• For Part 1, Creating a VHD and Uploading it to Azure Storage (Part 1 of 2, 30 minutes) – click here.
• For the Summary entry on blog.ehuna.org, click here.

Once the VHD file has been uploaded to Azure Storage you can use the Azure SDK to cache it in your web role instance and mount it - you then have a NTFS hard-drive in the cloud where you can use the standard System.IO classes to read and write files. 

For more articles, screencasts and tips check out www.ehuna.org - follow me on twitter.com/ehuna

See below for details on what's covered in the video, and download the Visual Studio 2010 RC VB.NET sample projects used in the videos here:

  http://blog.ehuna.org/files/Visual-Studio-Solution-AzureSpeed1.zip (134 KB)

Here’s what is covered in the video:

• 00:00 - Introduction / Overview (see notes here).
• Mounting a VHD in the Azure fabric, reading text files and spitting them out
• 00:50 - New Visual Studio 2010 RC cloud project with one web role
• MyVHDWebRole - it's a Windows Azure web role but is like a console app - runs and spits out results.
• 01:40 - Settings in ServiceDefinition.csdef with LocalResource "on-disk" cache

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<ServiceDefinition name="MyVHDWebRole" 
  xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceDefinition">
  <WebRole name="MyVHD_WebRole">
    <InputEndpoints>
      <InputEndpoint name="HttpIn" protocol="http" port="90" />
    </InputEndpoints>
    <ConfigurationSettings>
      <Setting name="DiagnosticsConnectionString" />
            <Setting name="AzureStorageAccount" />
            <Setting name="AzureStorageKey" />
            <Setting name="BlobStorageEndpoint" />
            <Setting name="QueueStorageEndpoint" />
            <Setting name="TableStorageEndpoint" />
            <Setting name="BlobContainePCLDrives" />
            <Setting name="VHDDriveName" />
        </ConfigurationSettings>
        <LocalResources>
            <LocalStorage name="MyCloudDriveCache"
                    cleanOnRoleRecycle="true"
                    sizeInMB="30" />
        </LocalResources>
    </WebRole>
</ServiceDefinition>

• 02:40 - Settings in ServiceConfiguration.cscfg with osVersion set to host OS 1.1 

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<ServiceConfiguration 
    serviceName="MyVHDWebRole" 
    osVersion="WA-GUEST-OS-1.1_201001-01"
    xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration">
  <Role name="MyVHD_WebRole">
    <Instances count="1" />
    <ConfigurationSettings>
      <Setting name="DiagnosticsConnectionString" value="UseDevelopmentStorage=true" />
            <Setting name="AzureStorageAccount" value="devstoreaccount1" />
            <Setting name="AzureStorageKey" value="Eby8vdM02xNOcqFlqUwJPLlmEtlCDXJ1OUzFT50uSRZ6IFsuFq2UVErCz4I6tq/K1SZFPTOtr/KBHBeksoGMGw==" />
            <Setting name="BlobStorageEndpoint" value="http://127.0.0.1:10000/devstoreaccount1/" />
            <Setting name="QueueStorageEndpoint" value="http://127.0.0.1:10001/devstoreaccount1/" />
            <Setting name="TableStorageEndpoint" value="http://127.0.0.1:10002/devstoreaccount1/" />
            <Setting name="BlobContainePCLDrives" value="vhddrives" />
            <Setting name="VHDDriveName" value="myvhddrive.vhd" />
        </ConfigurationSettings>
  </Role>
</ServiceConfiguration>

Host 1.1 does not yet support .NET Framework 4.0 yet (in the cloud)
This sample uses the local development storage - not Azure Storage in the cloud

• 04:55 - Make sure your Page Blob snapshot and CloudDrive instance is public - so you can unmount and delete when the web role shuts down.
• Specially in developmnent, where for a example a 1 GB VHD would be copied to a 1 GB snapshot
• In the cloud, this is not true, a snapshot is very small - one page.
• 06:10 - Tip to read templates if running outside of local development fabric (in IIS for faster development)
• 06:30 - ASPX file - a button and a label - the label contains the results.
• If an exception occurs, it's easy to see it and follow up in the forums.
• 07:45 - We only enable the "Mount VHD" button if we are running in the fabric.
• 08:30 - Function BP() - just used to build up a string that is then displayed through the page's label.
• 09:20 - We dig into the cache code -

oLocalResource = RoleEnvironment.GetLocalResource("MyCloudDriveCache")
sCacheFolder = AddTrailingSlash(oLocalResource.RootPath) + "cache"
If Not (IO.Directory.Exists(sCacheFolder)) Then IO.Directory.CreateDirectory(sCacheFolder)

Make sure your cache folder does not have a trailing backslash "\" - the Azure SDK 1.1 has a bug that will throw an exception if it does.

