Azure Data Factory (ADF) is a cloud-based ETL and data integration service that allows users to create data-driven workflows for orchestrating both data movement and data transformation.
It is used to create and schedule data-driven workflows (called pipelines) that can ingest and transform data from disparate data stores.
Azure Data Factory can also publish transformed data to data stores such as Azure Synapse Analytics for business intelligence.
It is a code-free ETL as a service on Azure.
ADF’s are built using Azure Resource Manager (ARM) templates, a decorative syntax that can create and deploy an entire Azure infrastructure. This allows for the intention of deployment to be stated, without having to write the programming commands, allowing ease when deploying to one or multiple resources like virtual machines and storage systems.
It allows for repeatability, meaning you can deploy the same template multiple times with consistent results.
ARM orchestrates the order of deployment for resources to ensure they are created in the correct order.
You can deploy any Azure resource though the ARM template.
There is built in validation ensuring success, and limiting the likelihood of unsuccessful deployment.