Windows Azure is a cloud computing platform that provides Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS), Platform as a Service (PaaS), and Software as a Service (SaaS). It allows developers to build, deploy, and manage applications through Microsoft-managed data centers. The key services include compute, storage, networking, and development tools. Architectural principles for building reliable cloud applications on Windows Azure emphasize statelessness, redundancy, loose coupling between components, and scaling automatically based on demand.

1. Windows Azure
for Architects
Anko Duizer
February 6nd 2010

2. Introducing…
• Anko Duizer
– Chief Software architect
– Blog: http://www.ankoduizer.nl
– Twitter: ankoduizer
• TellUs
– Lead generation
– > 5000 sites
– World wide
– Microsoft platform

3. Introduction

4. Cloud computing is Internet
("cloud") based development
and use of computer technology
("computing”)

5. Cloud
Attached platforms
IaaS services SaaS (PaaS)
Extra Application
Cloud ? Application
functions
Platform
On- Browser/
? Application
client
Application
premises

6. Storage
Integration
Development environment
Identity
Management
Application
Infrastructure services
Local support
Operating system
Applications
Foundation
Application services

7. Cloud
From on-premises to cloud platforms
Cloud infrastructure
application services
Cloud foundation Cloud application
services
On-premises
On-premises
infrastructure
application services
OS On-premises
application
services

8. Part 1:
Windows Azure Platform

15. Windows Azure platform
AppFabric
Applications SQL Azure
Windows Azure Live Services
Applications
Windows Windows 7/ Windows Others
Server Vista/XP Mobile

16. Application
Compute Storage
Config Fabric

17. HTTP
Blobs Tables Queues

18. Access Control (ACS) ?
Service Bus

19. 2) Discover
endpoints Service bus
Registry
1) Register
3) Access
Endpoints endpoints
application
Application Application
Organization X Organization Y

20. SQL Data
Services
Others
(future)

21. Windows Azure service lifecycle
Coding and Provisioning Deployment Maintain
modeling goal state
- Mapping and
deploying to - Monitor
New services Desired actual - React to
configuration hardware events
and updates
- Network
configuration
Developer Developer/ Automated Automated
Deployer

22. Part 2:
Basic principle

23. Simplicity

24. Part 3:
Architecture principles

25. Hardware fails

28. A few design choices

29. Big,
reliable,
expensive
machine

30. Several commodity machines

31. Lots and lots of commodity
machines

32. A few challenges

33. What do you do about that thing
called state?

35. Go horizontal
Go stateless

36. Store state in Windows Azure
storage

37. How do you deal with unreliable
components?

39. Default.aspx Worker.cs
LB
(web role) (worker role)
Queue

40. Public Internet
Web role
LB
Storage services

41. Public Internet
Worker
role
Storage services

42. Be loosely coupled

43. Use Windows Azure queues for
separation of work

44. How do you deal with varying load?

46. How do you deal with failures?

47. Use Windows Azure storage for
valuable data

48. ...
Entity Entity Entity ...
Property Property Property
Name Type Value

49. What about the SQL Azure?

50. Application Application
Browser
ODBC, OLEDB,
application
REST Client SQL Client* ADO.Net PHP,
Ruby, …
Cloud
HTTP+REST
HTTP
TDS
Windows Azure
REST (Astoria) Web App
Data center
ADO.Net + EF SQL Client*
TDS + TSQL Model
SQL Azure

51. Cloud
Data in the
application
cloud
On-premises
application

52. Retry on transient failures
But…

53. Be idempotent

55. Part 4:
Managing

58. Production
Stage Deployment
Deployment

59. +

60. Future: Precise control

61. How do I debug the cloud?

62. Logging

63. How do I get notified when
something bad happens?

64. !
Windows Azure’s alerts

65. Part 4:
Useful?

66. “On and Off “ “Growing Fast“
Compute
Compute
Inactivity
Period
Average Usage
Average Usage
Time Time
On & off workloads (e.g. batch job) Successful services needs to grow/scale
Over provisioned capacity is wasted Keeping up w/ growth is big IT challenge
Time to market can be cumbersome Complex lead time for deployment
“Unpredictable Bursting“ “Predictable Bursting“
Compute
Compute
Average Usage Average Usage
Time Time
Unexpected/unplanned peak in demand Services with micro seasonality trends
Sudden spike impacts performance Peaks due to periodic increased demand
Can’t over provision for extreme cases IT complexity and wasted capacity

67. Is it cheaper?

68. Compute : $0.12 / hour
Storage : $0.15 GB / month
Bandwidth: $0.10 GB in, $0.15 GB out

69. Retry on
failures
Recap
Loose
coupling