Tag: paas

Devops Invades with PaaS & CloudFoundry

I have jumped head first into CloudFoundry over the last few weeks. In doing so I’ve started working with AppFog, IronFoundry, VMware and other devops tools.  There are several avenues I’m taking to get more familiar with CloudFoundry based PaaS technology. Here’s a short review:

Writing

I started writing a series which is being published by New Relic around “Removing the Operating System Barrier with Platform as a Service“.  Part 1 is live NOW – so go give it a read!  🙂

Working

Currently I’ve been working up some Enterprise Prototypes using the IronFoundry Technology. The idea is to provide a seamless deployment option for Enterprises that may have a very mixed environment of public and private computing options, virtual and non-virtualized environments, and any array of other capabilities. I’ve also been toying around with Windows 2008 Server Core, which I’ll have more about shortly.

Public Cloud AppFog

AppFog provides a public facing PaaS supporting PHP, Ruby on Rails, Java, MongoDB and a lot of other packages. They’re currently in beta right now, which I was fortunate enough to snag access to, but I’m sure the covers will come off soon enough! The underlying technology is built on CloudFoundry, providing a robust, scalable, and capable infrastructure connection to provide PaaS on.

In addition to AppFog there is the CloudFoundry.com offering, which I’ve tested out a little bit, but mostly focused on AppFog and on building out…

Private Cloud Capabilities w/ Public Cloud Style Infrastructure

I’ve built out some images to test out how CloudFoundry and IronFoundry works. I did pull down the provided virtual machines but I’m also building out my own to understand it better. The Ruby + C# that I’ve seen from the VMware crew & Tier 3 team has been great so far (I always dig reading some solid code).

That’s it for this short review, more to come, and let me know what you think of my entry “Removing the Operating System Barrier with Platform as a Service” over on New Relic’s Blog.

PaaS Help! Know any PaaS Providers?

I’ve been diligent and started a search of Platform as a Service Providers, so far my list includes:

  • EngineYard
  • Heroku
  • AWS Beanstalk
  • Windows Azure
  • AppFog
  • Tier3
  • CloudFoundry
  • OpenShift
  • IBM PaaS
  • Google App Engine
  • CloudBees

Who else is there? Help me out in creating a list of every possible offering we can find!  Cheers! Please leave a comment or three below with any I’ve missed.  Thanks!

Git Rid of Windows Azure and Amazon Web Services (AWS) SDKs with .NET + Git + AppHarbor Deployment Revolution

I’ve been wanting to do a quick write up on the state of cloud apps from my perspective.  What’s my perspective?  Well I’m keeping up with  the SDKs from the big players; AWS and Windows Azure.  I’m also working on several cloud applications and providing consulting for some people and companies when approached related to which stack to go with, how to apply their current stacks (such as Ruby on Rails or .NET) in migrating to a cloud service provider.  Cloud services, or really more accurately utility computing has my personal and professional interest.  Above all, I keep trying to stay informed and know what the best path is for anyone that seeks my advice for moving into hosting & working in the SaaS, PaaS, or IaaS Space.  Feel free to contact me in regards to cloud questions:  adronhall at the famous gmail dot com.  🙂

Now on to the good tidbits that have been released lately.

The latest Microsoft goodies area available.  For the Windows Azure SDK go check out the Microsoft MSDN Site.

For the latest awesome from AWS (Amazon Web Services) SDK check out the AWS .NET Site.

These two SDKs are great for customers who want to build on the bare bones X platform.  Now whatever language & stack one builds in they are tied to that.  Ruby on Rails, .NET, Java, PHP, or whatever.  But getting tied to the stack is kind of like breathing air, one has to live with what air they have.  You can’t exactly get a refund very easily on that.

The Cloud SDKs though for Azure & AWS provide a certain amount of lock in, in addition to the stack lock in you’re using.  One of the easiest ways to prevent this lock in is to use a general deployment method backed by source control on something like Git or Mercurial.  So far though, .NET has been left out the cold.  There has been almost zero support for pushing .NET via Git or Mercurial into a cloud.

Heroku
Heroku

Ruby on Rails however has had support for this since…  well since the idea popped into the minds of the people at Heroku, EngineYard, and the other companies that are pushing this absolutely amazing and powerful technology pairing.

Engine Yard
Engine Yard

Again, for .NET, the problem is it has been left in the dust.  Smoked.  It has left a lot of .NET Developers moving to Ruby on Rails (which isn’t new, this is just one more thing that has pulled more developers away from the .NET stack).

 

Well, that’s changed a bit.  FINALLY someone has gotten the Git + .NET Pairing in the Cloud put together!  FINALLY you can get a cloud application running in a minute or two, instead of the absolutely inane amount of time it takes on Windows Azure (15+ minutes most of the time).  So who has done something about this?

