Book Image

Microsoft SQL Azure Enterprise Application Development

By : Jayaram Krishnaswamy
Book Image

Microsoft SQL Azure Enterprise Application Development

By: Jayaram Krishnaswamy

Overview of this book

SQL Azure is a database service in the cloud. Based on Microsoft’s Windows Azure platform, SQL Azure is well suited for web facing database applications. Are you interested in moving your business applications and data to the cloud but are not sure how to go about it? Look no further; this book covers all you ever wanted to know about taking your relational enterprise data to the cloud using SQL Azure. This book will show you how to manage SQL Azure using various tools and also guide you in developing enterprise applications and business intelligence solutions. It will take you through migration and synchronization scenarios with a variety of tools, help you in working with Microsoft technology still in incubation, and in leveraging hybrid applications that exist partially in the cloud and partially on the ground.This step-by-step tutorial begins by providing an overview of Cloud Computing, introducing you to the most significant Cloud Computing implementations. You will then learn the mechanics of signing up and obtaining an account on Microsoft Windows Azure and logging into the portal.The book then dives deep into SQL Azure, showing you how to provision a SQL Azure Server, and how to create/delete databases as well as set up Firewall rules so that you can access SQL Azure from tools/Client programs. It is then followed by details of how to access SQL Azure using Client and Server APIs.Other content includes, a comprehensive description of tools required to access SQL Azure and how to use them and how to populate and migrate SQL Azure databases using a variety of tools.Finally, the book will detail with examples, data-centric applications that leverage a mix of on-site data and Cloud based data, how to synchronize data and extend the applicability of SQL Azure data by disconnected applications on mobile media, and synchronize services for globally distributed data. After covering the topics of services which are in production, the book will then cover future developments as well as a complete update to SQL Azure at the time of writing this book.
Table of Contents (17 chapters)
Microsoft SQL Azure: Enterprise Application Development
Credits
About the Author
Acknowledgement
About the Reviewers
www.PacktPub.com
Preface

SQL Azure architecture


SQL Azure has a four-layered architecture, a Client Layer followed by a Services Layer, a Platform Layer, and finally the Infrastructure Layer. A schematic of the architecture is shown in the following diagram:

The Infrastructure Layer has all the associated hardware in the Microsoft Data Center as described in Chapter 1, Cloud Computing and Microsoft Azure Services Platform, managed automatically by the SQL Azure Fabric. The Platform Layer, which is above the Infrastructure Layer, has all the SQL Server clusters managed by the fabric as well as the Management Services. The Services Layer above the Platform Layer does all of the business logic, provisioning, connection routing, billing, and so on. The Client Layer above the Platform Layer can be at the client site or at the client's hosted site with all the applications that need access to SQL Azure.

Microsoft client technologies such as ODBC, ADO.NET, residing in the client site (or, in the Windows Azure Platform...