the Microsoft Azure AZ-104 exam, it is important to have knowledge of the basic details and requirements. So, without wasting any time let’s start with let’s get started with the AZ-104 exam basic requirements and overview.
Microsoft Azure Administrator Associate AZ-104 Exam Overview
You should know that the Microsoft Azure Administrator Associate (AZ-104) exam is the new pathway to become Microsoft Azure Administrator replacing the AZ-103 exam. However, the AZ-104 certification exam is designed for measuring the candidate’s skills as an Azure Administrator. And, the skills include can be implementing, managing, and monitoring identity in a cloud environment. Further, being the updated version, this comes with newly loaded and updated features such as:
- Firstly, this defines the importance of identities
- Secondly, this focuses on the management of data
- Thirdly, there is a new domain for backup and recovery
- Lastly, moving from virtual machines to compute resources
However, the exam overview is basic but the thing that is important to keep an eye on is its knowledge requirement part. So, let’s check the knowledge required for the AZ-104 Exam.
knowledge Required
Microsoft Azure Administrator Associate (AZ-104) exam is developed for facilitating candidates planning a career as Azure Administrator. However, there are certain knowledge areas which you have to fulfil for this exam,
- Firstly, a minimum of six months of hands-on experience administering Azure is essential.
- Secondly, there must be a strong understanding of core Azure services, Azure workloads, security, and governance.
- Thirdly, an experience in using PowerShell, the Command Line Interface, Azure Portal, and ARM templates.
AZ-104: Prerequisite Lessons for Azure Administrators
Below, you can see the list of lessons that you can get familiar with before applying for Azure Administrator AZ-104 exam.
- Firstly, Learn governance and Management in Azure
- Secondly, Intro to Azure Virtual Machines
- Thirdly, Networking Fundamentals
- Then, Network Security
- Next, Using Azure CLI to control azure services
- After that, Using Azure Powershell to automate azure tasks
- Then, Introduction to Azure Active Directory
- Next, Intro to Docker Containers
- After that, Intro to data storage in azure
- Lastly, Learn data storage approach in azure
Check out the AZ-104 study guide for better preparation!
Above we have understood the essential requirements and quick brief about the Azure AZ-104 exam. Now, moving on to the important part of the blog that is the preparation guide. Moreover, this is the part where you will spend most of the time in this cheat sheet. So, let’s check this.
Microsoft Azure AZ-104 Study Guide
In the Microsoft Azure Administrator Associate (AZ-104) exam study guide, we will cover the topmost areas of learning resources that you can use to have a good revision. Moreover, this includes Microsoft documentation links that directly take you to the exam topic you want to learn about. Let’s start with the guide and help you to prepare in a better way. Get ready to attain the AZ-104 passing score and become a Microsoft Azure Administrator Now!
Exam Topics AZ-104
This cheat is all about providing a quick recap of things you already have knowledge about. And, the important thing to start with is the exam objectives for the AZ-104 exam. That is to say, would be best to first go through the Microsoft exam objectives to maintain that familiarity with the exam important areas. Doing so will fill up your mind with the Microsoft Azure AZ-104 topics and skills. Also, reviewing the exam objectives will leave no space for confusion in your head and you can focus move for further revisions. Moreover, the exam objectives can help you strengthen the modules and the respective subtopics. For the Microsoft Azure Administrator Associate (AZ-104) exam, below we will learn about the important AZ-104 exam topics.
Microsoft AZ-104 Exam has been updated in the course outline as on July 28, 2022.