• 10:30 - Telling the CloudDrive API to cache the VHD page blob -

CloudDrive.InitializeCache(sCacheFolder, oLocalResource.MaximumSizeInMegabytes)

• 11:00 - Do the Windows Azure dance to get a reference to the VHD stored in Azure Blob Storage

uriBlobStorageEndpoint = New Uri(sBlobStorageEndpoint)
uriQueueStorageEndpoint = New Uri(sQueueStorageEndpoint)
uriTableStorageEndpoint = New Uri(sTableStorageEndpoint)

oStorageCredentialsAccountAndKey = New StorageCredentialsAccountAndKey(sAzureStorageAccount, sAzureStorageKey)
oCloudStorageAccount = New CloudStorageAccount(oStorageCredentialsAccountAndKey, _ 
                           uriBlobStorageEndpoint, uriQueueStorageEndpoint, uriTableStorageEndpoint)

oCloudBlobClient = oCloudStorageAccount.CreateCloudBlobClient()
oCloudBlobContainer = oCloudBlobClient.GetContainerReference(sBlobContainePCLDrives)
oCloudBlobContainer.CreateIfNotExist()

• 11:35 - Creating an instance of the CloudDrive class -

' Existing Drive
oCloudPageBlob = oCloudBlobContainer.GetPageBlobReference(sVHDDriveName)
sVHDUri = oCloudPageBlob.Uri.ToString

• 12:00 - Creating a snapshot of the page blob and the read-only CloudDrive -

oCloudDrive = oCloudStorageAccount.CreateCloudDrive(sVHDUri)
uriVHDSnapshot = oCloudDrive.Snapshot
sVHDSnapshotUri = uriVHDSnapshot.ToString 

oCloudDriveReadOnly = New CloudDrive(uriVHDSnapshot, oCloudStorageAccount.Credentials)

• 12:45 - Mount the VHD drive in read-only mode -

sLocalPath = oCloudDriveReadOnly.Mount(oLocalResource.MaximumSizeInMegabytes, _ 
                                       DriveMountOptions.None)

Make sure you handle exceptions here!

• 13:45 - Use the regular System.IO classes to enumerate files in a folder in the VHD file -

If IO.Directory.Exists(sLocalPath) Then
  …
  sFiles = IO.Directory.GetFiles(sDataFolder, "*.TXT")
End If

Mentioned Visual Studio 2010 RC Code Snippets in VB.NET (for the C# developers, here’s a tutorial on code snippets).  Spent a bit of time to read the text content from each file and displayed it in the results.

• 16:50 - Running the web role in the Windows Azure local development fabric
• Showing the deployment in the service details
• Showing the default.aspx page in the browser.
• Clicked on 'Mount VHD' -
• Showed the snapshot directory in C:\Users\emmanuel_huna\AppData\Local\dftmp\wadd\devstoreaccount1\vhddrives\myvhddrive.vhd!2010-03-12T21_52_56.6300000Z
• Got exception on reading the contents since the filename contained the path already; fixed it and ran it again - it worked!
• 19:49 - When your web role shuts down: Un-mount your read-only CloudDrive and make sure you delete the Azure Page Blob snapshots.
• 21:40 - Conclusion.

Good times!

• For Part 2, Creating a Web Role that mounts the CloudDrive from Azure Storage and reads text files (Part 2 of 2, 22 minutes) – click here.
• For the Summary entry on blog.ehuna.org, click here.

In this video I go over the details on how to create a VHD file in Windows 7 and the code you need to upload it as a Page Blob in Windows Azure Storage.

I found the code that uploads the VHD to a Page Blob to Azure Storage in the cloud on Thomas Conte’s MSDN blog – thanks Thomas!  Also, thanks to Neil Mackenzie on the Azure forums who helped me out with many issues I ran into.

For more articles, screencasts and tips check out www.ehuna.org – you can also follow me on twitter.com/ehuna

See below for more details on what's covered in the screencast and download the Visual Studio 2010 VB.NET projects here:

  http://blog.ehuna.org/files/Visual-Studio-Solution-AzureSpeed1.zip (134 KB)

Here’s what is covered in the video:

• 00:00 - Introduction / Overview (see notes here).
  • Development Tip: access files that are normally in CloudDrive - when ASP.NET web site is running in IIS (not in the cloud)

Creating the VHD Manually

Windows 7 or Windows Server 2008 R2

• 09:25 - Windows 7 > Control Panel > Disk Management
• 10:05 - Disk Management > Create VHD
  • Folder: C:\Data\Personal\projects\MyVHDDrive\MyVHDDrive\data
    • File: myvhddrive.vhd
    • Size: 16 MB (fixed size)
  • You can also create a VHD through the CloudDrive APIs.

• 11:38 - Initialize Disk > Format > NTFS > Assign drive letter of "V"
  • NTFS has large overhead for small drives: 16 MB drive only has 3.9 MB of free space.

