Discard Windows Azure name? Uncover Microsoft Cloud Platform

Cloud computing is a way to provide information technology as a service (IT as a services). The concept of "service" needs to be viewed from the consumer (service user) perspective rather than from the service provider, so a basic feature is that cloud computing requires on-demand services, that is, users can receive immediate service as needed. From this perspective, cloud computing is like running water, electricity and gas in our public service, concentrating on supply and on-demand services and billing. Instead of buying and maintaining your own machine, why not try a server that can be accessed from the Internet? So it makes sense to use a computer in the cloud.

For some applications, you can place programs and data in a cloud platform that others manage and maintain, and for other applications, you can run within the enterprise but data is stored in the cloud, or rely on other cloud-based infrastructure services. By leveraging cloud computing, users can simplify the complexity of using information technology and make the information truly accessible. However, whether it is a service running in the cloud or a user-local application requires an application platform that can be viewed as a service that is provided to developers to create applications or store data. In the traditional Windows world, it includes technologies such as Windows Server, SQL Server, and the. NET Framework. Similarly, in order for the application to run on the cloud, there must also be a cloud application platform. This is what Windows Azure platform offers.

Microsoft replacement Windows Azure service name

Microsoft launched the Windows Azure Cloud computing Platform service in early 2010, but after announcing its abandonment of the Windows Live brand, Windows Azure's name was replaced by Microsoft.

Although Microsoft has not made it clear that it will abandon the Windows Azure brand for the time being, the names of Azure's services have been changed to include the word Azure. Here's a summary chart from Microsoft's email to customers today, listing the previous Windows Azure service names and their new names:

You can see from the chart that the words Windows azure have been replaced

In the new naming scheme, the word "zure" disappears almost completely. For example, after modification, Windows Azure Compute will become Cloud services, and Windows Azure Platform-all Services will simply be called All Services.

As part of these modifications, SQL Azure becomes the SQL database. The SQL Azure Reporting Service will simply be called "SQL Reporting." Microsoft said in the letter: "In the next few weeks, we will update the Windows Azure service name." This is just a change in name, and there is no change in the price of various services. ”

Despite the change in name, the technical architecture and service approach of the Windows Azure platform has not changed.

Understanding Windows Azure Platform

Simply put, the Windows Azure platform is an Internet-scale platform for hosting and running applications. The application hosting platform is built entirely in accordance with the requirements and technologies of cloud computing, such as dynamic allocation of resources on demand, flexible expansion, and billing according to usage. Developers only need to develop applications for the platform, without having to worry about the specifics of the underlying platform, such as platform security, system upgrades, patches, and so on. Windows Azure platform includes a cloud computing operating system, a cloud relational database, a collection of services for developers or cloud middleware, and other ancillary services.

The application created by the developer can be run directly on the platform, and it can be run elsewhere, but only through the Internet using the services provided by the cloud platform. By contrast, the Windows Azure platform continues to feature Microsoft's traditional software platform, providing customers with a familiar development experience, and many of the applications that users already have can migrate relatively smoothly to the platform. In addition, Windows Azure platform can be scaled as needed in cloud computing and billed based on resources used by the actual user, such as CPU, storage, network, and so on.

Windows Azure platform includes Windows Azure, SQL Azure, Windows Azure Platform AppFabric, and Windows Azure Marketplace (now the name has changed, You can view the chart above). Where Windows Azure can be viewed as an operating system for cloud computing services; SQL Azure is a relational database in the cloud; Azure AppFabric is a web-based development service that makes it easier to connect existing applications and services to cloud platforms, user authentication, and interoperability; Azure Marketplace is an online marketplace for developers, allowing developers to share, search, and trade applications, build modules, and data Services for Windows Azure platforms.

They are composed as shown in the figure below:

▲ Image: The composition of Windows Azure platform

Noun discrimination: For first contact with Windows Azure platform, the name of this platform is easy to confuse. Windows Azure Platform is the full name of Microsoft's cloud computing platform, Windows Azure Platform, and Windows Azure refers specifically to the cloud operating system portion of the platform.

Windows Azure Platform Positioning

We know that cloud computing is a way to increase resource utilization by sharing pools of resources. In cloud computing, according to the resources in this resource pool, we divide the cloud computing service model into software services (SaaS), Platform-Service (PaaS), and infrastructure-service (IaaS) three. Service providers with different service models are more differentiated. From the perspective of the application run stack, the three service models compare to the traditional it approach as shown in Figure 1.3.

▲ Chart: Comparison of different service types

The primary location of the Windows Azure platform is the platform, the service, so it is directly targeted to the user as a developer. Windows Azure platform allows developers to focus on applying logic instead of deploying and managing the cloud services infrastructure, and can save time and expense for deployment. In fact, for the sake of understanding, we can also see Windows Azure as the operating system of the datacenter. Of course, what we call the operating system here is actually an analogy, because Windows Azure is not an operating system in the traditional sense. Both traditional operating systems and Windows Azure, they try to abstract the underlying physical resources. Windows Azure also fulfills the responsibility for resource management, except that it manages more macro resources, which are managed by all servers, storage, switches, load balancers, and even power switches on the rack in the data center. The future of the data center will be more like a supercomputer, so Windows Azure will become more and more like a super operating system.

Windows Azure Platform provides developers with managed, scalable, on-demand computing and storage resources, and provides developers with control over cloud platform management and dynamic allocation of resources. Windows Azure is an open platform that supports a variety of popular standards and protocols, including SOAP, REST, XML, and HTTPS. When building Windows Azure applications and services, developers can use not only different development languages such as. NET language, Java, PHP, and more, you can also use different tools such as Microsoft Visual Studio, Eclipse, and so on, which most developers are familiar with. So many of the developer's experience and skills can be transferred relatively smoothly from traditional platform-oriented programming to cloud-based platform based programming.

Build your own Windows Azure platform

When Microsoft launched its Windows Azure platform in October 2008, it was a cloud computing platform running in Microsoft's data center, which, together with the vast data centers and networks distributed around the world, constituted a platform for globalisation. In other words, at that time, Microsoft provided and sold Windows Azure platform services through a public cloud. Microsoft customers, partners, and developers can quickly deploy their own developed application services on the Windows Azure platform, in a pay-as-you-go manner. But at the Microsoft Global Partners Conference (WPC) in July 2010, Microsoft announced that it would windows Azure Platform Appliance (WAPA) on the basis of its original service and its hardware and software integration. To help large enterprises and hosting providers build their own service platforms, as shown in Figure 1.4.

WAPA is a cloud platform solution that can be deployed in the customer data center, the hardware and software integrated. WAPA is made up of hardware products that meet Microsoft's requirements, including servers, storage and networking, as well as Windows Azure and SQL Azure. WAPA is designed for service providers, large enterprises and government departments, and includes hundreds of to thousands of servers per Wapa. It provides a cloud computing platform that is tested by Microsoft's real-world services and delivers breakthrough performance through innovative energy, refrigeration and automation technologies. WAPA's hardware is designed according to the fourth generation Data center of Microsoft, can integrate different components including refrigeration, UPS, fans, so it can be used as a container-type deployment unit to build the customer data center in a modular way. Some of the features of WAPA can be summarized as follows:

▲ diagram: Two ways to build a cloud platform

Provide scalable PAAs services in the customer's own data center and build SaaS services on this basis;

Deploy a tested cloud platform that can scale to thousands of servers;

The ability to provide Microsoft Windows Azure platform in its own data center, but customers themselves control the independence of physical devices and data and comply with regulatory compliance requirements.