The Microsoft AZ-104 exam topics include:
Module 1: Manage Azure identities and governance (15-20%)
1.1 Manage Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) objects
Read the following documentations
- Create users and groups (Microsoft Documentation: Add or delete users using Azure Active Directory)
- Manage licenses in Azure AD (Microsoft Documentation: Assign or remove licenses in the Azure Active Directory portal)
- Create administrative units (Microsoft Documentation: Administrative units in Azure Active Directory)
- Manage User and Group Properties (Microsoft Documentation: Update user’s profile information in Azure Active Directory)
- Manage device settings and device identity (Microsoft Documentation: Manage device identities using the Azure portal)
- Perform bulk user updates (Microsoft Documentation: Active Directory Bulk User Modification)
- Manage guest accounts (Microsoft Documentation: Quickstart: Add guest users to your directory in the Azure portal)
- Configure self-service password reset (Microsoft Documentation: Tutorial: Enable users to unlock their account or reset passwords using Azure Active Directory self-service password reset)
1.2 Manage access control
- Create custom role-based access control (RBAC) and Azure AD roles (Microsoft Documentation: Azure custom roles)
- Provide access to Azure resources by assigning roles at different scopes (Microsoft Documentation: Assign Azure roles using the Azure portal)
- Interpret access assignments (Microsoft Documentation: Role-based Access Control/Deny Assignments)
1.3 Manage subscriptions and governance
- Configuring and managing Azure policies (Microsoft Documentation: Create and manage policies to enforce compliance)
- Configuring resource locks (Microsoft Documentation: Lock resources to prevent unexpected changes)
- Apply and manage tags on resources (Microsoft Documentation: Use tags to organize your Azure resources and management hierarchy)
- Managing resource groups (Microsoft Documentation: Move resources to a new resource group or subscription)
- Managing subscriptions (Microsoft Documentation: Organize and manage multiple Azure subscriptions)
- Manage costs by using alerts, budgets, and recommendations (Microsoft Documentation: Use cost alerts to monitor usage and spending)
- Configuring management groups (Microsoft Documentation: Create management groups for resource organization and management)
Module 2: Implement and manage storage (15-20%)
2.1 Configure access to storage
- Configure network access to storage accounts (Microsoft Documentation: Configure Azure Storage firewalls and virtual networks)
- Create and configure storage accounts (Microsoft Documentation: Create an Azure Storage account)
- Generate shared access signature tokens (Microsoft Documentation: Grant limited access to Azure Storage resources using shared access signatures (SAS) )
- Manage access keys (Microsoft Documentation: Manage storage account access keys)
- Configure Azure AD Authentication for a storage account (Microsoft Documentation: Acquire a token from Azure AD for authorizing requests from a client application)
- Configure storage encryption (Microsoft Documentation: Azure encryption overview)
2.2 Manage data in Azure storage accounts
- Create import and export jobs (Microsoft Documentation: Azure Import/Export service)
- Manage data by using Azure Storage Explorer and AzCopy (Microsoft Documentation: Get started with AzCopy)
- Implement Azure Storage redundancy (Microsoft Documentation: Azure Storage redundancy)
- Configure object replication (Microsoft Documentation: Configure object replication for block blobs)
2.3 Configure Azure files and Azure blob storage
- Create an Azure file share (Microsoft Documentation: Create an Azure file share)
- Configure Azure blob storage (Microsoft Documentation: Upload, download, and list blobs with the Azure portal)
- Configure storage tiers (Microsoft Documentation: Hot, Cool, and Archive access tiers for blob data)
- Configure blob lifecycle management (Microsoft Documentation: Configure a lifecycle management policy)
Module 3: Deploy and manage Azure compute resources (20-25%)
3.1 Automate deployment of resources by using templates
- Modify an ARM template (Microsoft Documentation: Create and deploy ARM templates by using the Azure portal)
- Deploy from a template (Microsoft Documentation: ARM templates)
- Save a deployment as an ARM template (Microsoft Documentation: Use Azure portal to export a template)
- Deploy virtual machine (VM) extensions (Microsoft Documentation: Azure virtual machine extensions and features)
3.2 Create and configure VMs
- Create a VM (Microsoft Documentation: Create a Windows virtual machine)
- Manage images by using the Azure Compute Gallery (Microsoft Documentation: Store and share resources in an Azure Compute Gallery)
- Configure Azure Disk Encryption (Microsoft Documentation: Create and encrypt a Windows virtual machine with the Azure portal)
- Move VMs from one resource group to another (Microsoft Documentation: Move a Windows VM to another Azure subscription or resource group)
- Manage VM sizes (Microsoft Documentation: Sizes for virtual machines in Azure)
- Add data disks (Microsoft Documentation: Attach a managed data disk to a Windows VM by using the Azure portal)
- Configure VM network settings (Microsoft Documentation: Configure the network for your virtual machines)
- Configure VM availability options (Microsoft Documentation: Availability options for Azure Virtual Machines)
- Deploy and configure VM scale sets (Microsoft Documentation: Create a virtual machine scale set in the Azure portal)
3.3 Create and configure containers
- Configure sizing and scaling for Azure Container Instances (Microsoft Documentation: Set scaling rules in Azure Container Apps)
- Configure container groups for Azure Container Instances (Microsoft Documentation: Container groups in Azure Container Instances)
- Configure storage for Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) (Microsoft Documentation: Storage options for applications in Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS))
- Configure scaling for AKS (Microsoft Documentation: Automatically scale a cluster to meet application demands)
- Configure network connections for AKS (Microsoft Documentation: Network concepts for applications in Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS))