• 13:19 - creating a folder and files in the VHD
  • Folder: "datafolder"
    • Files "textfile1.txt" and "textfile2.txt"
    • Add some content to the text files using Notepad.

• 14:00 - Disk Management > Detach VHD

Uploading the VHD to a Page Blob in Azure Storage
Console Application created using Visual Studio 2010 RC

• 15:09 - Visual Studio 2010 RC test project - console application called "MyVHDDrive".
• 15:40 - No reference to "C:\Program Files\Windows Azure SDK\v1.1\ref\Microsoft.WindowsAzure.CloudDrive.dll"
  • This console app does not run in the Azure fabric.
• 16:00 - Azure Storage parameters in app.config

<add key="AzureStorageAccount" value="YOURstorage"/> 
<add key="AzureStorageKey" value="YOURKEY"/> 
<add key="BlobStorageEndpoint" value="http://YOURstorage.blob.core.windows.net/"/> 
<add key="QueueStorageEndpoint" value="http://YOURstorage.queue.core.windows.net/"/> 
<add key="TableStorageEndpoint" value="http://YOURstorage.table.core.windows.net/"/> 
<add key="BlobContainer" value="vhddrives"/>

• 17:08 - Folder and File name of VHD

<!-- The location where the VHD file is located --> 
<add key="VHDDriveName" value="myvhddrive.vhd"/> 
<!-- The name of the VHD drive to deploy to Azure Storage -->
<add key="VHDDriveNamePageBlob" value="myvhddrive.vhd"/> 

• 18:23 - Imports

Imports System.Xml 
Imports System.Xml.Linq 
Imports System.Configuration 
Imports System.IO 
Imports System.Text.RegularExpressions 
Imports System.Collections.Generic 
Imports Microsoft.VisualBasic.FileIO 
Imports Microsoft.WindowsAzure 
Imports Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics 
Imports Microsoft.WindowsAzure.Diagnostics.Management 
Imports Microsoft.WindowsAzure.StorageClient 
Imports Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime

• 18:50 - VB.Net Module: Static Shared classes - much simpler code.
• 19:23 - Running and testing that settings are loaded properly.
• 20:26 - Running and doing some data validation on the input settings
• 21:31 - Checking the code that uploads the VHD to the Page Blob in Azure Storage

oStorageCredentialsAccountAndKey = New StorageCredentialsAccountAndKey(sAzureStorageAccount, sAzureStorageKey)
oCloudStorageAccount = New CloudStorageAccount(oStorageCredentialsAccountAndKey, _ 
                           uriBlobStorageEndpoint, uriQueueStorageEndpoint, uriTableStorageEndpoint)

oCloudBlobClient = oCloudStorageAccount.CreateCloudBlobClient()
oCloudBlobContainer = oCloudBlobClient.GetContainerReference(sBlobContainer)
oCloudBlobContainer.CreateIfNotExist()

oCloudPageBlob = oCloudBlobContainer.GetPageBlobReference(sVHDDriveNamePageBlob)
sVHDUri = oCloudPageBlob.Uri.ToString

oFileStream = IO.File.OpenRead(sVHDDriveNameFull)
[…]

• 24:15 - Running and debugging the code - placing breakpoints and checking variable values
  • Showing the URI of the Page Blob that hosts the VHD file.
  • Using Cloud Storage Studio to download a VHD from an Azure Storage Page Blob and then mounting it.

• 27:06 - Windows Azure Local Development Fabric - simulation of Page Blob - where to copy your files to simulate the VHD in local storage
  • The directory is normally: C:\Users\[USERNAME]\AppData\Local\dftmp\wadd\devstoreaccount1\[CONTAINER]\[DRIVE.VHD]\[FOLDER]
  • If you ran into the path max length issue, look at _CSRUN_STATE_DIRECTORY: C:\t\wadd\devstoreaccount1\[CONTAINER]\[DRIVE.VHD]\[FOLDER]

• 29:30 - Conclusion

How to speed up Windows Azure Development (Part 2 of 2) from Emmanuel Huna on Vimeo.

Here’s what is covered in the video:

1. The rinetd trick and the RinetdService – accessing your windows azure web roles from the real IP (not 127.0.0.1). See “An easier way to access the Windows Azure local development fabric from another computer” -
  http://blog.ehuna.org/2009/10/an_easier_way_to_access_the_wi.html
2. Adding a breakpoint in Visual Studio 2008.
3. W3WP.EXE – the IIS host process.
4. Tools > Attach to process – takes forever for the list of processes to come up.
5. Attach to W3WP.exe the IIS host process.
6. Load the ASPX page in the browser and debug your code-behind.
7. Create a Visual Studio macro (Macros > Record Temporary Macro).
8. Rename and save the temporary macro.  Right-click and run.
9. Visual Studio > Options > Keyboard > Create keyboard shortcut.
10.  Change something in your code, right-click web role and build, press “CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+?” and open a browser to access your ASPX page.  Boom!  Debug your code in 1-2 seconds!
11. Attach to process when running a windows service or a worker role.
12. If using the ASP.NET custom session provider that uses Azure storage, don’t use it in development.  Set your web role instance count to 1 and store your ASP.NET sessions in proc.

