Throughout my guides and any others you read about Application Insights, you will come across the term 'Instrumentation Key' or 'iKey'. This key is essential for sending application telemetry data to application insights. Fortunately these keys are fairly straight forward to create in the new azure portal.
- Log into the new Azure Portal. If you don't already have an azure account, just follow the registration steps first.
- Create a new Application Insights resource. This can be done by clicking the 'New' button at the bottom left of the portal, and then selecting Application Insights under the 'Developer services' category.
- Selecting Application Insights, will open the creation blade. The only required fields are the name and the Application Type. Make sure to choose the right application type that matches the best with your own app, as this setting cannot be changed afterwards. Click the create button when you are done.
- If you left the 'Add to Startboard' option checked, you will find a new tile created for you application on the main screen. This is accessible by clicking 'Home' on the left bar. Clicking this tile or finding the app listing (via Browse) will show you the Application Insights blade for your application. The key thing to note on this screen is the 'Essentials' button near the top of the blade. Click this item to expand out the panel it controls.
- The panel that opens contains the core information about your resource, as well as the instrumentation key. You can copy this value from the panel and use it anywhere instructions call for it, such as setting up telemetry SDKs for sending data to Application Insights
