Terminology

There are quite a few new terms with Azure/Cloud which I plan to list down here in order of relevance -



Grid Computing - this has been around since 90's. Grid computing is more about division of labour and how tasks could be run in parallel.

Cloud Computing - Cloud is about collaboration at the software level delivered as services (my own definition). Cloud is more refined and specific than grid so that it serves specific hosted services. As with any operating system, OS provides lower level of services on top which application softwares run. Similarly cloud which is simply bunch of physical/virtual machines are managed by operating system (s) services which can co-ordinate at that level rather than individual machine level.

Azure - Based on earlier Cloud computing description, Azure is such an operating system which can manage/serve Cloud to cater for services. How and what Azure does to make Cloud or save from Cloud burst is not something which Cloud application or application developer needs to know and its completely abstracted. Wiindows Azure Hypervisor is the technology, specifically customised for Azure, behind it. Its something thats used on Microsoft datacenters which host Azure cloud platform. Its not going to be public and it should be the last thing to worry/think about from a developers point off view.


Azure services platform - Azure service platform is layer which provides Azure services to be comsumed by applications hosted in cloud. One way to visualise it is as .Net platform, as .Net platform provides / co-ordinates services like memory management (garbaging), sercurity etc at an machine level (there could be different isolation levels off course in the form of application domains for example), Azure platform services provides for cloud applications similar and relevant services. Examples of such services are computational services e.g. hosting a web application in cloud, data storage services e.g. storing data on cloud.



Azure SDK - this is development kit which can used on Vista / Win 2008 to program applications which would either be hosted in Cloud or which would be consuming/interfacing with Cloud applications. Developer can run the program using emulation provided by SDK which essentially hosts that application as if its runnning in Cloud similar to the way 'cassini' emulates web server for developer.

Azure pricing - As the applications and service are hosted in Cloud run on Microsoft datacenters Microsoft would be charging for it based on different pricing models. The key advantage is would be need to plan how much to be consumed in terms of infrastructure and catering for it on need basis with good opportunity to scale out to any extent in future. I see this as a rent / buy kind of decision (noteworthy is its also influenced by whats on offer - many corporates rent office in a sky scrapper in key city location where security etc. is managed by someone else for all ) and each one is relevant in specific context and parameters ( which are indeed numerous ranging from affordability to statutory aspects and auditing etc etc. ). Everything needs time to mature or gain confidence so would be the case for Azure Cloud. The ease and affordability always go in favour of Microsoft and Microsoft is known to take technology to masses and this time its backed by .net force across globe so personally I pretty am confident Azure will be everywhere soon.


more to come .....................

UKAzure Net Inuagural Meeting

Just attended UKAzure Net Inuagural Meeting at MS campus. There was something for architects as well as devs ( and pizzas for everyone :)).

As with any new platform, there is paradigm shift needed to over come 'not hosted here' mind set (off / on premises - new cloud parlance I will say ) and leverage platform and services which does justice to project budget or rather its a good way to get financials aligned with what project/business really needs.

The Vista Squad showed fantastic apps which were developed using Azure platform. I am sure it will be showcased somewhere soonn if not yet so will update later rather than trying draw some incomplete picture. In nutshell there is nice API to code against. I was really happy to see the API, devs back in business :)

I hope to pick up on Azure soon and blog here.