Good Times!
Below you can find sample code and additional tips related to this screencast.

Download the Visual Studio Solution here:
  http://blog.ehuna.org/files/Visual-Studio-Solution-AzureSpeed1.zip (26 KB)

Record a Macro in Visual Studio 2008
  Macros > Record Temporary Macro
  Tools > Attach to process
  Select W3WP.exe
  Click ‘Attach’
  Stop recording of macro
  Stop project from running in Visual Studio
  Save temporary macro
  Rename it “IISAttachToProcess”

Right click and “Run” the macro anytime – you’re now attached to the W3WP.exe IIS host process.

Keyboard shortcuts in Visual Studio 2008
  Options > Keyboard
  Search for “IIS…” – find and select the “IISAttachToProcess” macro
  Set a keyboard shortcut of “CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+?”

Press “CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+?” and you’re now attached to the W3WP.exe IIS host process. 

Change something in your code, right-click web role and build, press “CTRL+SHIFT+ALT+?” and open a browser to access your ASPX page. 

Boom!  Debug your code in 1-2 seconds!

Good Times!

Here’s what is covered in the video:

1. To get this working you need Microsoft Visual Studio and the Windows Azure SDK (November 2009 CTP) – you can get it here at -
  http://www.microsoft.com/windowsazure/windowsazure/
2. Create a new CloudService project (VB.Net) called “AzureSpeed1”, with an ASP.NET web role called “AzureSpeed1_WebRole”. 
3. Create a setting in the ServiceConfiguration.cscfg file.
4. Running the project in the Windows Azure local development fabric.  Benefits of running in a virtual machine.  A bit slower since we’re running in a virtual machine. 
5. Displaying a setting in the default.aspx page – web role still running in the local development fabric.
6. How I’m impatient – I’m used to years of RAD – Rapid Application Development with IIS, ASP.NET, VB.NET and Visual Studio.
7. You can run your web roles in the local development fabric – but you can also run them in IIS!  Make sure handle settings and logging properly.
8. Add new IIS site, match azure local development fabric and IIS ports (change by one number – e.g. 8080 and 9080).  Try loading the page and see the exception.
9. Knowing whether you’re running the Azure fabric or not.
10. Smarter function to read settings – if not running in the cloud from the web.config.
11. We’re back to RAD development!  Build your web role (really just an ASP.NET site) and start testing your ASPX pages – no need to run the local development fabric.
12. Conclusion: whenever you implement a feature in your Windows Azure projects, make sure you add support for running both in the Windows Azure fabric (local development fabric or Staging/Production cloud) or on-premise hosted in IIS.  Settings, logging, and ASP.NET sessions are examples of features that need to support both.

Below you can find sample code and additional tips related to this screencast.

Download the Visual Studio Solution here:
  http://blog.ehuna.org/files/Visual-Studio-Solution-AzureSpeed1.zip (26 KB)

IIS
Once you’ve opened the solution and compiled it in Visual Studio 2008, create an IIS web site (watch video if you don’t know how).

Settings
Settings should be in both ServiceConfiguration.cscfg and Web.Config

Settings > ServiceConfiguration.cscfg

<?xml version="1.0"?>
<ServiceConfiguration 
  serviceName="AzureSpeed1" 
  xmlns="http://schemas.microsoft.com/ServiceHosting/2008/10/ServiceConfiguration">
  <Role name="AzureSpeed1_WebRole">
    <Instances count="1" />
    <ConfigurationSettings>
      <Setting name="DiagnosticsConnectionString" value="UseDevelopmentStorage=true" />
      <Setting name="MySetting" value="This is my setting" />
    </ConfigurationSettings>
  </Role>
</ServiceConfiguration>

Settings > Web.Config

  <appSettings>
    <add key="MySetting" value="This is my setting from web.config" />
  </appSettings>

VB.NET Code Behind

Imports Microsoft.WindowsAzure.ServiceRuntime
Module modUtils
  Public bIsAzure As Boolean = False
  Public sMySetting As String = "" 

  Public Sub LoadSettings()
    bIsAzure = IIf(RoleEnvironment.IsAvailable, True, False)
    sMySetting = GetSetting("MySetting")
  End Sub
  
  Function GetSetting(ByVal sSettingName As String) As String
    Dim sReturn As String = "" 

    Try
      If bIsAzure Then
        sReturn = RoleEnvironment.GetConfigurationSettingValue(sSettingName)
      Else
        sReturn = ConfigurationSettings.AppSettings(sSettingName)
      End If 

    Catch ex As Exception
      'LogMessage("Error retrieving setting '" + sSettingName + "'; Exception: " + ex.ToString, EventLogEntryType.Information)
      sReturn = ""
    End Try 

    Return sReturn
  End Function 

End Module

Good Times!