- Upgrade an AKS cluster (Microsoft Documentation: Upgrade an Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS) cluster)
3.4 Create and configure Azure App Service
- Create an App Service plan (Microsoft Documentation: Manage an App Service plan in Azure)
- Configure scaling settings in an App Service plan (Microsoft Documentation: Scale up an app in Azure App Service)
- Create an App Service (Microsoft Documentation: App Service overview)
- Secure an App Service (Microsoft Documentation: Security in Azure App Service)
- Configure custom domain names (Microsoft Documentation: Add your custom domain name using the Azure Active Directory portal)
- Configure a backup for an App Service (Microsoft Documentation: Back up and restore your app in Azure App Service)
- Configuring networking settings (Microsoft Documentation: Configuring the Network)
- Configure deployment settings
Module 4: Configure and manage virtual networking (20-25%)
4.1 Configure virtual networks
- Create and configure virtual networks and subsets (Microsoft Documentation: Azure Virtual Network)
- Create and configure virtual network peering (Microsoft Documentation: Virtual network peering)
- Configure private and public IP addresses (Microsoft Documentation: Private IP addresses)
- Configure user-defined network routes (Microsoft Documentation: Virtual network traffic routing)
- Configure Azure DNS (Microsoft Documentation: Azure DNS)
4.2 Configure secure access to virtual networks
- Create and configure network security groups (NSGs) and application security groups (ASGs) (Microsoft Documentation: Network security groups)
- Evaluate effective security rules (Microsoft Documentation: Effective security rules view in Azure Network Watcher)
- Implement Azure Bastion (Microsoft Documentation: Azure Bastion)
- Configure service endpoints on subnets (Microsoft Documentation: Virtual Network service endpoints)
- Configure private endpoints (Microsoft Documentation: private endpoint)
4.3 Configure load balancing
- Configure Azure Application Gateway (Microsoft Documentation: Application Gateway configuration overview)
- Configure an internal or public load balancer (Microsoft Documentation: Create an internal load balancer)
- Troubleshoot load balancing (Microsoft Documentation: Troubleshoot Azure Load Balancer)
4.4 Monitor virtual networking
- Monitor on-premises connectivity (Microsoft Documentation: Monitor network connectivity by using Connection Monitor)
- Configure and use Azure Monitor for networks (Microsoft Documentation: Azure Monitor Network Insights)
- Use Azure Network Watcher (Microsoft Documentation: Azure Network Watcher)
- Troubleshoot external networking
- Troubleshoot virtual network connectivity (Microsoft Documentation: Troubleshooting connectivity problems between Azure VMs)
Module 5: Monitor and back up Azure resources (10-15%)
5.1 Monitor resources by using Azure Monitor
- Configure and interpret metrics (Microsoft Documentation: Metrics in Azure Monitor)
- Configure Azure Monitor Log (Microsoft Documentation: Azure Monitor Logs overview)
- Query and analyze logs (Microsoft Documentation: Get started with log queries in Azure Monitor)
- Set up alerts and actions (Microsoft Documentation: Create, view, and manage metric alerts using Azure Monitor)
- Configure monitoring of VMs, storage accounts, and networks by using VM insights (Microsoft Documentation: VM insights)
5.2 Implement backup and recovery
- Create an Azure Recovery Services vault (Microsoft Documentation: Create and configure a Recovery Services vault)
- Create Azure backup vault (Microsoft Documentation: Backup vaults overview)
- Perform backup and restore operations by using Azure Backup (Microsoft Documentation: restore Azure VM data in Azure portal)
- Configure Azure Site Recovery for Azure resources (Microsoft Documentation: Azure to Azure disaster recovery architecture)
- Perform failover to a secondary region by using Azure Site Recovery (Microsoft Documentation: Failover Azure VMs to a secondary region)
- Configure and review backup reports (Microsoft Documentation: Configure Azure Backup reports)
Learn how to pass AZ-104 Exam with Practice Test
Microsoft Instructor Led Training
For any certification, having the right source of training is important. However, for the Microsoft AZ-104 exam training, you will get Instructor-led training that is basically an online training course to covering up the basic understanding of the skills that are required for the exam. There are various modules covered in this training so, you can go through them. Moreover, there are two instructor-led training courses for AZ-104 included with the lab for adding support and exhibiting the structure of various application scenarios. So, let’s have a look at them.
Reference Books
Books are the most important ingredient while you prepare for your certification exam. Moreover, this can be very beneficial during revision time. As you can easily locate the topic you want to check and learn. Related to the exam, there are some excellent AZ-104 books ruling the market for years that you can use or refer to study. Some of the books are:
- Firstly, Exam Ref AZ-104 Microsoft Azure Administrator by Harshul Patel, Michael Washam, Jonathan Tuliani
- Secondly, Hands-On Cloud Administration in Azure by Mustafa Toroman
Online Forums
Joining online forums is a great idea to boost your preparation process as they help you meet different people who are on the same road as you. They provide you the advantage to ask your queries immediately and receive the response in a prompt manner. Online forums are generally headed by industry experts or certified professionals. But the idea to join an online forum is completely subjective. There is no such compulsion for the same.
Assess yourself with AZ-104 Practice Tests
Practice tests are important for better preparation as by assessing yourself with these tests you will know about your weak and strong areas. You can start taking AZ-104 exam practice tests as this will not help you to assess or evaluate yourself. Moreover, it will improve your answering skills as well which will result in saving a lot of time. And, the best way to start doing AZ-104 practice tests is after completing one full topic as this will provide a good revision. Lastly, just make sure to study well and crack the exam.
