You opened the Azure portal. You closed it five minutes later.
There were a hundred services, three different menus, and a billing page that looked like a trap. You wanted a virtual machine. You got a panic attack.
This book fixes that, in about an hour.
The Azure Pocket Guide: First Contact is the no-fluff starting point for absolute beginners. By the time you close it, you'll have:
✅ A free Azure account, configured so it can't surprise you with charges
✅ A working virtual machine you can actually sign in to
✅ Your own storage account with files in it
✅ A private network with the right firewall rules
✅ Budget alerts so you find out before the bill does
✅ A clean, one-click way to delete everything when you're done
No fluff. No filler. Just the parts that matter.
Inside you'll learn:
- How Azure's free tier really works — the $200 credit, the 12-month services, and 65+ always-free services that never expire
- How to navigate the portal without getting lost
- Step-by-step: creating, connecting to, and properly stopping a virtual machine
- The single most expensive beginner mistake (Stop vs Deallocate) — and how to avoid it
- Azure Storage, Networking, and Cost Management explained in plain English
- Security basics, including the 2026 mandatory MFA requirement
- What to learn next, including the AZ-900 certification path
Written for people who want to learn cloud by doing, not by drowning in 800-page reference manuals.
If you've been intimidated by cloud, this is your first contact.
Book 1 of The Azure Pocket Guide series.
