[This article was contributed by the SQL Azure team.]
Interested in learning firsthand about SQL Azure? Come meet our team at Microsoft TechEd North America. We will be presenting at six sessions and hosting an open lab so that you can experiment with SQL Azure.
DAT209: What’s New in Microsoft SQL Azure
SQL Azure provides a highly available and scalable relational database engine in the cloud. In this demo-intensive and interactive session, learn how to quickly build Web applications with SQL Azure Databases and familiar Web technologies. Patric McElroy demonstrates several new enhancements we have added to SQL Azure based on the feedback received from the community since launching the service earlier this year.
COS305: Microsoft SQL Azure Development Best Practices
Rick Negrin will be covering best practices for using the SQL Azure cloud relational database. He walk through the creation of a departmental application from scratch. See firsthand how easy it is to provision a SQL Azure Database and start developing against it. We also look at importing and exporting data, and reporting. Time is also spent looking at strategies for migrating your existing applications to the cloud so that you are provided with high availability, fault tolerance and visibility to these often unseen data repositories. Finally we see how the reach of the cloud provides you with opportunities to create a new, differentiated class of applications.
COS311: Migrating Applications to Microsoft SQL Azure
Are you looking to migrate your on-premise applications and database from MySql or other RDBMs to SQL Azure? Or are you simply focused on the easiest ways to get your SQL Server database up to SQL Azure? Then, this session is for you…
Cihan Biyikoglu will focus on 2 fundamental areas in this talk; application data access tier and the database schema+data. In Part 1, he will dive into application data-access tier, covering common migration issues as well as best practices that will help make your data-access tier more resilient in the cloud and on SQL Azure. In Part 2, the focus will be on database migration. He will go through migrating schema and data, taking a look at tools and techniques for efficient transfer of schema through Management Studio and Data-Tier Application (DAC). Then, you will discover efficient ways of moving small and large data into SQL Azure through tools like SSIS and BCP. He will close the session with a glimpse into what is in store in future for easing migration of applications into SQL Azure.
COS13-INT: Database Performance in a Multi-tenant Environment
Microsoft SQL Azure presents unique opportunities with regards to performance. The key distinction is multi-tenancy where every user database is co-located with multiple other databases on the same machine. Since your database no longer runs on dedicated hardware, activities of your neighbor databases could impact your performance. When the neighbors are quiet, your database has the luxury to utilize all the resources on the machine. However, when the neighbors get busy, your database performance may be affected. In this session, Henry Zhang shows you a case study in which we quantify the multi-tenancy impact on performance. He gives you some guidelines to monitor such effect on your database and predicate your database performance.
COS07-INT: Using Microsoft SQL Azure as a Datahub to Connect Microsoft SQL Server and Silverlight Clients
In this session, Liam Cavanagh demonstrates how the Sync Framework is used to enable a new series of exciting scenarios made possible by SQL Azure. First, we demonstrate how the Sync Framework is integrated with SQL Server to make it easy to extend data to SQL Azure in only a few clicks. He then show how customers can drop down to lower levels in the stack in an effort to customize the behavior of that data movement without having to rebuild the application from the ground up. Finally, he demonstrate how the Sync Framework is being enhanced to expand our offline client-side reach beyond traditional Windows Presentation Foundation/Winforms applications by adding support for Microsoft Silverlight, HTML 5, Windows Phone 7, and other devices such as an iPhone.
COS208: Building Engaging Apps with Data Using Microsoft Codename “Dallas”
Microsoft Codename “Dallas” enables developers to consume premium commercial and public domain data hosted on SQL Azure to power consumer and business apps on any platform or device. You can provide relevant data to inform business decisions, create visualizations to discover patterns, and increase user engagement with datasets from finance to demographics, and many more. A consistent REST-based API, simple terms of use, and per-transaction billing make consuming data easy. In this session by Adam Wilson, learn how “Dallas” removes the friction for accessing data by enabling you to visually discover, explore, and purchase data of any type, including images, real-time Web services and blobs, through a unified marketplace of trusted partners. We use a variety of “Dallas” datasets to develop Web and mobile applications using technologies such as Microsoft Silverlight 4, Microsoft ASP.NET MVC, and Windows Phone.
Hope to see your there.