Cloudy in Seattle

Rapid Developer Deploy to Windows Azure

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Fri, 29 Oct 2010 18:36:00 GMT

At PDC10 , I did a session Building, Deploying and Managing Windows Azure Applications that covered the end to end experience of using Windows Azure. To watch the recording, go to http://player.microsoftpdc.com/session click on “Guide”...(read more)

Hope to see you at PDC – live or online

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Fri, 22 Oct 2010 05:11:00 GMT

Next week, I’ll be speaking at PDC. The sessions were published recently and I’ll be speaking on Thursday at 11:30AM PST. Building, Deploying, and Managing Windows Azure Applications In order to take full advantage of Windows Azure and...(read more)

Windows Azure Tools featured on Cloud Cover

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 23:17:00 GMT

Aside from the fact that I was setup and they took every opportunity they could to give me a hard time, I had a lot of fun as a guest on Cloud Cover with Ryan Dunn and Steve Marx . I showed the new features in our latest June 2010 release of the...(read more)

VerificationException from Windows Azure IntelliTrace

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Fri, 23 Jul 2010 00:24:00 GMT

Kyle has posted about a problem you may see if you use IntelliTrace in the Cloud to debug your RIA Services on Windows Azure. In a nutshell, if you see these exceptions: and the client, this will appear as the standard “Not Found”...(read more)

Windows Azure Tools Goes International

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Fri, 02 Jul 2010 23:15:00 GMT

We’re happy to announce that the June 2010 release of the Windows Azure Tools for Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 is now available in German, French, Japanese, Chinese, Spanish, Italian, Russian and Korean. On the download page select the language...(read more)

Windows Azure Storage Browser in the Visual Studio Server Explorer

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 16:40:00 GMT

As part of the June 2010 release of the Windows Azure Tools , we now have a Windows Azure Storage browser in the Visual Studio Server Explorer: It is our first cut at this feature and we've been iterating fairly quickly on the Windows Azure Tools...(read more)

TechEd Session Takeaways - Using Visual Studio to build Windows Azure Applications

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Thu, 10 Jun 2010 01:33:00 GMT

Thank you to all of you who attended my session at TechEd 2010 - COS307 | Using Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 to Build Applications That Run on Windows Azure Here are some of the key takeaways and links from the session: Lots of New Tools The...(read more)

Using IntelliTrace to debug Windows Azure Cloud Services

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 13:42:00 GMT

One of the cool new features of the June 2010 Windows Azure Tools + SDK is the integration of IntelliTrace to allow you to debug issues that occur in the cloud. IntelliTrace support requires .NET 4, Visual Studio 2010 Ultimate and the cloud service...(read more)

June 2010 Release of the Windows Azure Tools + SDK

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Mon, 07 Jun 2010 13:40:00 GMT

I’m pleased to announce the release of the June 2010 Windows Azure Tools + SDK . The Windows Azure Tools for Microsoft Visual Studio extend Visual Studio 2010 and Visual Studio 2008 to enable the creation, configuration, building, debugging,...(read more)

Hope to see you at TechEd

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Fri, 04 Jun 2010 05:11:00 GMT

If you are attending TechEd 2010 next week, I really hope to see you there. I’ll be at the Windows Azure booth and speaking on Wednesday June 9th at 5:00 in Room 356. I’ll be speaking about the end to end development experience for Windows...(read more)

WCF on Windows Azure

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Thu, 27 May 2010 20:40:00 GMT

One thing we’ve had for a while but I wanted to bring some attention to is our “wcfazure” code gallery page that has a useful set of known issues and a number of samples on using WCF on Windows Azure. It’s been updated recently...(read more)

MSDN Magazine Article on Windows Azure Development

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Wed, 07 Apr 2010 19:12:00 GMT

I’m really jazzed because not only did I get an article published in Visual Studio Magazine a little while ago, I also published a similar article in MSDN Magazine.

http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/magazine/ee336122.aspx

Here’s an excerpt from the introduction:

Developers are the heart and soul of any platform release—the very definition of a successful release is the large number of developers deploying applications and services on it. Microsoft has always focused on providing the best development experience for a range of platforms—whether established or emerging—with Visual Studio, and that continues for cloud computing. Microsoft added direct support for building Windows Azure applications to Visual Studio 2010 and Visual Web Developer 2010 Express.

This article will walk you through using Visual Studio 2010 for the entirety of the Windows Azure application development lifecycle. Note that even if you aren’t a Visual Studio user today, you can still evaluate Windows Azure development for free, using the Windows Azure support in Visual Web Developer 2010 Express.

Visual Studio Magazine Article on Cloud Development

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 18:04:00 GMT

I recently co-authored an article for Visual Studio Magazine titled Cloud Development in Visual Studio 2010 which in now online!

