Tuesday, December 20, 2011

More on the "Moving Applications to the Cloud" HOL's (Think "Just what were in those Azure HOL's? Oh... that! That's cool..." )

Avkash Chauhan's Blog - Windows Azure: Hands on Lab for Moving Applications to the Cloud

"Each of the Hands-On Labs is separate and stand-alone so you can choose which ones you want to use, and you can work through them in any order. However, it is recommended that you follow the sequence of the labs. Within each lab, you should work through the individual exercises in the order they appear in the lab as the exercises build upon each other within that lab.

Each Hands-On Lab contains a description of the individual exercises, and a series of steps you can work through to implement the techniques demonstrated by these exercises. The code for each lab contains both a "begin" and an "end" version (the exercises that require you to start a new blank project have no "begin" version) so that you can work through the steps, or you can open the "end" solution to see the result.

  • Lab 1: Getting to the Cloud. This lab will guide you through the minimum set of changes that you must make to the aExpense application before you can host it on Windows Azure. It will show you how to enable claims-based authentication, how to create a Windows Azure cloud project in Visual Studio, how to configure a Windows Azure web role, and how to connect to SQL Azure.
  • Lab 2: Using Windows Azure Table Storage. This lab will help you to understand how the aExpense application uses Windows Azure table storage. The aExpense application uses table storage as a backing store for the application data that relates to expense claims. It will also help you understand how to implement transactions and select row and partition keys. You will also explore an alternative implementation that stores multiple entity types in the same Windows Azure Storage table.
  • Lab 3: Using Windows Azure Blob Storage. This lab will show you how to use blob storage to store the scanned receipt images in the aExpense application. The lab will show you the changes in the cloud-based version aExpense application that Adatum made when it added support for uploading, storing, and displaying scanned images of receipts.
  • Lab 4: Using Windows Azure Queues and Worker Roles. This lab will guide you through the process of using a Windows Azure queue and worker role to run an asynchronous, background process in Windows Azure. The worker role will create thumbnail versions of the receipt images that users upload and resize large images down to standard size.
  • Lab 5: How much will it cost? Adatum wants to estimate how much it will cost to run the aExpense application in the cloud. One of the specific goals of the pilot migration project is to discover how accurately Adatum can predict the running costs for cloud-based applications. The initial expense analysis you will complete assumes that aExpense is using SQL Azure for storing expense data. You will also investigate the cost implications of moving from SQL Azure to Windows Azure storage.

..."

While I mentioned these HOL's here already, Moving Applications to the Cloud 2nd Edition guide (and Hands on Labs), I thought this expanded definition and extra details warranted an update post...

(via Alvin Ashcraft's Morning Dew - Dew Drop – December 20, 2011 (#1,223))

 

Related Past Post XRef:
Moving Applications to the Cloud 2nd Edition guide (and Hands on Labs)

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