Reading Notes #18

Cloud

• Windows Azure: Startup task or OnStart(), which to choose? (Avkash Chauhan - MSFT) - Know the difference between starup task and onStart()
• Can Cloud Computing Reduce IT Cost Complexities?
• Packaging an Executable as a Windows Azure Application From the Command Line – Quick way using programEntryPoint of worker role
• New Article: How To Integrate a BizTalk Server Application with Service Bus Queues and Topics - This is looking promising, need to read the full article.
• Four key reasons to include cloud computing in your business strategy - To help some client to find if the cloud is good from them
• Cloud Cover Show: Episode 62 - Marketplace with Christian Liensberger – Great info about Marketplace.
• Cloud Cover Show: Episode 63 - Securely Sharing Files with Windows Azure – Really nice introduction of the BlobShare. 
• Six Reasons to Use Cloud Services for Small Business - Another list of arguments of why you should go in the cloud

Programming

• Bodega Sale Blog - A kind of American idol for developer... not a bad idea.
• Engine Yard Platform-as-a-Service – Difference between concurrency and parallelism by type of ruby
• Sandro Pereira BizTalk Blog - When an image IS thousand words
• Fire and Ice: David Pallmann's Web and Cloud Blog: Adventures in HTML5: Bouncy Bar Chart (David Pallmann) - If you're looking for a nice way to learn HTML5 then this how-to make a htmk5 version of Jelly bars is perfect for you.

Miscellaneous

• An analysis of four lazy years with an Amazon Kindle and no dead trees (Scott Hanselman) - Understand why you should go with a e Reader
• I know apps - Interesting point. Next time keep that in mind.

~Franky

Reading Notes #17

Cloud

• Announcing Improved In-place Updates (DrewMcDaniel) - A must to read to any Azure developer. this will improve the speed and lower the friction...
• Windows Azure In-place Upgrades (Year of Azure – Week16) (brentdacodemonkey) - Really interesting. A recap of where we where and where we are going. continue with the post.
• Questions About the Cloud? Learn from Windows Azure Partners And Accelerate Your Move to the Cloud  (blogs.msdn.com) - True stories. perfect to finish convincing someone to move to the cloud (is the cloud is a solution)
• Editing a Local Windows Azure Project with the Emulator Running (Nathan Totten)- Great news... Debugging will be lot less painful.
• Dark Side of the Cloud (Andy Singleton) - Its not always as perfect as it look. Some time the cloud is not the best solution.
• SQL Azure Federations: Building Scalable, Elastic, and Multi-tenant Database Solutions - To start learning about SQL Azure federations this is a good post. a lot of details and links
• Simple Database Migration to SQL Azure (David Pallmann) - Well explain, well packaged this very frequent scenario.
• Windows Azure VM downtime due to Host and Guest OS update and how to manage it in multi-instance Windows Azure Application (Avkash Chauhan - MSFT) - Explain different scenarios possible when Azure is doing an update.
• What is Amazon’s Secret for Success and Why is EC2 a Runaway Train? (Randy Bias) - Great post exposing the Amazon web service AWS secret.
• Microsoft Azure: B for effort, less for execution (Barb Darrow) - Very nice post where the author talk about where Azure is compare with is competitor.
• The Microsoft Private Cloud: A Technology Overview – Perfect post to start learning on private cloud, or should I say IaaS?
• Implementing Windows Azure Retry Logic (DavidAiken) – AzureSQL and Service Bus don't implement the retry. To have a good idea u cant use the framework explain in this post

Programming

• What Ruby’s ||= (Double Pipe / Or Equals) Really Does - Explain how really this particular operator works.
• Introducing the OData Library (dpblogs) - This post explain the new feature present in the new October CTP of oData.
• Cutting Edge - Objects and the Art of Data Modeling (Dino Esposito) - Good article, and by the side explain some EF stuff. Explain how to use the active record pattern and Domain Model Pattern with EF.

~Franky

Reading Notes #16

Cloud

• The Windows Azure AppFabric Service Bus (Joseph Fultz) - A great and complete sample of a use of azure AppFabric service bus. code also available.
• Announcing The New SQL Azure Reporting CTP Release - all detail about the new CTP release.

"SQL Azure Reporting enables new hybrid IT scenarios - for example, customers can schedule automatic synchronization of on-premises databases with SQL Azure, and then deploy cloud-based BI reports based on the synchronized cloud-based data"

• On Not Using owner With the Azure AppFabric Service Bus (Neil Mackenzie) -Great post to get started on Access Control Service (acs) with out using owner as in CTP.
• Types of Cloud Computing (ArchieIndian) - if still confuse between SAAS IAAS PAAS then this the post.
• Reporting on Diagnostics Data(Joseph Fultz) – Wooo! A lot of stuff is going on here. grab your CTP access and download the code available in this article. great prove of concept.
• Field Note: Calling the Windows Azure Storage API Asynchronously  (Tejaswi Redkar) - Nice trick about accessing storage asynchronously.
• Static Web Site Migration to Windows Azure (David Pallmann) - If you didn't know yet, here packaged in a 30 minutes recipe how to migrate a static web site.  good way to move in the cloud AND saving money.
• The Developer’s Guide to AppFabric (Alan Smith) - This is the official release version of “The Developer’s Guide to AppFabric” and it’s free.