The article covers the end to end experience of building and running an application on Windows Azure using Visual Studio 2010. Check it out and let me know what you think!

“OutputPath Property is not set for Project” Error when building a Windows Azure Cloud Service in VS 2010

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Wed, 24 Mar 2010 16:00:00 GMT

If you’ve even seen the following error when trying to build a Windows Azure Cloud Service Visual Studio 2010:

OutputPath property is not set for project 'CloudService1.ccproj'. Please check to make sure that you have specified a valid combination of Configuration and Platform for this project. Configuration='Debug' Platform='HPD'.

The solution is to delete the Platform environment variable that may have been added to your machine as it conflicts with an environment variable of the same name that MSBUILD uses. (more info here)

This environment variable is added on HP machines and does impact a number of different scenarios with Visual Studio and Expression Blend.

Fixing the Silverlight Design Time in a Windows Azure Cloud Service

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Tue, 23 Mar 2010 16:00:00 GMT

This is a workaround for the following configuration:

Visual Studio 2008 (works fine on VS 2010)
Windows Azure Tools for Microsoft Visual Studio February 2010 Release
Silverlight 3 Tools for Visual Studio 2008
Building a Silverlight application in a Windows Azure Cloud Service

This is the issue reported in this forum thread.

To reproduce the issue:

1. Create a new Windows Azure Cloud Service project. (File | New Project)

2. Add a Web Role to the project, this will be the web application for the Silverlight application.

3. Right click on the Solution in Solution Explorer and select “Add |New Project…” Select, a Silverlight Application

4. Use an existing web site in the solution to host the Silverlight application.

5. Open up MainPage.xaml and notice that 1. there are no controls on the Toolbox, 2. Intellisense no longer works and 3. pasting in to the XAML editor results in an “Object reference not set to an instance of an object.” error.

Fixing the issue:

1. Close Visual Studio

2. Save the attached file (Microsoft.CloudService.targets) to your local machine

3. Copy the file to:

C:\Program Files (x86)\MSBuild\Microsoft\Cloud Service\v1.0 (64-Bit OS)
C:\Program Files\MSBuild\Microsoft\Cloud Service\v1.0 (32-Bit OS)

overwriting the existing file

4. Open Visual Studio, open your Cloud Service and you’ll find you will have the controls on the Toolbox, Intellisense and you can paste in XAML without hitting the Object reference error dialog.

This issue will be fixed in our post February 2010 release.

Viewing GAC’d Assemblies in the Windows Azure OS

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:00:00 GMT

One of the main issues you can run into when deploying is that one of your dependent assemblies is not available in the cloud.

This will result in your cloud service never hitting the running state, instead it will cycle between the initializing, busy and stopping states.

(the other main reason is that a storage account, especially the one included in the default template, is pointing to development storage – see this post about running the app on the devfabric with devstorage turned off to weed that issue out)

To help you understand what assemblies are available in the cloud and which are not, this post goes through the steps of building a cloud service that will output the assemblies in the GAC – a view into the cloud, similar to my certificate viewing app. (Download the Source Code)

Here’s the final product showing the canonical example of how System.Web.Mvc is not a part of the .NET Framework 3.5 install and needs to be XCOPY deployed to Windows Azure as part of the service package:

Since the GAC APIs are all native, I figured the easiest way to do what I want and leverage a bunch of existing functionality is to simply include gacutil as part my cloud service, run it and show the output in a web page.

1. Create a new cloud service with a web role

2. Add gacutil.exe and gacutil.exe.config to the project. Right click on WebRole1 in Solution Explorer and select Add | Existing Item.

Navigate to C:\Program Files\Microsoft SDKs\Windows\v6.0A\Bin\x64 and add both gacutil.exe and gacutil.exe.config to the web role project.

3. Right click on each of the gacutil files and double check that the build action is set to content. This will ensure the two files we added are included as part of the Service Package. (see this post on adding files to the service package for more info)

4. Add some UI to Default.aspx – a couple of TextBoxes and Buttons. I added the following to the <div/> tag.

<asp:TextBox runat="server" Width="200" ID="assemblyName" />
<asp:Button runat="server" OnClick="OnViewAssemblyButtonClick" ID="viewAssemblyButton" Text="Look up Assembly"  />
<asp:Button runat="server" OnClick="OnViewAllButtonClick" ID="viewAllButton" Text="View all Assemblies"/>
<br />
<asp:TextBox runat="server" ID="ressultsBox" Width="600" Height="800" TextMode="MultiLine"/>

5. Add some event handlers for the buttons that will call gacutil. “View all Assemblies” simply calls gacutil with the “/l” parameter whereas the “Look up Assembly” button will append the assembly name to that parameter causing gacutil only to list the assemblies that match that assembly name (no ".dll").

