Here is an outline of topics covered in this article series:

* Azure cloud for Blockchain Applications
* Fabric Marketplace Template versus Manual Configurations
* Deploy Orderer and Peer Organizations
* Setting Up the Development Environment
* Setting Up Configurations for Orderer and Peer
* Setting Up Pods and Volume Mounts for Development
* Create A Channel
* Adding Peer to Network, Channel and Nodes
* Deploying and Operating Chaincode

This series is divided into 3 parts:

In the first part, we cover item 1, 2, 3 of the outline. In the second part, we will cover items 4, 5 and 6 and in the last part we will cover the remaining items (7, 8 and 9).

    Introduction

By finishing this article series, you will gain and be able to put Hyperledger Fabric skills into practice through creating and deploying Fabric applications on Azure cloud platforms. As such, this article covers highly practical steps for those interested in moving their Fabric application from the pilot step to production. We start off by reviewing the Azure cloud platform and its features, and follow with hands-on steps for building and deploying Fabric applications on Azure.

While managed blockchain solutions from Azure were limited to an enterprise Ethereum variant called Quorum, Hyperledger Fabric is now also supported. However, at the time of writing, Azure Blockchain Service only offers Quorum in General Availability. Support for Hyperledger Fabric is a part of offering Blockchain-As-A-Service (BAAS) solutions in the Azure platform..

It should be noted that while this article is intended to be beginner friendly, it would be helpful to have prior familiarity with Azure, Kubernetes APIs, and Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS). Also, a good knowledge of Hyperledger Fabric and its components is required to follow steps discussed in this article. If you have no experience with Fabric, The Linux Foundation’s free Introduction to Hyperledger Blockchain Technologies course is a good place to start. The topics and steps covered in this article are very useful for those interested in doing blockchain consulting and development.