Accessing Azure Table Data with REST

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Accessing Azure Table Data with REST

Azure tables are an excellent way to store structured data in a query-able NoSQL database. Azure provides a variety of ways to interact with this data, including a REST API, which allows you to use Azure Table storage with simple HTTP requests. In this lab, you will be able to interact with the Azure Table service REST API by using it to retrieve and store data.

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Lab Info

Level

Intermediate

Last updated

Sep 21, 2025

Duration

45m

Challenge

Save a copy of the table's entity data to a file.

Set up some environment variables to aid in generating a signature. For the storage_account and access_key, provide the actual storage account name and access key. One way to obtain these is to log in to the Azure portal. The access key can be found by clicking the storage account, then clicking Access Keys:

storage_account=${your storage account name}

access_key=${your storage account access key}

table_name=inventory

request_date=$(TZ=GMT date "+%a, %d %h %Y %H:%M:%S %Z")

resource="/${storage_account}/${table_name}"

request_method="GET"

Generate a signature and Authorization header:

string_to_sign="${request_method}\n\n\n${request_date}\n${resource}"

hex_key="$(echo -n $access_key | base64 -d -w0 | xxd -p -c256)"

signature=$(printf "$string_to_sign" | openssl dgst -sha256 -mac HMAC -macopt "hexkey:$hex_key" -binary |  base64 -w0)

authorization_header="SharedKey $storage_account:$signature"

Make a request to query for all entities currently in the table, redirecting the output to a file:

curl -s -X $request_method 
  -H "x-ms-date:$request_date" 
  -H "Authorization:$authorization_header" 
  "https://${storage_account}.table.core.windows.net/${table_name}" 
  > /home/cloud_user/entities.txt

Check the contents of the file to see the entity data:

cat /home/cloud_user/entities.txt

You should see some XML representing the existing entities.

Challenge

Insert a new entity into the table.

Set up some environment variables to aid in generating a signature:

request_date=$(TZ=GMT date "+%a, %d %h %Y %H:%M:%S %Z")

request_method="POST"

content_type="application/json"

Generate a signature and Authorization header:

string_to_sign="${request_method}\n\n${content_type}\n${request_date}\n${resource}"

hex_key="$(echo -n $access_key | base64 -d -w0 | xxd -p -c256)"

signature=$(printf "$string_to_sign" | openssl dgst -sha256 -mac HMAC -macopt "hexkey:$hex_key" -binary |  base64 -w0)

authorization_header="SharedKey $storage_account:$signature"

Set up your entity data:

entity="{\"PartitionKey\":\"warehouse1\",\"RowKey\":\"A4452\",\"Description\":\"Trophy Collection\",\"OwnerName\":\"Sgt. Pepper\",\"Unit\":\"554\"}"

entity_length=${#entity}

Make a request to insert the entity:

curl -X $request_method 
  -H "x-ms-date:$request_date" 
  -H "x-ms-version:2019-02-02" 
  -H "Content-Type:$content_type" 
  -H "Content-Length:$entity_length" 
  -H "Authorization:$authorization_header" 
  -d "$entity" 
  "https://${storage_account}.table.core.windows.net/${table_name}"

The output should include an <updated /> tag with a timestamp, indicating when the record was inserted.

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