protected void OnViewAllButtonClick(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    string path = MapPath("gacutil.exe");
    string command = "/l";

    ressultsBox.Text = RunCommandLineTool(path, command);
}

protected void OnViewAssemblyButtonClick(object sender, EventArgs e)
{
    string path = MapPath("gacutil.exe");
    string command = "/l " + assemblyName.Text;

    ressultsBox.Text = RunCommandLineTool(path, command);
}

6. The meat of the call to gacutil is contained in a method called “RunCommandLineTool”:

private string RunCommandLineTool(string path, string parameters)
{
    ProcessStartInfo info = new System.Diagnostics.ProcessStartInfo(path, parameters);
    info.UseShellExecute = false;
    info.ErrorDialog = false;
    info.CreateNoWindow = true;
    info.RedirectStandardOutput = true;

    Process p = Process.Start(info);

    StreamReader sr = p.StandardOutput;
    string output = sr.ReadToEnd();
    sr.Close();

    return output;
}

The code is pretty straightforward, launches gacutil and redirects standard output to a stream which is eventually converted to a string and set on one of the TextBoxes in the UI.

And that’s about it, when you deploy and then run this application in the Windows Azure cloud, you’ll be able to see what assemblies are in the GAC! Note that this is useful as the actual assemblies can vary for different OS versions.

Here’s the listing for Windows Azure Guest OS 1.1 (Release 201001-01). (in reality, even though there are changes in different OS versions, what you need to deploy and what’s available really isn’t going to change)

Once you figure out you need to add some dependent assemblies to you service package you can see this post to help you, and this post to see what assemblies are in the service package.

One final tip – in a new Cloud Service, we add references to Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics, Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime and Microsoft.WindowsAzure.StorageClient.

The Copy Local property for Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics and Microsoft.WindowsAzure.StorageClient should be set to True and for Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime, it should be set to False. (important to not if you add the reference yoursefl)

The reason is that Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime is a bit of a special assembly so we treat it a little differently.

GAC Listing for Windows Azure Guest OS 1.1

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Mon, 22 Mar 2010 16:00:00 GMT

The following is a list of the contents of the GAC for Windows Azure Guest OS 1.1 (Release 201001-01)

Please see this post: http://blogs.msdn.com/jnak/archive/2010/03/21/viewing-gac-d-assemblies-in-the-windows-azure-os.aspx for a walkthrough of how this listing was obtained and how you can obtain the listing for any Windows Azure OS you choose.

