Wow.

Everyone knows about my deep love for Azure. Most people also know it’s a bit of a love-hate relationship.

It’s so full of promise, but everything turns out to be a bit harder to implement in practice than it should be… until now.

Figure: In the Azure portal, go to your Account settings, then to the Preview Features tab, and select ‘Try it now’ next to Web Sites

Figure: Navigate back to the Portal, click ‘New’, select ‘Web Site’ and then ‘From Gallery‘

Figure: A host of great Apps are available. I’m pushed for time and this is a distraction from writing the course I am delivering tomorrow so I will choose WordPress as I am familiar with it.

Figure: Choose the DNS prefix that you wish to use, select your nearest region and click Next

Figure: Enter a database name, select the region, agree to the conditions and click next

Figure: Complete the WordPress installation form and click ‘Install’

Figure: And you are done. I love this confirmation message.

Figure: And as easy as that I am hosting my own WordPress blog.

Thank you Azure.

And Yes. This blog post took three times longer to create than the new site that I am going to have to move it to.