SQL Azure Overview - Part 3 from Emmanuel Huna on Vimeo.

86. Modifying the .netTiers templates to read the SQL connection string from Windows Azure configuration instead of Web.Config (or app.config).
87. How the code looks in the ASP.NET page - it doesn't change, it's the same "DataRepository.MyTableProvider" code we've used in the past.
88. Changes in the DataRepository.cst template - changing the ConnectionString collection.
89. Making sure all .netTiers templates use "connectionString" from this collection.
90. The process of creating custom features in CodeSmith templates: first make the changes in the code, then make the changes in the templates.
91. Details of what was executed to modify the .netTiers 2.3 templates to support reading the netTiersConnectionString from Windows Azure configuration using the Windows Azure SDK v1.0.  We now have a "IsConnectionStringAzure" property in the main NetTiers.cst templates!

Good times!

SQL Azure Overview - Part 2 from Emmanuel Huna on Vimeo.

SQL Azure Overview - Part 1 from Emmanuel Huna on Vimeo.

52. Overview of SQL Azure.
53. Warning on name changes and confusing documentation (e.g. SQL Azure was previously called "SDS", SQL Data Services).
54. SQL Azure CTP limits: 5 databases, 10 GB per Windows Live Account.  MyCalyx Windows Live account: cloudservice2@calyxsoftware.com
55. SQL Azure Connection Strings for ADO.NET, ODBC, and OLE DB.  Our ORM of choice, .netTiers, uses the ADO.NET connection string.
56. The "sa" account in SQL Azure.
57. Using SQL Management Studio to manage SQL Azure databases.  SQL Azure server names, errors and warnings to currently ignore.
58. TDS - Tabular Data Stream protocol on port 1433.
59. Useful "manual" SQL statements.
60. Cleaning up SQL scripts for SQL Azure - including link to my blog entry.
61. Another blog entry I wrote with PowerShell scripts to clean up SQL scripts for SQL Azure: http://blog.ehuna.org/2009/08/windows_powershell_commands_to.html
62. Creating new databases in SQL Azure - having separate SQL Azure databases for Staging and Production.  Continue using on-premise SQL Server for development.
63. Types of SQL Azure databases when v1.0 rolls out: Web Edition (1 GB max, $9.99/month) and Business Edition (10 GB max, $99.99/month).
64. Creating a specific Login and User for every database (do not use the "sa" account).
65. Creating a sample database (TESTDB1) on an on-premise SQL Server 2008 Standard and deploying it to SQL Azure.
66. Important: you need at least one primary key - clustered index - before you can insert any records in a SQL Azure table (good and also works well with the .netTiers model).
67. Options to change in SQL Server Management Studio > TESTDB1 > Tasks > Generate Scripts (due to currently unsupported features in SQL Azure).
68. Handling SQL Azure timeouts in SQL Server Management Studio.
69. A better way: the new "SQL Azure Migration Wizard" released on CodePlex.  Installing it, configuring it and using it.  Automatic cleaned up scripts for SQL Azure including tables, stored procedures, primary keys, foreign keys, indexes, etc.
70. RedGate SQL Compare and my suggestion for a version that works with SQL Azure.  

Update 1/27/2010: David A. from Red Gate has announced that they now have an early access build of SQL Compare that works with Azure!  You can find the announcement at the bottom of this thread:

I highly recommend Red Gate’s SQL Compare – it’s an amazing product that has literally saved me hundreds of hours.  You can download a free trial here and request the SQL Azure early access build here: http://www.red-gate.com/Azure

Good Times!

71. Strategies for deploying a database on SQL Azure (first time) and options for schema changes and upgrades in future versions.

Windows Azure Overview - Part 4 from Emmanuel Huna on Vimeo.

39. Unhandled exceptions and custom errors in Web.Config.
40. Handling Upgrades: making sure the roles properly act when we are upgrading SQL Azure.
41. Loading a Windows Azure Storage Queue endpoint (QueueEndPointURI, AccountName, AccountSharedKey, StorageAccountInfo).
42. Creating a persistent and stateless Azure Storage Queue (QueueStorage and MessageQueue).
43. Adding an event to a queue in a web role.
44. Handling the event from a queue in a worker role.
45. Properly returning RoleStatus.Healthy or RoleStatus.UnHealthy in a worker's role GetHealthStatus() to allow for better monitoring of our role instances.
46. Considerations in removing a message from a queue when an error occurs (examples where message should be deleted and should not be deleted when sending out an email).
47. Logging Levels in the Development Fabric UI (Critical, Error, Warning, Information and Debugging).
48. Windows Azure Storage labs in the Azure training kit (to cover blobs and tables).
49. DNS considerations with Windows Azure URLs (CNAME entries).
50. Self signed SSL certificates for Windows Azure development (see Azure Links, OneNote required).
51. Adding purchased SSL certificates to your Windows Azure project.