The Global Assembly Cache contains the following assemblies:
blbproxy, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
CustomMarshalers, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=AMD64
ISymWrapper, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=AMD64
Microsoft.CertificateServices.Setup.Interop, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
Microsoft.GroupPolicy.Interop, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
Microsoft.Interop.Security.AzRoles, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
Microsoft.Transactions.Bridge.Dtc, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=AMD64
mscorlib, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=AMD64
msshrtmi, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
mswacdmi, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
napcrypt, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
naphlpr, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
Policy.1.0.Microsoft.Interop.Security.AzRoles, Version=6.0.6001.18000, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
Policy.1.2.Microsoft.Interop.Security.AzRoles, Version=6.0.6001.18000, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
PresentationCore, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
srmlib, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
System.Data, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=AMD64
System.Data.OracleClient, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=AMD64
System.EnterpriseServices, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=AMD64
System.Printing, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=AMD64
System.Transactions, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=AMD64
System.Web, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=AMD64
CustomMarshalers, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=x86
ISymWrapper, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=x86
Microsoft.CertificateServices.Setup.Interop, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
Microsoft.GroupPolicy.Interop, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
Microsoft.Interop.Security.AzRoles, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
Microsoft.Transactions.Bridge.Dtc, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=x86
mscorlib, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=x86
msshrtmi, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
napcrypt, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
naphlpr, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
Policy.1.0.Microsoft.Interop.Security.AzRoles, Version=6.0.6001.18000, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
Policy.1.2.Microsoft.Interop.Security.AzRoles, Version=6.0.6001.18000, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
PresentationCore, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
srmlib, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
System.Data, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=x86
System.Data.OracleClient, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=x86
System.EnterpriseServices, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=x86
System.Printing, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=x86
System.Transactions, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=x86
System.Web, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=x86
Accessibility, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
blbmmc, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
blbmmc.resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
blbproxy.resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
blbwizfx, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
blbwizfx.resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
CfsCommonUIFx, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
CfsCommonUIFx.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
ComSvcConfig, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
cscompmgd, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
DfsMgmt, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
DfsMgmt.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
DfsObjectModel, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
DfsObjectModel.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
dfsvc, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
EventViewer, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
EventViewer.Resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
IEExecRemote, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
IEHost, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
IIEHost, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Conversion.v3.5, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Engine, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Engine, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Framework, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Framework, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Tasks, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Tasks.v3.5, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Utilities, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Build.Utilities.v3.5, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.GroupPolicy.Reporting, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.GroupPolicy.Reporting.Resources, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.JScript, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.ManagementConsole, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.ManagementConsole.Resources, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.Management, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.Management.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.Utility, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.PowerShell.Commands.Utility.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.PowerShell.ConsoleHost, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.PowerShell.ConsoleHost.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.PowerShell.Security, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.PowerShell.Security.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Storage.NfsCommon, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Storage.NfsCommon.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Storage.SanCommon, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Storage.SanCommon.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Storage.SanCommon.UI, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Storage.SanCommon.UI.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Storage.Vds, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Tpm, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Tpm.Resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Transactions.Bridge, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.VisualBasic, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.VisualBasic.Compatibility, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.VisualBasic.Compatibility.Data, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.VisualBasic.Vsa, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.VisualC, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.VisualC.STLCLR, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Vsa, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Vsa.Vb.CodeDOMProcessor, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Administration, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Administration.Resources, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.Aspnet, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.Aspnet.Resources, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.AspnetClient, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.AspnetClient.Resources, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.Iis, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.Iis.Resources, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.IisClient, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.IisClient.Resources, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.Remoting, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.Remoting.Resources, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Web.Management.Resources, Version=7.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Windows.ServerManager, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.Windows.ServerManager.Resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Microsoft_VsaVb, Version=8.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
MiguiControls, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
MiguiControls.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
MMCEx, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
MMCEx.Resources, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
MMCFxCommon, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
MMCFxCommon.Resources, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
napinit, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
napinit.resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
napsnap, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
napsnap.resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Narrator, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
NfsConfigGuide, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
NfsConfigGuide.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationBuildTasks, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationCFFRasterizer, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationFontCache, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationFramework, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationFramework.Aero, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationFramework.Classic, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationFramework.Luna, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationFramework.Royale, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
PresentationUI, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
ReachFramework, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
rmConfigHelper, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
rmConfigHelper.Resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Sentinel.v3.5Client, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
ServerManagerCmd.Resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
ServiceModelReg, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
SetupNfsIdMap, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
SMDiagnostics, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
SMSvcHost, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
srmgui, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
srmgui.resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
srmreports, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
srmreports.resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
StorageMgmt, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
Storagemgmt.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
sysglobl, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.AddIn, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.AddIn.Contract, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.ComponentModel.DataAnnotations, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Configuration, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Configuration.Install, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Core, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Data.DataSetExtensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Data.Entity, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Data.Entity.Design, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Data.Linq, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Data.Services, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Data.Services.Client, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Data.Services.Design, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Data.SqlXml, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Deployment, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Design, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.DirectoryServices, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.DirectoryServices.AccountManagement, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.DirectoryServices.Protocols, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Drawing, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Drawing.Design, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.IdentityModel, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.IdentityModel.Selectors, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.IO.Log, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Management, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Management.Automation, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Management.Automation.Resources, Version=1.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Management.Instrumentation, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Messaging, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Net, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Runtime.Remoting, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Runtime.Serialization, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Runtime.Serialization.Formatters.Soap, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Security, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.ServiceModel, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.ServiceModel.Install, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.ServiceModel.WasHosting, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.ServiceModel.Web, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.ServiceProcess, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Speech, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.Abstractions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.DynamicData, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.DynamicData.Design, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.Entity, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.Entity.Design, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.Extensions, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.Extensions.Design, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.Mobile, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.RegularExpressions, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.Routing, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Web.Services, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Windows.Forms, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Windows.Presentation, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Workflow.Activities, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Workflow.ComponentModel, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Workflow.Runtime, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.WorkflowServices, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Xml, Version=2.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
System.Xml.Linq, Version=3.5.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b77a5c561934e089, processorArchitecture=MSIL
TaskScheduler, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
TaskScheduler.Resources, Version=6.0.0.0, Culture=en, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
UIAutomationClient, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
UIAutomationClientsideProviders, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
UIAutomationProvider, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
UIAutomationTypes, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
WindowsBase, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
WindowsFormsIntegration, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=31bf3856ad364e35, processorArchitecture=MSIL
WsatConfig, Version=3.0.0.0, Culture=neutral, PublicKeyToken=b03f5f7f11d50a3a, processorArchitecture=MSIL

Number of items = 227

Channel9 Show - Cloud Cover

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Fri, 19 Mar 2010 16:00:00 GMT

Since Steve and Ryan listed my blog as one of the daily tips and just interviewed me for their Cloud Cover show, I felt compelled to plug the show :)

In all honesty, it’s a good show, lots of good Windows Azure Platform information in very consumable pieces (i.e. not too long, not too short). New episodes will be available on a weekly basis.

