What does the Serverless Framework offers for Azure Functions?

Question

I wonder what are the features/capabilities that Serverless Framework gives me when developing Node.js functions in Azure Functions environment?

When I look to this CLI, there is nothing I cannot do with Kudu and GitHub integration (or for simpler scenarios - directly with IDE built into the portal).

So I wonder if I am missing something (and I will regret in the future), or Serverless Framework at this stage is more useful for AWS Lambdas?

Answer 1

The Serverless Framework is a CLI that offers the following:

• Deployment: it will zip your functions/modules and upload to Azure.
• Integration: you can integrate with Blob Storage, DocumentDB and create HTTP endpoints with the same configuration file.
• Multi-vendor support: if you decide to leave Azure, migrating to AWS or IBM will be easier.
• Configuration: YAML syntax is readable and overall configuration is simple.
• Logs: you can stream the logs into the terminal.
• Environments: you can replicate a dev stage into production.
• Plugins: you can extend the framework features by yourself or use things that the community is creating.

When I look to this CLI, there is nothing I cannot do with Kudu and GitHub integration

That's great. If you have already stablished a development workflow to organize and deploy your code, maybe you don't need the Serverless Framework. The framework was created to help new users to deploy stuff, but it it based on Azure tools, so there is no magic happening there. Just some people trying to make things easier than using the Azure CLI.

Serverless Framework at this stage is more useful for AWS Lambdas?

Maybe. Depends if you think that Azure CLI is better or not than AWS CLI. I have tried to implement my own code to deploy AWS Lambda functions and I know how hard it is. There are many configuration steps and things to learn, which are very trivial to configure when using the Serverless Framework.