Programming

• Working with Lazy Loading in Entity Framework Code First  (stevesmithblog.com) - EF code first manage the lazy loading automatically. this post show you how to disable it when needed.
• Actions in OData (Alex James) - First post of a nice series talking about pushing farther oData by adding/using action.
• Do you know Ruby Doctest? - Great tool for units test in Ruby

Miscellaneous

•  Securing Service Bus with ACS - In this talk Clemens will discuss how to secure your Service Bus applications using ACS.
• Is BizTalk Server Going Away At Some Point? Yes. Dead? Nope (Richard Seroter) - Answering the question that every one have on her lips: Does Biztalk is dead?

"Microsoft’s Tony Meleg actually did an excellent job frankly discussing the future of the middle platform and their challenges of branding and cohesion.  I strongly encourage you to watch that session"

• How to Start Freelancing (Coby Chapple) – A series about doing some freelancing. the author share is experience. Read part1, part2, part3... still one more to come
• Cloud Cover Episode 61 - Updates to SQL Azure Database with Roger Doherty - In this episode, Roger Doherty, Technical Evangelist for SQL Server and SQL Azure, joins Steve and Wade to discuss recent updates to SQL Azure database.

~Franky

Reading Notes #15

Cloud

Moving to Azure: The Plan and Start - First post of a series about moving to azure. Some good links.

Moving to Azure: The Database – (part two)  SQLAzure is so nice ;)

New Docs: AWS Getting Started Guides for Linux and Microsoft Windows - New docs... Great!

Hosting a Web Site Completely from Windows Azure Storage (David Pallmann) - If smaller is better, will you prefer 0,15 or 90?

TechDays 2011: Developer Tools, Languages, Frameworks & awesomeness (Frédéric Harper) - A lot of good things... And it’s coming at Montreal!

Does Windows Azure Startup task have time limit? What to do with heavy processing startup task in Windows Azure Role? (Avkash Chauhan - MSFT) - Explain a way to manage long start-up task without any issue.

Relaunching AzureDesignPatterns.com with HTML5 and Expanded Content (David Pallmann) - A useful web site that is store in blob storage...

Programming

• Ninjecting MVC3 - If you never try Ninject, then try it! Go update youre pet project to make use of it.

Miscellaneous

• M. Wright’s “Hard Code” (ericbrec) – Nice post.

~Franky

Reading Notes #14

Azure

• HTML5 + Cloud = Elasticity² (David Pallmann) - In this post David Pallman continue is explanation of relation between frontend and backend by explaining how both of them need scalability today.
• Skipping Windows Azure Startup Tasks When Running in the Emulator - Quick clean and easy.
• Key Concepts Associated with Windows Azure Development - Nice post, explaining some important notions.
• Eight cloud computing risks, and how to quash them - Good post, that help having more element when answering some frequently ask questions about moving to the cloud.
• NuGet push... to Windows Azure - wow this “PoC” is impressive. It’s amazing what we can do we NuGet
• Use the Windows Azure CDN for Assets (Brian Hitney) - Nicely explain.
• Best Practices for Leveraging Windows Azure Service Bus Brokered Messaging API - A lot of info in this great post.
• Message-oriented Architectures (Updated) - Everything you should know about message oriented architecture.
• Scaling Facebook Applications in the Azure Cloud – A Success Story and Lessons Learned (allandcp) - 2 success stories
• Windows Azure and SQL Azure Tutorials - nice tutorial to implement oData in Azure project.
• Automating Azure 1.4 Packaging using MSBuild and CSPack - Continuous integration in Azure is not strait forward. This post will help to pass truth.

Programming

• Setting up a NuGet repository in seconds: MyGet public feeds - That could be very useful. Even more when your team is split across the globe.
• September 2011 Release of the Ajax Control Toolkit  (stephenwalther.com) - as usual great features like Gravatar control, Twitter Control and a better Date picker added by Stephen’s team.
• New Features in the Entity Framework June CTP - New features: enum now supported, table-valued function(TVF) kind of store procedure usable with Linq, multiple result from a store procedure and by able to cache a compiled version of the Linq query. Even the geo localisation reach the EF.
• Development Is Design - If you think that rounded window corners or cutesy animations are design... read this post. It's decoration. The development is design....
• Build Great Experiences on Any Device with OData - One of the best post I read about oData.

Ruby

• Large Ruby File Downloads Done Right! – Well done.

~Franky