Check it out: http://channel9.msdn.com/shows/Cloud+Cover/

Videos of the Windows Azure Sessions at MIX10

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Thu, 18 Mar 2010 16:00:00 GMT

Had a great time at MIX10 this year, talked to a lot of customers and got a lot of great feedback – thank you.

If you weren’t able to attend and are interested in Windows Azure, here are links to the Windows Azure sessions. Videos of all of the sessions are available at: http://live.visitmix.com/Videos (some of the sessions will come online toward the end of the day)

My session: Building and Deploying Windows Azure based Applications with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010.

Day 1 Keynote - Scott Guthrie and Joe Belfiore

Day 2 Keynote – Scott Guthrie, Dean Hachamovitch, Bill Buxton and Doug Purdy

All Windows Azure sessions:

Lap around the Windows Azure Platform – Steve Marx
Building and Deploying Windows Azure Based Applications with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010 – Jim Nakashima
Building PHP Applications using the Windows Azure Platform – Craig Kitterman, Sumit Chawla
Using Ruby on Rails to Build Windows Azure Applications – Sriram Krishnan
Microsoft Project Code Name “Dallas": Data for your apps – Moe Khosravy
Using Storage in the Windows Azure Platform – Chris Auld
Building Web Applications with Windows Azure Storage – Brad Calder
Building Web Application with Microsoft SQL Azure – David Robinson
Connecting Your Applications in the Cloud with Windows Azure AppFabric – Clemens Vasters
Microsoft Silverlight and Windows Azure: A Match Made for the Web – Matt Kerner

Mix ‘10 Session - Building Windows Azure Applications is now online

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Wed, 17 Mar 2010 20:46:00 GMT

My session at Mix ‘10 is now online: http://live.visitmix.com/MIX10/Sessions/SVC09

If you want to get a solid understanding of what a developer needs to know in order to successfully build Windows Azure applications using Visual Studio both in terms of a new application or migrating an existing application (including the use of SQL Azure) this is the session for you.

Links, resources and some summary information is available in this post: http://blogs.msdn.com/jnak/archive/2010/03/16/mix-10-building-and-deploying-windows-azure-based-applications-with-microsoft-visual-studio-2010.aspx

Mix ‘10: Building and Deploying Windows Azure-Based Applications with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Tue, 16 Mar 2010 20:00:00 GMT

Thank you to all of you who attended my session at Mix ‘10 on Building and Deploying Windows Azure-Based Applications with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010. The video will be available within the next couple of days.

Here are some of the key takeaways and links from the session:

Getting Started

The Web Platform Installer automates a number of the steps to install the Windows Azure Tools for VS 2008 or to install IIS prior to installing the Windows Azure Tools for VS 2010.

Get the patches - http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cc974146.aspx

Samples

http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/windowsazuresamples

Using WCF on Windows Azure

http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/wcfazure

ASP.NET Web Roles vs ASP.NET Web Applications

The 3 differences are:

References to the Windows Azure specific assemblies: Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics, Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime, and Microsoft.WindowsAzure.StorageClient
Bootstrap code in the WebRole.cs/vb file that starts the DiagnosticMonitor as well as defines a default behavior of recycling the role when a configuration setting change occurs.
The addition of a trace listener in the web.config file: Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics.DiagnosticMonitorTraceListener.

NerdDinner

The NerdDinner sample code can be found at: http://nerddinner.codeplex.com/

ASP.NET Provider scripts for SQL Azure

To use the ASP.NET providers with SQL Azure, you can use these scripts: http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx/kb/2006191 to setup the database.

Unzipping the Service Package

To be able to unzip the Service Package the environment variable you need is _CSPACK_FORCE_NOENCRYPT_. See this post for more information.

Run you app on the devfabric with cloud storage before deploying to Windows Azure

Do this to weed out potential problems with connection strings including deploying with a connection string pointing to the development storage.

Right click on the Cloud Service project and select Properties:

Select the “Development” tab and change “Start Development Storage services” to “False”.

Shut down the development storage service:

Change your connection strings. Do this for every role. Right click on the role under the Roles node in Solution Explorer and select Properties.

Switch to the “Settings” tab and for each connection string, bring up the connection string dialog and enter your cloud storage credentials.

Run your Cloud Service on the Development Fabric and make sure that everything works as expected.

Service Management

Windows Azure has a the Service Management APIs and Powershell cmdlets you can use to automate deployment and service management. See this post for more information.

