Run Azure IoT Edge on Ubuntu Virtual Machines by using Bicep

Applies to: IoT Edge 1.5 IoT Edge 1.4

Important

IoT Edge 1.5 LTS and IoT Edge 1.4 LTS are supported releases. IoT Edge 1.4 LTS is end of life on November 12, 2024. If you are on an earlier release, see Update IoT Edge.

The Azure IoT Edge runtime is what turns a device into an IoT Edge device. The runtime can be deployed on devices as small as a Raspberry Pi or as large as an industrial server. Once a device is configured with the IoT Edge runtime, you can start deploying business logic to it from the cloud.

To learn more about how the IoT Edge runtime works and what components are included, see Understand the Azure IoT Edge runtime and its architecture.

Deploy from Azure CLI

You can't deploy a remote Bicep file. Save a copy of the Bicep file locally as main.bicep.

1. Ensure that you installed the Azure CLI iot extension with:

   az extension add --name azure-iot
   

2. Next, if you're using Azure CLI on your desktop, start by logging in:

   az login
   

3. If you have multiple subscriptions, select the subscription you'd like to use:

   1. List your subscriptions:

      az account list --output table
      

   2. Copy the SubscriptionID field for the subscription you'd like to use.

   3. Set your working subscription with the ID that you copied:

      az account set -s <SubscriptionId>
      

4. Create a new resource group (or specify an existing one in the next steps):

   az group create --name IoTEdgeResources --location westus2
   

5. Create a new virtual machine:

   To use an authenticationType of password, see the following example:

   az deployment group create \
   --resource-group IoTEdgeResources \
   --template-file "main.bicep" \
   --parameters dnsLabelPrefix='my-edge-vm1' \
   --parameters deviceConnectionString=$(az iot hub device-identity connection-string show --device-id <REPLACE_WITH_DEVICE-NAME> --hub-name <REPLACE-WITH-HUB-NAME> -o tsv) \
   --parameters authenticationType='password' \
   --parameters adminUsername='<REPLACE_WITH_USERNAME>' \
   --parameters adminPasswordOrKey="<REPLACE_WITH_SECRET_PASSWORD>"
   

   To authenticate with an SSH key, you may do so by specifying an authenticationType of sshPublicKey, then provide the value of the SSH key in the adminPasswordOrKey parameter. For example:

   #Generate the SSH Key
   ssh-keygen -m PEM -t rsa -b 4096 -q -f ~/.ssh/iotedge-vm-key -N ""
   
   #Create a VM using the iotedge-vm-deploy script
   az deployment group create \
   --resource-group IoTEdgeResources \
   --template-file "main.bicep" \
   --parameters dnsLabelPrefix='my-edge-vm1' \
   --parameters deviceConnectionString=$(az iot hub device-identity connection-string show --device-id <REPLACE_WITH_DEVICE-NAME> --hub-name <REPLACE-WITH-HUB-NAME> -o tsv) \
   --parameters authenticationType='sshPublicKey' \
   --parameters adminUsername='<REPLACE_WITH_USERNAME>' \
   --parameters adminPasswordOrKey="$(< ~/.ssh/iotedge-vm-key.pub)"
   

6. Verify that the deployment completed successfully. A virtual machine resource should be deployed into the selected resource group. Take note of the machine name, this should be in the format vm-0000000000000. Also, take note of the associated DNS Name, which should be in the format <dnsLabelPrefix>.<location>.cloudapp.azure.com.

   The DNS Name can be obtained from the JSON-formatted output of the previous step, within the outputs section as part of the public SSH entry. The value of this entry can be used to SSH into to the newly deployed machine.

   "outputs": {
     "public SSH": {
       "type": "String",
       "value": "ssh <adminUsername>@<DNS_Name>"
     }
   }
   

   The DNS Name can also be obtained from the Overview section of the newly deployed virtual machine within the Azure portal.

   

7. If you want to SSH into this VM after setup, use the associated DNS Name with the command: ssh <adminUsername>@<DNS_Name>

Next steps

Now that you have an IoT Edge device provisioned with the runtime installed, you can deploy IoT Edge modules.

If you are having problems with the IoT Edge runtime installing properly, check out the troubleshooting page.

To update an existing installation to the newest version of IoT Edge, see Update the IoT Edge security daemon and runtime.

If you'd like to open up ports to access the VM through SSH or other inbound connections, refer to the Azure Virtual Machines documentation on opening up ports and endpoints to a Linux VM.