Totul despre Microsoft Azure

Discutiile despre platforma Azure de la Microsoft au inundat blogosfera, asa ca am adunat in acelasi post cele mai importante aspecte despre acest anunt. Intr-adevar, nu m-am concentrat pe detaliile tehnice, ci mai multe pe viziunea si viitorul Azure. De asemenea, am gasit si citeva video-uri foarte interesante care introduc si acopera aspectele cele mai importante despre Azure.

Pentru a naviga mai usor articolul am creat un fel de cuprins:

• Detalii despre platform
• Video
• Intrebari deschise

Webware: Microsoft launches Windows Azure

Microsoft first outlined a shift to "Live Services" at an event in San Francisco in 2005. The company has released a few things piecemeal, such as Live Mesh, but Monday's announcement marked the first real discussion of how Microsoft's disparate Internet strategies fit together.

Webware: Ina Fried

StartupMeme: Microsoft PDC : The Coverage - KeyNote

The Azure Services Platform is an industry-leading move by Microsoft to help developers build the next generation of applications that will span from the cloud to the enterprise datacenter and deliver compelling new experiences across the PC, Web and phone.

StartupMeme: Sam

Ray Ozzie Keynote: Microsoft Unveils Windows Azure

The Azure™ Services Platform is an internet-scale cloud computing and services platform hosted in Microsoft data centers. The Azure Services Platform provides a range of functionality to build applications that span from consumer web to enterprise scenarios and includes a cloud operating system and a set of developer services. Fully interoperable through the support of industry standards and web protocols such as REST and SOAP, you can use the Azure services individually or together, either to build new applications or to extend existing ones [...]

Pentru si mai multe de detalii tehnice puteti descarca whitepaper-ul despre Azure (DOCX).

ZDNet: Microsoft’s Azure cloud platform: A guide for the perplexed

The goal of Azure is to provide developers who want to write applications that run partially and/or entirely in a remote datacenter with a platform and set of tools.

The Azure architecture

• Layer zero: Microsoft’s Global Foundational Services (hardware abstraction layer)
• Layer one: the Azure operating system which is made up of:
  1. storage
  2. a management system for modeling/deploying and provisioning
  3. virtualized computation/VM
  4. a development environment
• Layer two: building block services:
  1. Live Services/Live Mesh platform
  2. SQL Server Data Services/SQL Services
  3. .Net Services
  4. SharePoint Services and Dynamics CRM Services
• Layer three: the Azure-hosted applications (some may be from Microsoft)

ZDNet: Marey Jo Foley

TechCrunch: Ray Ozzie Has His Head in The Clouds

Azure will run Windows servers and the .Net framework in the cloud as a hosted, pay-as-you go service. It will be part of what Microsoft is calling Live Services, and it will run Live apps, .Net apps, SQL server, Sharepoint servers, and Microsoft’s Dynamics CRM. No wonder Amazon added support for Windows servers and SQL servers to EC2 just last week.

TechCrunch: Erick Schonfeld

StartupMeme: Microsoft PDC : Azure – The New cloud Computing Platform By Microsoft

The platform:
• Empowering Cloud Development With the Azure Services Platform
• State-of-the-Art Datacenter Infrastructure
• Cut Costs and Unlock Innovation
• Providing Businesses Choice and Flexibility Through Software and Services

Unlike many of today’s service-based solutions, the Azure Services Platform provides developers with the flexibility and ability to create applications while taking advantage of their existing skills, tools and technologies [...]. Developers can [...] access the Azure Services Platform using a variety of common Internet standards including HTTP, REST, WS-* and AtomPub.

Key components of the Azure Services Platform include the following:

• Windows Azure for service hosting and management, low-level scalable storage, computation and networking
• Microsoft SQL Services
• Microsoft .NET Services
• Live Services for a consistent way for users to store, share and synchronize documents, photos, files and information across their PCs, phones, PC applications and Web sites
• Microsoft SharePoint Services and Microsoft Dynamics CRM Services for business content, collaboration and rapid solution development in the cloud

StartupMeme: Sam

Sillicon Alley Insider: Unanswered Questions About Microsoft's New Cloud Service "Azure"

Like Amazon's EC2, Azure will allow developers to code applications within Microsoft's cloud, promising greater reliability and scalability than traditional data centers. Redmond makes a point to note "Azure is an open platform that will support both Microsoft and non-Microsoft languages and environments."

Sillicon Alley Insider: Eric Krangel

Webware: Windows Azure: Blue skies ahead?

Developers can build applications and host them on Microsoft's servers for free, though the company will start charging once it has nailed down the features and made sure everything is ready for business applications.

Webware: Elinor Mills

Video

In articolele Azure - Platforma Microsoft si Prezentari despre Microsoft Azure am postat deja 3 videouri, dar pentru o mai usoara referinta le adaug aici la sfirsit alaturi de unul mai nou cu Ray Ozzie, Bob Muglia, and Amitabh Srivastava.

Ray Ozzie, Bob Muglia, and Amitabh Srivastava

Manuvir Das (Director in the Windows Azure)

Steve Marx (Windows Azure Program Manager)

Microsoft Partener

(NOU) Interview cu Bob Muglia

Interbari deschise

Service Level Agreement (SLA)

Inca nu se stie nimic despre acest aspect. Am aflat ca ar fi posibil sa existe diferite tipuri de SLA la preturi diferite.

Pricing

Alt alt capitol care nu este clarificat inca. In acest moment, dezvoltatorii au acest gratuit, dar asta pina cina se vor anunta preturile. In mod normal, si facind o paralela cu Amazon Web Services costul va fi calculat in functie de spatiul de stocare, ciclurile procesor utilizate si traficul internet.

Integration with desktops OS

Desi Microsoft a fost foarte clar despre integrarea si suportul pentru Azure in uneltele de dezvoltare, nu s-a spus nimic despre o posibila integrare cu OS-urile instalate pe desktop.

SaaS Microsoft

SaaS (Software-as-a-Service) se refera la solutii software gazduite. Din cite cred eu, cel mai probabil suita Office va fi oferita ca SaaS, dar nu este clar daca aceasta va fi implementata pe platforma Azure.

Related:

• Richard MacManus@ReadWriteWeb: Microsoft Azure Aims to Re-define the OS
• Boris Veldhuijzen van Zanten@TheNextWeb: Windows Azure: A Clear Perspective on Cloud Computing
• Steve Gilmor@TechCrunch: Microsoft offers cloud computing a hearty handclasp
• Svetlana Gladkova@profy: Microsoft Azure Enters the Crowded Cloud Computing Market
• Mark 'Rizzn' Hopkin@Mashable: Microsoft’s Azure is So 1997 (and Why I Love it)
• TechMeme
• Azure - Platforma Microsoft
• Prezentari despre Microsoft Azure
• Q&A: Ray Ozzie on Microsoft's future, and how he's different from Bill Gates