The script I used to deploy the service was:

$cert = Get-Item cert:\CurrentUser\My\<enter cert>
$sub = "<enter subscription ID>"
$servicename = <enter service name>'
$package = "<enter url to service package in blob storage or local file path>"
$config = "<enter path to service configuration file>"

Add-PSSnapin AzureManagementToolsSnapIn

Get-HostedService $servicename -Certificate $cert -SubscriptionId $sub |
    New-Deployment Staging $package $config -Label 'PDC09Staging' |
    Get-OperationStatus –WaitToComplete

Get-HostedService $servicename -Certificate $cert -SubscriptionId $sub |
    Get-Deployment -Slot Staging |
    Set-DeploymentStatus 'Running' |
    Get-OperationStatus –WaitToComplete

If you pass in a local file for the $package variable, you must have a storage account with the same name as the hosted service account you are deploying to.

csmanage (tool that exercises the Service Management APIs) and other samples that aren't included in the Windows Azure SDK can be found here: http://code.msdn.microsoft.com/windowsazuresamples

Hope to see you at my Mix ‘10 Windows Azure session

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 21:30:00 GMT

I’m really excited about Mix ‘10 this year. There’s going to be a lot of cool announcements and sessions.

One of the sessions I’d love to see you at is my session on building Windows Azure applications with Visual Studio (Tuesday right after the keynote at 11:30 in Breakers L):

Building and Deploying Windows Azure-Based Applications with Microsoft Visual Studio 2010

My goal for the talk is to have you walk away with enough nuts and bolts developer info to feel comfortable opening Visual Studio and begin writing new Windows Azure Cloud Service or migrate an existing ASP.NET Web Application to be a scalable Cloud Service.

Windows Azure RoleEntryPoint Method Call Order

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 17:00:00 GMT

I saw an internal discussion that had some information I thought would be useful to share. It’s about how some of the methods in RoleEntryPoint get called.

In the case of a Worker Role, the RoleEntryPoint class is the class you derive to write your code. When you create a new Worker Role project in Visual Studio, you’ll see that the project contains one code file and in that code file there is a class called WorkerRole that derives from RoleEntryPoint.

Worker Role Call Order:

WaWorkerHost process is started.

Worker Role assembly is loaded and surfed for a class that derives from RoleEntryPoint. This class is instantiated.
RoleEntryPoint.OnStart() is called.
RoleEntryPoint.Run() is called.
If the RoleEntryPoint.Run() method exits, the RoleEntryPoint.OnStop() method is called .
WaWorkerHost process is stopped. The role will recycle and startup again.

For step 1 above, Windows Azure only loads one assembly and takes the first class that derives from RoleEntryPoint that it finds. Visual Studio knows which assembly implements RoleEntryPoint based on the reference to the project under the Roles node.

That reference is a project to project reference that is passed through to packaging. This puts a file called __entrypoint.txt in the Service Package than contains the name of the assembly that has a class that derives from RoleEntryPoint.

In the case of a Web role, a RoleEntryPoint derived class is actually not required. That said, in the Visual Studio web role templates, we add a file called WebRole.cs that includes an implementation of OnStart() specifically to add template code to show you how to startup the the Diagnostic Monitor and to show you how to hook into configuration setting changes. (i.e. when a new serviceconfiguration.cscfg file is uploaded to the cloud)

Web Role Call Order:

WaWebHost process is started.
Hostable Web Core is activated.
Web role assembly is loaded and RoleEntryPoint.OnStart() is called.
Global.Application_Start() is called.
The web application runs…
Global.Application_End() is called.
RoleEntryPoint.OnStop() is called.
Hostable Web Core is deactivated.
WaWebHost process is stopped.

You can implement a RoleEntryPoint.Run() method in a WebRole, it’ll get called on a new foreground thread that executes in parallel with RoleEntryPoint.OnStart().

Thing is, if you exit from the RoleEntryPoint.Run() method, (the default implementation just waits on an infinite Thread.Sleep()) your role is going to recycle – so just be aware of that consequence, almost certainly not what you want in a web role (the role will be offline while it starts up again).

Where to Find your Windows Azure Billable Usage Info

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Tue, 09 Feb 2010 06:26:00 GMT

This weekend I had someone email me asking me to blog about where to find the usage info used for billing because they were having a hard time finding it and figured others were having difficulty as well.

Coincidentally, I saw an internal thread this morning where someone was asking the very same question so... Erik, I believe you are correct, a post will probably be helpful for folks.

To find your usage info, go to:

https://mocp.microsoftonline.com (From the Developer Portal, you can click on the "Billing" link in the upper right hand corner.

I'm going to walk through getting to the actual bill because I know some people get this far but get lost in some of these pages.

Choose your country / region and hit continue.

Then click “Sign in now” or “Sign in” and sign in.

Followed by “View my bills”, then click on “View Online Bill/Invoice”

From the “Online Bill” page you can select the Billing Period and click on one of the Usage Charge links in the middle of the page. This will bring you to a page similar to the following:

Essentially, everything you want to know about your bill will be there. Note that this doesn’t update in real time and that there is a lag.

