Overview
avd‑occasional is a practical, infrastructure‑as‑code solution for deploying a full Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD) environment on demand. The idea came from my own recurring need: when travelling or visiting family, I often require a capable development machine — something far beyond what my lightweight laptop can manage.
Having built AVD manually in the past, I knew how many interconnected steps were involved, and how unrealistic it was to remember them months later when I needed the environment again. I wanted a setup I could summon with a single deployment, use for a few days, then tear down without hesitation.
This project delivers exactly that. Using Bicep, it automates all AVD components into a clean, reproducible workflow. It also served as my first real Bicep project — a surprisingly enjoyable way to learn the language while solving a real‑world problem.
Technologies Used
- Azure Virtual Desktop — cloud‑hosted Windows desktops for development and testing.
- Azure Bicep — modular infrastructure‑as‑code used to orchestrate every component.
- Azure Resource Manager — underlying deployment platform.
- Azure Networking — virtual networks, subnets, extensions, and connectivity.
- Entra ID — identity and optional domain join.
- Azure CLI — command‑line deployment interface.
- GitHub — source control and open‑source hosting.
- GitHub Pages — docs site with config and setup details.
Key Features
- Full AVD deployment — host pool, workspace, application group, VM(s), and extensions.
- Clean modular Bicep structure — easy to read, extend, and troubleshoot.
- One‑command provisioning — deploy a complete environment from parameters.
- Designed for occasional use — perfect for a short‑term dev box.
- Cost‑efficient — destroy the resource group to instantly stop all spend.
- Real‑world ready — handles the wiring, RBAC, networking, and identity steps that are tedious to configure manually.
Docs Site
👉 https://markheydon.me.uk/avd-occasional/
Repository
This project is a lightweight set of scripts and Azure AVD configuration that saves hours of manual setup, ensures consistent environment configuration, and showcases the power of Bicep for orchestrating complex Azure services.