Windows Azure Overview - Part 3 from Emmanuel Huna on Vimeo.

35. Using the Windows Azure forums and getting feedback from Microsoft employees.
36. Loading parameters when role starts.
37. Using reflection to log the role's version.
38. Page_Init() calls that should always be made.

Windows Azure Overview - Part 2 from Emmanuel Huna on Vimeo.

Note: we lost sound in the last 25 minutes - you get the Allman brothers instead.
15. Worker Role health status.
16. Custom ASP.NET Session provider that uses Azure storage - configuration in both Azure files and web.config/app.config.
17. Windows Azure portal.
18. Windows Live IDs and Azure CTP.
19. CS (Cloud Service) packages and Azure configuration.
20. Azure Storage Accounts.
21. Azure Staging and Production Environments.
22. Deployment IDs.
23. Staging DNS entries.
24. Upgrade/Run/Suspend/Configure/Delete commands.
25. Initialized/Running/Stopped/Paused role instance states.
26. Billing considerations when instances are deployed.
27. Azure Storage Manager.
28. Custom error pages in ASP.NET.
29. Azure training kit labs.
30. Azure links.
31. Azure Service Management API.
32. Azure SDK Tools documentation and CSPack/CSRun Azure command line tools.
33. Doing a Staging Upgrade.
34. Serving dynamic compressed content in Azure and bug on Microsoft Connect.

Windows Azure Overview - Part 1 from Emmanuel Huna on Vimeo.

1. Overview of Windows Azure.
2. Using the virtual machine with the Windows Azure SDK.
3. Creating a cloud service project.
4. Adding web roles and worker roles.
5. Azure service definition and service configuration.
6. Input endpoints (HTTP and HTTPS) and multiple role instances.
7. Custom ASP.NET Session provider that uses Azure storage.
8. Azure Storage client library.
9. Azure storage - blobs, queues and messages.
10. Development fabric.
11. Development storage.
12. Writing to the Azure log.
13. Loading parameters when your role starts.
14. Running roles in full trust.

Windows 7, the next version of Windows (after Vista) due in 2009 was
announced at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference 2008

In this screencast you'll learn about Windows Azure, Windows 7 (the version coming up after Windows Vista), Office 14 on the Web, Visual Studio 2010, the .NET Framework 4.0 and more. 

See below for the screencast, links and more information.

Note: during the screencast I talk about the 160 GB hard drive that Microsoft gave PDC attendees. These PDC 2008 materials are only available to my co-workers; I have not made them available online.

Screencast Notes

Here are the notes I used during the screencast -

Microsoft Professional Developers Conference 2008
Los Angeles, CA - 10/26/2008 - 10/30/2008

High Level Overview

• Windows Azure
  • Marketing: a Windows Operating System "in the cloud".
  • Really: advanced hosting services for scalable apps written in .NET.
  • Greatly integrated with Microsoft development tools
    • Run a simulated local "Azure" on your laptop - works in a plane.
    • Advanced tools to deploy to Staging/Production

• Windows 7

Demo: build 6801 from PDC running in Virtual PC 2007

• Smaller footprint
  • About 500 MB RAM
  • Hidden Windows do not use video memory.

• Better windows management: Superbar
• Aero Enhancements
  • Transparent windows on hover

• Easy home networking: Homegroup
• Easier to find data: Jump Lists and Libraries

• Unified search: e.g. search for picture will search across computers in Homegroup/Domain

• Better UAC control: less annoying pop-ups
• Applications updated (after 15 years)
  • Paint: now with Ribbon.
  • Wordpad: now with Ribbon
  • Calculator
  • Notepad
  • Etc...

• Virtual Disk partitioning: mount virtual machines (VHD) natively
• Bitlocker on external drives.
• Centralized device manager
  • See battery status for MP3 player or camera directly in device manager

• Built-in Multi-Touch, affordable (e.g. HP Touchsmart)
• Built-in Sensor APIs - light sensor, accelerometer, and touch sensor
  • Control a game by moving the board
  • Changethe view in a text reader depending on the brightness of the environment

• Windows key + P to change display mode
• Improvements in Multimonitor: even via RDP!
• Improved Firewall - more options
• Media streaming: you can stream any media from/to any computer, including digital picture frames.
• Windows Explorer: new navigation page integrated with Libraries and Homegroup

• Software + Services
  • Windows Live and IE8
  • Office 14 now on the web!
  • Microsoft "eats its own dog food" Office on the Web using Windows Azure and Live Services.