Also note that you need to delete your deployment to stop the clock on compute hours.

[Update 2/11/2010 - The intent of this post was to help you get to the right place where you can explore around. If you are looking for more information on Data Transfer usage, SQL Azure and other usage charge pages, please see this post by Roger Jennings for more details.]

Hope this helps.

Migrating an Existing ASP.NET App to run on Windows Azure

Jim Nakashima - MSFT — Mon, 08 Feb 2010 17:00:00 GMT

This post has 2 main parts. The first part is an update to a post I wrote back in February 2009 about using an existing ASP.NET Web Application as Web Role and rolls in information from this post and this post. The second part is about migrating an existing database running on SQL Express and ASP.NET providers to SQL Azure.

I’ll start with the NerdDinner sample, so make sure you have ASP.NET MVC installed. Although I used VS 2008 for the screen shots, this walkthrough is compatible with VS 2010.

I’ve opened the solution in Visual Studio and removed the test project to keep things simple.

The first thing I need to do is make this Web Application project a Web Role.

I can do that one of two ways:

1) Since I have the NerdDinner project open, I can add a Windows Azure Cloud Service to the solution.

Select “Windows Azure Cloud Service” and hit “OK”

Hit “OK” again, because we don’t need to add any Roles to this Cloud Service.

Right click on the “Roles” node in the Cloud Service project and select “Add | Web Role Project in solution…”

Select the NerdDinner project. Note that all of the Web Application projects in the solution will show up in this list.

2) The other option would have been to create a new Cloud Service project and add the NerdDinner project to it using Solution | Add | Existing Project… then following the step of Add | Web Role Project in solution…

We now have the following:

Before I get to what it will take to hit F5 and make the NerdDinner application run as a Web Role, let’s discuss the differences between a Web Role and an ASP.NET Web Application.

There are 4 differences and they are:

References to the Windows Azure specific assemblies: Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics, Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime, and Microsoft.WindowsAzure.StorageClient
Bootstrap code in the WebRole.cs/vb file that starts the DiagnosticMonitor as well as defines a default behavior of recycling the role when a configuration setting change occurs.
The addition of a trace listener in the web.config file: Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics.DiagnosticMonitorTraceListener.
In the case of an MVC web application, the assembly reference to System.Web.Mvc may not have the Copy Local property set to “True” – you need to to have this to ensure that the System.Web.Mvc assembly is available in the cloud. The cloud VMs only contain the assemblies that come with the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 redistributable. (System.Web.Mvc is not one of them and this is actually a hard thing to diagnose today as your role will go into an intializing, starting, stopping loop). Setting “Copy Local” to True will ensure the assembly is added to the Service Package – the package that gets uploaded to the cloud and used to run a Cloud Service on the local development fabric.

Additionally, today we only support targeting .NET Framework 3.5 SP1. Stay tuned for .NET 4 support.

Except for #4, the other 3 differences aren’t strictly required.

Chances are, at a minimum you are going to want to reference Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime and Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics, start the Diagnostic Monitor and add the trace listener so that you can write logs and gather other diagnostic information to diagnose issues or monitor the health of your application.

If you use Windows Azure Storage, you are going to want to use the Microsoft.WindowsAzure.StorageClient library which provides a .NET interface to Windows Azure Storage.

For the sake of this article, I’m just going to make sure that System.Web.Mvc has Copy Local set to true.

Let’s try hitting F5 and seeing what we get.

The application runs… almost… if I click on “View Upcoming Dinners” I get an error.

The connectionstrings.config file that is referenced in the web.config is not being found.

<connectionStrings configSource="ConnectionStrings.config" />

I need to make sure that this file is added to the Service Package. I can do so by adding it to the NerdDinner project (right click on the NerdDinner project in Solution Explorer and select Add | Existing Item…)

Now set the Build Action to Content which should be done by default but I want to call it out as a way to ensure that given files in the project get added to the Service Package – you may a need to do this with some of your other files.

Now, I hit F5 again, and everything works. But will it work in the cloud?

The answer is no – NerdDinner has a NerdDinner.mdf file it uses for data and it makes use of ASP.NET providers – both of these rely on SQL Express, which I have on my local machine but are not available in the cloud VMs (even if it was, you would need to have a story that works across multiple instances).

I have a decision to make. I can use SQL Azure or I can rewrite the application to use Windows Azure Storage. Since it is easy to do a search for “NerdDinner Azure” and find examples of the latter I will do the former – the point of this article is also to primarily focus on using the an existing project in a Windows Azure Cloud Service.

In the real world, you’ll want to consider your data and compare the long term costs / effort / requirements to make the right decision.

The key app I need to migrate the data to SQL Azure is the SQL Server Management Studio R2 CTP that supports SQL Azure. Links are here. This post may also be helpful.

