The Microsoft Azure storage services support multiple versions. To make a request against the storage services, you must specify the version that you want to use for that operation, unless the request is anonymous.
The MSI files of the latest and previous versions can also be found at GitHub (scroll down to 1.0.1). If you intend to install Azure PowerShell on multiple machines, the MSI file is what you need. Azure PowerShell direct download link to MSI. Differences between the install methods ^. Microsoft Azure Storage Explorer is a standalone app from Microsoft that allows you to easily work with Azure Storage data on Windows, macOS and Linux. Log in or click on link to see number of positives. In cases where actual malware is found, the packages are subject to. Azure Storage Explorer is a feature-rich application that you can just download on your machine, connect to your subscription and access your storage account without actually using the Azure portal. It also enables you to connect to other data storage features provided by Azure such as Azure Data Lake and Azure Cosmos DB.
Available Versions
The current version of the Azure storage services is 2020-06-12, and using that version is recommended where possible. For information about the latest version, see Versioning for the Azure Storage Services.
Additional supported versions include:
Requests authorized via a Shared Access Signature (SAS)
A request made via a SAS is processed according to which service version was used to generate the SAS. Versions 2013-08-15 and 2012-02-12 include a versioning parameter (SignedVersion
, or sv
), which specifies which version to use to authorize and execute the SAS request.
Version 2012-02-12 and later
Requests with Shared Access Signatures (SAS) generated using version 2012-02-12 or later require the SignedVersion (sv)
parameter. SignedVersion
indicates the service version used for authorization and authorization and for calling the API operation. If the x-ms-version
header is passed on the request, it is ignored; only the SignedVersion (sv)
parameter determines the service version to use to process the request made via the SAS.
Note
For version 2013-08-15 and earlier, code that prepares and distributes shared access signature URLs (*that is, SAS providers or generators) should specify versions that are understood by client software (*that is, SAS consumers) that makes storage service requests.
The following table indicates which services are supported for which version for a request made via a SAS:
Value of SignedVersion (sv) parameter | Supported services |
---|---|
2015-12-11 | All (Blob, Queue, Table, File) |
2015-04-05 | All (Blob, Queue, Table, File) |
2015-02-21 | All (Blob, Queue, Table, File) |
2014-02-14 | Blob, Queue, Table |
2013-08-15 | Blob, Queue, Table |
2012-02-12 | Blob, Queue, Table |
Example
The following example shows a SAS that calls List Blobs using sv=2013-08-15
.
https://myaccount.blob.core.windows.net/mycontainer?restype=container&comp=list&sv=2013-08-15&si=readpolicy&sig=a39 %2BYozJhGp6miujGymjRpN8tsrQfLo9Z3i8IRyIpnQ%3d
In this example, the service will authorize and execute the request using version 2013-08-15. The response will not include the Url
element under the Blob
element, as it was removed in 2013-08-15 version.
If a client application using a version of the Storage Client Library based on version 2012-02-12 makes a request using this SAS, the client would expect the Uri
element and so would fail with a NullReferenceException
.
Versions Prior to 2012-02-12 (Blob Service Only)
The Blob service introduced shared access signatures in version 2009-07-17, while the Table and Queue services introduced shared access signatures in version 2012-02-12, so SAS behavior prior to version 2012-02-12 applies only to the Blob service. Version 2012-02-12 also introduced the SignedVersion (sv)
parameter, which enables the SAS generator to specify the version to use to process the request. A SAS generated with a version prior to 2012-02-12 cannot specify the version to use to process the request and so relies on the following rules.