• Much more for Developers
  • Visual Studio 2010
    • Now 100% WPF - no more COM.
  • .NET Framework 4.0
  • Advances in VB.NET and C#
    • Parallel/Multi core features - easy to use, but be careful
  • Silverlight:
    • New toolkit - datagrid, datepicker, calendar, and ribbon
    • Will soon work on mobile phones
  • WPF: new controls (ribbon, datagrid
  • ASP.NET MVC Framework
  • Open XML SDK
  • Enhancements in XML Paper Specification (XPS) documents.
  • Live Mesh OS
    • SDK available
    • -OR- direct REST through WCF helper classes.
  • Virtual Earth Web Services

A few links mentioned at the beginning of the screencast -

Microsoft Professional Developers Conference 2008
http://microsoftpdc.com/

Visual Studio Developer Conference
http://vslive.com/

Windows Azure Services Platform
http://www.microsoft.com/azure/default.mspx

A couple of items I mentioned during the screencast -

The government of Ethiopia data center before
the teacher application was deployed on Windows Azure

Web and Worker services running on sample application on local
machine (127.0.0.1) - simulating a load balanced Production system

I took the screenshots above from this session - check it out it's very interesting -

"ES16 A Lap Around Windows Azure" from day 1
http://mschnlnine.vo.llnwd.net/d1/pdc08/WMV-HQ/ES16.wmv

I mentioned this application in the screencast -

Taskbar Shuffle (Works on XP and Vista)
http://nerdcave.webs.com/taskbarshuffle.htm

Taskbar Shuffle is a simple, small, free utility that lets you drag and drop your Windows taskbar buttons to rearrange them. Here’s a full feature list:

• Reorder your taskbar buttons by dragging and dropping them
• Reorder your tray icons in the same way
• Reorder tasks in a grouped button's popup menu in the same way
• Middle-click to close programs on your taskbar
• Works with UltraMon taskbars
• Tweak taskbar button grouping

If you run more than a few applications at a time, you'll definitely find Taskbar Shuffle useful, so give it a try!

For a great Windows 7 demo, check out Keynote on day 2, look for the demo from Julie Larson Green

KYN02 Day Two Keynote - Ray Ozzie,
Steven Sinofsky, Scott Guthrie and David Treadwell
http://mschnlnine.vo.llnwd.net/d1/pdc08/WMV-HQ/KYN02.wmv

Another great session I mentioned is the day 2 keynote with Don Box:

KYN03 Day Two Keynote - Chris Anderson and Don Box
http://mschnlnine.vo.llnwd.net/d1/pdc08/WMV-HQ/KYN03.wmv

A good article on why it's exciting that Visual Studio 2010 is written in WPF:

Writing Visual Studio 2010 Shell In WPF Reflects Confidence
http://www.onedotnetway.com/writing-visual-studio-2010-shell-in-wpf-reflects-confidence/

I mentioned the Firefox "Download Them All" add-on and how to download all of the PDC 2008 videos:

How to download PDC Sessions using DownThemAll! Firefox addon
http://weblogs.asp.net/guerchele/archive/2008/10/29/how-to-download-pdc-sessions-using-downthemall-firefox-addon.aspx

Firefox 3.0 - free open-source Browser
http://www.mozilla.com/en-US/firefox/

Download Them All - free Firefox Add-On
https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/201

At the end of my screencast, my employer Calyx Software (www.CalyxSoftware.com) was kind enough to pay for lunch (excellent Chinese food from Mandarin Gourmet - the Mongolian beef is very tasty!) and we watched the day 1 keynote:

KYN01 Day One Keynote - Ray Ozzie,
Amitabh Srivastava, Bob Muglia and David Thompson
http://mschnlnine.vo.llnwd.net/d1/pdc08/WMV-HQ/KYN01.wmv

Additional Links

I collected these links during the PDC and in the last few weeks as I watched the Twitter stream of PDC tagged tweets (see this article if you don't know what Twitter is).

    Sessions - includes description and link to stream
    https://sessions.microsoftpdc.com/public/timeline.aspx

    PDC 2008 Session List by Mike Swanson
    http://blogs.msdn.com/mswanson/pages/PDC2008Sessions.aspx

    Quick Video List, sort by Title
    http://coolthingoftheday.blogspot.com/2008/10/pdc2008-quick-video-link-list.html

    How to download PDC Sessions using DownThemAll! Firefox addon
    http://weblogs.asp.net/guerchele/archive/2008/10/29/how-to-download-pdc-sessions-using-downthemall-firefox-addon.aspx

    Channel 9 RSS feed of all sessions
    http://channel9.msdn.com/posts/pdc2008/RSS/

    Windows Azure - Links and Resources
    http://www.sriramkrishnan.com/blog/

    Azure Coding .NET - Wiki, Forums and shared blogs
    http://azurecoding.net/

    Windows Azure overview
    http://blogs.msdn.com/mikeormond/archive/2008/11/01/some-reflections-on-pdc-2008-windows-azure.aspx

    Windows Azure from a Developer's Perspective
  http://www.25hoursaday.com/weblog/2008/11/03/WindowsAzureFromADevelopersPerspective.aspx

