How to Use If Conditions with Azure CLI

In this blog post, we will explore how to use if conditions in Azure CLI scripts to enhance their functionality and make them more flexible.

With proper conditional logic, you can create more dynamic and efficient scripts, tailored to your specific needs.

Using If Conditions in Azure CLI

If conditions allow you to perform actions based on specific criteria. In Azure CLI scripts, we use the standard shell scripting syntax for if conditions. We will use Bash shell syntax for this tutorial, but you can adapt it to other shells if needed.

Basic If Condition

The basic if condition syntax in Bash is:

if [ expression ]; then
   commands
fi

Here’s an example of an if condition in an Azure CLI script:

#!/bin/bash

resource_group="myResourceGroup"

# Check if the resource group exists
exists=$(az group exists --name $resource_group)

if [ "$exists" == "true" ]; then
    echo "Resource group $resource_group exists."
else
    echo "Resource group $resource_group does not exist."
fi

2. Using If-Else Condition

To further enhance the script, you can use an if-else condition to execute different commands based on the outcome of the expression:

if [ expression ]; then
   commands_if_true
else
   commands_if_false
fi

For example, you can create a resource group if it does not exist:

#!/bin/bash

resource_group="myResourceGroup"
location="East US"

exists=$(az group exists --name $resource_group)

if [ "$exists" == "true" ]; then
    echo "Resource group $resource_group exists."
else
    echo "Creating resource group $resource_group..."
    az group create --name $resource_group --location "$location"
fi

3. Using If-Elif-Else Condition

You can use the elif (else if) statement to check multiple conditions:

if [ expression1 ]; then
   commands_if_expression1_true
elif [ expression2 ]; then
   commands_if_expression2_true
else
   commands_if_both_expressions_false
fi

As an example, let’s check if a virtual machine exists and if it’s in a running state:

#!/bin/bash

resource_group="myResourceGroup"
vm_name="myVM"

# Get VM information
vm_info=$(az vm get-instance-view --name $vm_name --resource-group $resource_group --output json)

if [ -z "$vm_info" ]; then
    echo "Virtual machine $vm_name does not exist."
else
    vm_status=$(echo "$vm_info" | jq -r '.statuses[] | select(.code | startswith("PowerState")) | .code')
    
    if [ "$vm_status" == "PowerState/running" ]; then
        echo "Virtual machine $vm_name is running."
    else
        echo "Virtual machine $vm_name is not running. Current state: $vm_status"
    fi
fi