In versions prior to 2012-02-12, the following rules are used to process the SAS request for authorization, authorization, and API execution:
If the SAS request against the Blob service has a valid
x-ms-version
header, the earliest valid version (2009-07-17) is used to interpret the SAS parameters, and the version specified byx-ms-version
is used to perform the Blob service storage operation.If the SAS request against the Blob service does not have an
x-ms-version
header and the owner has set the default version for this storage service type using Set Blob Service Properties, version 2009-07-17 is used to interpret the SAS parameters and the owner-specified default version is used to perform the Blob service storage operation.If the SAS request against the Blob service does not have an
x-ms-version
header and the owner has not set a default version, the Blob service uses the earliest valid version (2009-07-17) to interpret the SAS parameters. If the container is public and its access restrictions were set with a Set Container ACL operation that used version 2009-09-19 or newer, version 2009-09-19 is used to perform the Blob service operation.If the SAS request against the Blob service does not have an
x-ms-version
header and the owner has not set a default version, the Blob service uses the earliest valid version (2009-07-17) to interpret the SAS parameters. If the container access restrictions were not set with a Set Container ACL operation that used version 2009-09-19 or newer, the Blob service operation is performed using the earliest version of the service.
The following table applies these rules to various scenarios, and assumes the SignedVersion
parameter is not included.
Value of x-ms-version header | Version used to interpret SAS parameters for authorization and authorization for Blob service | Version used to perform Blob service operation |
---|---|---|
None | Earliest valid SAS version (2009-07-17) | 2009-09-19 is used if the container was set to public by Set Container ACL using version 2009-09-19 or newer; otherwise the earliest version of Blob service is used. |
2011-08-18 | Earliest valid SAS version (2009-07-17) | 2011-08-18. |
Any version XXXX-XX-XX | Earliest valid SAS version (2009-07-17) | Version XXXX-XX-XX |
Download Azure Storage Explorer
Note
Microsoft recommends using version 2011-08-18 or later for scenarios that require quoted ETag values or valid Accept-Ranges
response headers, because browsers and other streaming clients require these headers for efficient download and retries.
Azure Storage Explorer Download Latest Version Windows 10
See Also
Azure Storage Explorer is a tool built by Microsoft which allows you to securely access your blob storage accounts in Azure.
Many of you know that accessing Storage Accounts in Azure can be done using the portal which is an easy way to manage and maintain them but when it comes to copying data into or out of them the portal is not enough. When you want to mass copy files in a blob storage account you have to go back to the CLI and use the AZCopy tool.
AZCopy is a cmdline utility that permits you to copy files into or from your storage accounts. The problem with AZCopy is that it’s not built into the operating system and you need to install it externally in order to leverage it. My preferred method is using Chocolatey -> choco install azcopy
Lately, Microsoft added support for AzCopy in the latest build of Azure Storage Explorer
What is Azure Storage Explorer you might ask?
Azure Storage Explorer is a GUI tool that allows you graphically access your storage accounts without the need for the Azure Portal. It’s a very useful tool when you want to manage your storage accounts. The downside was that file copying in and out of a storage account was slow. I mean very slow and it wasn’t usable in that way. With the latest version of Azure Storage Explorer, Microsoft added AZCopy support into the tool and you can now leverage huge improvements in upload/download speeds. So now you can leverage the best of both worlds, without ever touching the CLI 🙂
What are the performance benefits?
At the time of writing this post, I’m on a not so good connection so I will just borrow the examples from the example from the Azure blog.
What else can I do with the Storage Explorer?
- Login to storage accounts with Azure credentials, SAS or Accounts keys
- You can create containers
- You can drag & drop files to initiate the copy process
- You can do blob snapshots
- Change the access tier (hot, cold, archive)
- Sync storage accounts as shown below
My personal favorite for Azure Storage Explorer is when I’m doing migrations towards Office 365 and I have to do PST uploads. For those that don’t know, when you need to upload pst files in Office 365, you are given a storage account with write access where you can upload your pst files and after that, you map them with a CSV file. For those savvy with the cmdline this is not a problem but for those lazy like me, it’s much simpler to just log in to that storage account with Storage Explorer and copy-paste the pst files.
That being said. I hope you found this post useful and as always, have a good one!
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