    Flashy Windows 7 bits protected by elaborate scheme, workaround
(turns on Windows 7 Superbar in PDC bits)
    http://www.withinwindows.com/2008/11/02/flashy-windows-7-bits-protected-by-elaborate-scheme-workaround/

    PDC Resources from Scoble
    http://scobleizer.com/2008/11/01/never-underestimate-microsofts-ability-to-turn-a-corner/

    Exposing Connected Home Services to the Internet via Windows Home Server
    http://channel9.msdn.com/pdc2008/ES12/

    Second Light for Surface
    http://www.electronista.com/articles/08/10/30/secondlight.for.ms.surface/

    "Not at PDC" group - all sessions
    http://notatpdc.com/presentations/

It's a great time to be a Microsoft developer - good times!

Your documents, pictures, music and portable applications on Microsoft Live mesh: that's "Cloud Computing" today, not tomorrow.  Watch the screencast below to learn how to use these technologies.

Very recently a few services and applications became available that gave Emmanuel a few ideas.  In this session, Emmanuel will share these ideas with you, showing you how the “Cloud” can be used today  – allowing you to access your data and many applications on any Windows desktop or laptop connected to the Internet.

Update 9/28/2008 - Spore on the cloud

I found a way to use Live Mesh to play a saved Spore game on any device in the Mesh.  See this post on my blog for more details.

Update 10/30/2008 - Support for Mac and Windows Mobile

I'm at the Professional Developers Conference (PDC, www.microsoftpdc.com) and they just announced support in Live Mesh for the Mac and Windows Mobile:

• Mac: https://www.mesh.com/Web/Devices.aspx
• Windows Mobile: https://www.mesh.com/Web/MobileDownload.aspx 

Original 9/19/2008: Here's the idea: use Portable Applications with Microsoft Live Mesh - install rich desktop applications and run them on any of your computers!  In addition, control any of your machines from any computer with Internet Explorer.  Microsoft currently gives you 5 GBs of data per Live Mesh.

Note: during the screencast (after about 10 minutes), I had an error installing Live Mesh on a virtual machine running Vista.  I wanted to make sure I showed how it's installed and how it works on two clean machines, one running Windows XP and one running Windows Vista.

Instead (on my laptop running Vista), I simply logged out of my real Live Mesh and logged in on the test Live Mesh I created for the screencast.  I learned that I could actually not only have multiple folders in my Live Mesh, shared with different folks, but I can also have multiple, separate, Live Meshes!

Applications and Technologies mentioned in this screencast:

• Cloud Computing
  • Wikipedia entry: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cloud_computing
• Microsoft Live Mesh: https://www.mesh.com
  • Forums: http://social.microsoft.com/forums/en-US/LiveMesh/threads/
    • If you get errors installing or using Live Mesh (like I did during the screencast), check out the forums - you may find the answer to your issue.
  • Microsoft Live: http://www.live.com (create your live.com here so you can use Microsoft Live Mesh for free!)
• SuperGenPass
  • SuperGenPass: http://supergenpass.com/
  • Emmanuel's Screencast on how to use SuperGenPass.
• Portable Applicationss: http://portableapps.com/
  • Suites: http://portableapps.com/suite
  • More Applications: http://portableapps.com/apps
  • Test Releases: http://portableapps.com/development/test
• Windows (XP and Vista): http://www.microsoft.com/windows/
• Notepad++
  • Main site: http://notepad-plus.sourceforge.net/uk/site.htm
  • Portable version: http://portableapps.com/apps/development/notepadpp_portable
• SysInternals AutoRuns for Windows
  • Main site: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb963902.aspx
  • No portable version installer (*.paf.exe) yet available.
• SysInternals Process Explorer: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/sysinternals/bb896653.aspx
• Microsoft PDC (Professional Developers Conference)
  • Main site: http://www.microsoftpdc.com/
  • Channel 9 video from the Vice President of Cloud Computing
• TrueCrypt
  • Main site: http://www.truecrypt.org/
  • Instructions for Portable version: http://portableapps.com/node/4072

Here are all of the portable apps I currently run from my Live Mesh "CloudDrive" folder:

Here's the picture I dropped on my "Cloud Drive" on my Live Mesh -

I was able to view it from all devices that were part of the Mesh.

 
Click on image above for tutorial (13 minutes, 150 MB)

In this screencast I explain how you can easily download and install Google Earth and then check out the Loreto Bay Agua Viva Layer. 

I heard that Loreto Bay has some kind of map application in its web site.  Since that application is only available to LB owners, I decided to create this Agua Viva Layer for Google Earth. I don't know how good the Loreto Bay map is or how it compares to Google Earth - but our Agua Viva layer is free and available to anyone. 

See the tutorial for more details or check http://loreto.ehuna.org for more information on Loreto and Loreto Bay.