Getting started with Azure in PowerShell

As it turns out, Azure has a ton of cmdlets available in the PowerShell command line to help you quickly and easily manage aspects of Azure.

• Install the Azure PowerShell from the Microsoft Web Platform Installer
• Install the Azure AD Module from the links on this page.
• After installing the Microsoft Online pack, you may have to copy the 'MSOnline' and 'MSOnlineExtended' folders from 'C:\windows\system32\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules' to 'C:\Windows\SysWOW64\WindowsPowerShell\v1.0\Modules' if you're running a server version of Windows
• Open a PowerShell session as Administrator
• Run the command "Import-Module azure"
• Run the command "Import-Module MSOnline"

Here are some of the ones you'll need to get started:

• Add-AzureAccount -- Allows you to enter credentials and register your account with PowerShell so that you can manage it
• Get-AzureAccount -- shows you the currently active accounts
• Get-AzureSubscription -- shows the subscriptions available for the currently selected azure account

Also, to manage the roles in your Azure Active Directory, check out this page on Microsoft's Azure section.

Beginning in version 0.8.0, the Azure PowerShell installation includes more than one PowerShell module. You must explicitly decide whether to use the commands that are available in the Azure module or the Azure Resource Manager module. To make it easy to switch between them, we have added a new cmdlet, Switch-AzureMode, to the Azure Profile module.

When you use Azure PowerShell, the cmdlets in the Azure module are imported by default. To switch to the Azure Resource Manager module, use the Switch-AzureMode cmdlet. It removes the Azure module from your session and imports the Azure Resource Manager and Azure Profile modules.

To switch to the AzureResoureManager module, type:

PS C:\> Switch-AzureMode -Name AzureResourceManager

To switch back to the Azure module, type:

PS C:\> Switch-AzureMode -Name AzureServiceManagement

By default, Switch-AzureMode affects only the current session. To make the switch effective in all PowerShell sessions, use the Global parameter of Switch-AzureMode.

To start log streaming for a specific web application, use this command:
PS C:\> Get-AzureWebsiteLog -Tail -Name mywebsitenamehere