Vijay Rajagopalan, Microsoft Principal Architect in the Interoperability group, unveiled at Open Source India conference, in Chennai, a new set of developer tools and Software Development Kits (SDKs) for PHP developers who want to build modern cloud applications targeting Windows Azure Platform:

• Windows Azure Companion – September 2010 Community Technology Preview(CTP)– is a new tool that aims to provide a seamless experience when installing and configuring PHP platform-elements (PHP runtime, extensions) and Web applications running on Windows Azure. This first CTP focuses on PHP, but it may be extended to be used for deploying any open source component or application that runs on Windows Azure. Read below for more details.
• Windows Azure Tools for Eclipse for PHP - September 2010 Update–is a plug-in for PHP developers using the Eclipse development environment, which provides tools to create, test and deploy Web applications targeting Windows Azure.
• Windows Azure Command-line Tools for PHP – September 2010 Update– is a command-line tool, which offers PHP developers a simple way to package PHP based applications in order to deploy to Windows Azure.
• Windows Azure SDK for PHP– Version 2.0 – enables PHP developers to easily extend their applications by leveraging Windows Azure services (like blobs, tables and queues) in their Web applications whether they run on Windows Azure or on another cloud platform.