AppHarbor is the first fully deployable solution for the cloud that allows Git + .NET to get going FAST!  I don’t work for these guys at all, so don’t think I’m shilling for them.  I’m just THAT happy that .NET has been pulled out of the dust bins and the community has this option.  I am flippin’ stoked matter of fact.

Currently, because of pricing and ease of deployment, I’ve been solely using AWS.  I can have a .NET MVC app running in AWS in about 5-10 minutes.  Between that speed of setup and the pricing, I pay 2/3 as much as Azure would be and can deploy much fast with a completely traditional .NET deployment.  No special project type needed, no extra configs, just a straight deployment with full control over the server (i.e. I can RDP in with no problem).  Anyway, the list of reasons I went with AWS over Azure really deserve an entire blog entry unto themselves.

AppHarbor
AppHarbor

With AppHarbor though I can step into the realm of doing exactly the same thing a Ruby on Rails Developer would do with Heroku or EngineYard.  Fully PaaS Capable with the scalability and features without needing to port or migrate to an entirely new stack!  I’ll probably keep a number of things running on AWS (such as the pending WordPress Websites I am about to push up to AWS), but will absolutely be starting up some applications to run in AppHarbor.

If you’re a .NET Developer and you’ve been wanting, looking for, and frustrated that the .NET Community didn’t have a Git + Cloud Deployment option for .NET, wait no longer.  Give AppHarbor a look ASAP!

Anyway… off to do a little work on my infrastructure project.  Cheers!

A Short Introduction to Windows Azure AppFabric

Windows Azure AppFabric is arguably the main feature set that truly sets Windows Azure apart from any cloud services on the market today. The AppFabric allows cloud users to hookup on-premises services to their cloud services, to secure cloud & on-premises services with new or existing security frameworks (identity based, active directory, or otherwise), cache Internet or other content, and on top of all that build out and enable composite application integration.

At the same time that Windows Azure AppFabric is one of the main features that sets Windows Azure apart from the competition, it is often one of the most misunderstood or unknown parts of the entire offering. In this chapter I’ll cover the main parts of the AppFabric including the service bus, access control, caching, integration, and patterns for integrating composite applications.

Home of Windows Azure AppFabric

The first thing to do in order to begin building with the Windows Azure AppFabric is to download the SDK, check out the various Windows Azure AppFabric Sites and familiarize yourself with what it is and how it works into the Windows Azure Platform.

The main web presence is located at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsazure/AppFabric/Overview/default.aspx

Windows Azure AppFabric Site
Windows Azure AppFabric Site

On the main site you will primarily find a marketing presence, but with links to many locations with useful architectural, development, and related technical information.  On the left hand side of the site there is a navigation bar that provides access to specific information describing the service bus, access control, and other features of the Windows Azure AppFabric.

The next major web presence that is extremely useful for Windows Azure AppFabric is the Windows Azure AppFabric Team Blob. It is located at http://blogs.msdn.com/b/windowsazureappfabric/. This site is regularly updated with development tips, patterns and practices, related MVP and Microsoft Enangelist links, updates on the SDK, CTPs, and other technical information.

The last major link that should be reviewed and checked often in relation to Windows Azure AppFabric Development is the Windows Azure AppFabric Developers’ Center located at http://msdn.microsoft.com/en-us/windowsazure/appfabric.aspx. Next to the blog, which often links to this page, this site is probably the most useful in relation to AppFabric Development. There are headlines, quick starts, and other documentation related to AppFabric Development with Ruby, Java, and other languages and technology stacks.

I don’t want to provide a direct link to the SDK. The reason is that Microsoft’s method for tracking and providing download links to SDKs, CTPs, and other related software often changes. The best way to find the current download location for the Windows Azure AppFabric SDK is to use a search engine and enter the keywords “Windows Azure AppFabric SDK” (click the link as I setup the search for you). The first links provided will get you to the current location to download the SDK & other related files discussed below.

As of the current v1.0 release of the SDK there are several downloads that are matched along with it for documentation and samples. There is also a specific WindowsAzureAppFabricSDK-x64.msi and a WindowsAzureAppFabricSDK-x86.msi.  Each of these are different and specific to the 32 or 64 bit architecture. Along with the SDK there is a v1.0 C# and Visual Basic file available for download that includes multiple examples of how Windows Azure AppFabric works. The last file that is included with the Windows Azure AppFabric download page is the WindowsAzureAppFabric.chm. This is simply a documentation file for the Windows Azure AppFabric SDK.

What Exactly is Windows Azure AppFabric?

Windows Azure AppFabric can be seen as the all encompassing fabric that interconnects on-premises solutions to Windows Azure solutions, and even Windows Azure solution to other solutions within the cloud. