How to build and deploy an Azure Function with VB.NET and Framework 4.8

How to build and deploy an Azure Function with VB.NET and Framework 4.8 in 10 steps

Published on 8th of May, 2020
Last edit: August the 25th

You may choose to
avoid the "dirty work" -> clone my GitHub repo and skip to the last step
or
follow the instructions below.

New -> Ready made project templates with web deploy for Visual Studio (versions 2012, 2013, 2015, 2017 and 2019) are available here.

1. Using VS2015 (should work with other VS versions as well), create a Class Library, name it "Function Test VB"

2. Rename Class1.vb to Function1.vb in Solution Explorer

3. In Solution Explorer, right-click the project > Manage NuGet packages... and install the following four packages:

    Microsoft.Azure.webjobs version 2.2.0
    Microsoft.Azure.webjobs.extensions version 2.2.0
    Microsoft.Azure.webjobs.extensions.http version 1.1.0
    System.ValueTuple version 4.3.0

4. In Solution Explorer, expand References and select all items inside

4a. Hit the F4 key to open properties and set the Copy Local attribute to False

5. Paste this code into Function1.vb (this is the converted output of the default C# code for Azure Function by Telerik's C to VB converter):

Imports System.Linq
Imports System.Net
Imports System.Net.Http
Imports System.Threading.Tasks
Imports Microsoft.Azure.WebJobs
Imports Microsoft.Azure.WebJobs.Extensions.Http
Imports Microsoft.Azure.WebJobs.Host

Public Class Function1
        
 <FunctionName("Function1")>
 Public Shared Async Function Run(<HttpTrigger(AuthorizationLevel.[Function], "get", "post", Route:=Nothing)> ByVal req As HttpRequestMessage, ByVal log As TraceWriter) As Task(Of HttpResponseMessage)

log.Info("VB.NET HTTP trigger function processed a request.")
  Dim name As String = req.GetQueryNameValuePairs().FirstOrDefault(Function(q) String.Compare(q.Key, "name", True) = 0).Value

If name Is Nothing Then
   Dim dat = Await req.Content.ReadAsAsync(Of Object)()
   name = dat?.name
  End If

Return If(name Is Nothing, req.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.BadRequest, "Please pass a name on the query string or in the request body"), req.CreateResponse(HttpStatusCode.OK, "Hello from VB HTTP trigger function, " & name))
 End Function
End Class

6. Create a file named host.json in root folder. It should contain nothing but empty brackets ( {} )

7. Add a folder named Function1 and in that folder, create a file function.json, which should look something like this:

{ "generatedBy": "Microsoft.NET.Sdk.Functions-1.0.24", "configurationSource": "attributes", "bindings": [ { "type": "httpTrigger", "methods": [ "get", "post" ], "authLevel": "function", "name": "req" } ], "disabled": false, "scriptFile": "../Function Test VB.dll", "entryPoint": "Function_Test_VB.Function1.Run" }

8. Build the solution

9. Zip-deploy to your Azure Function runtime version ~1 and there's your perfect solution!