I also need to have a database setup on SQL Azure. Go to sql.azure.com and sign in. Create databases called NerdDinnerDB and aspprovidersdb.

Make sure to set your firewall settings such that you can the machine where your app is running in the development fabric has access. For example: this is not recommended, but makes development on multiple machines easy.

The steps to migrate the data are now:

Migrate the NerdDinner.MDF
Migrate the ASP.NET providers
Change the connection strings.

Let’s start with NerdDinner.MDF.

Open SQL Server Management Studio 2008 R2 and connect to .\SQLExpress.

Right click on Databases, and select “Attach…”

Click the Add… button and browse to the location of the NerdDinner.MDF file then click OK.

Now right click on the NerdDinner database that was just added, select Tasks | Generate Scripts…

This will bring you to the Generate and Publish Scripts wizard. Click Next twice (selecting the default of the whole database) then click Advanced on the “Set Scripting Options” page.

Scroll down to “Script for the database engine type” and select “SQL Azure Database”.

You also have an option to choose whether to script the schema only, the schema and data or the data only. For the purposes of this walkthrough, you can choose the schema only or the schema and data.

Finish the wizard saving the script to file then open the file in SSMS.

Now we want to connect to SQL Azure. Do so by right clicking the Connect button in Object Explorer and selecting “Database Engine”.

For server name put the name you got from the SQL Azure portal, including the full domain name. For example in the SQL Azure portal, the server name is listed as: zky996mdy7.database.windows.net

Correspondingly, enter this Server name in the Connect to Server dialog in SSMS:

The login is the Administrator username and the password setup in the SQL Azure portal. Note that @zky996mdy7 is appended to the username.

Click on Options >> select the “Connection Properties” tab and enter NerdDinnerDB for “Connect to database”.

This puts the SQL Azure database in the Object Explorer in SSMS.

Right click on the SQL Azure database and select “New Query”. This will open a SQL Query window.

Copy and paste in the database script the SQL Query window and hit Execute. In the bottom status area of SSMS you should see that the query executed successfull and that it was against your SQL Azure NerdDinnerDB database.

Now we need to setup the ASP Providers. This requires using provider scripts that we created for SQL Azure. See this post for the scripts and more info.

Download the scripts and extract.

Open the InstallCommon.SQL script in SSMS. Since we were last connected to the NerdDinnerDB and we now want to connect to the aspprovidersDB you created above in the SQL Azure portal, right click in the query window and select Connection | Disconnect.

Follow that by right clicking in the SQL Query window and selecting Connection | Connect, entering the aspprovidersDB as the database to connect to in the options.

Run the script, open InstallMembership.SQL and installprofile.SQL and run those scripts as well. Just be sure to always be running these scripts against aspprovidersdb.

Now we need to change the connection strings in the connectionstrings.config file we added to the NerdDinner project. There is a connection string for the NerdDinner database and a connection string for the ASP Providers.

Here’s an example to follow, replacing the server, user ID and Password appropriately.

<connectionStrings>
  <add name="ApplicationServices" connectionString="Server=tcp:zky996mdy7.database.windows.net;Database=aspprovidersdb;User ID=jnak;Password=<enter>;Trusted_Connection=False;" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient"/>
  <add name="NerdDinnerConnectionString" connectionString="Server=tcp:zky996mdy7.database.windows.net;Database=NerdDinnerDB;User ID=jnak;Password=<enter>;Trusted_Connection=False;" providerName="System.Data.SqlClient"/>
</connectionStrings>

Delete the database files in App_Data and hit F5 to run this in the Development Fabric.

A couple things to test to ensure that both the providers and the nerddinner database are working correctly: Register for an account, host a dinner and view all upcoming dinners.

Now deploy this to the cloud -- Please see the Deploying a Cloud Service walkthrough if you need help.

What’s cool to consider here is we started with a single instance ASP.NET web application and turned it into a scalable cloud application that has the capability to be load balanced across any number of instances.

As I look back at this walkthrough, it’s actually quite long but over half is migrating the data to SQL Azure and there was a lot of screen shots. The key things I want you get out of this post are:

1) Add existing ASP.NET Web Applications to the same solution as a Cloud Service project and use Roles | Add | Web Role in project…

2) Understand the 4 differences between a Windows Azure Web Role project and a standard Web Application project

3) Figure out how you are going to handle your data, you have a few options notably Windows Azure Storage and SQL Azure. Don’t forget about your providers.

4) Walkthrough of migrating an existing database to SQL Azure.

Finally, whenever you are deploying the cloud, it is useful to look into the service package and make sure that everything you need is in the service package. See this post for more info – remember Windows Azure VMs only include the .NET Framework 3.5 SP1 redistributable.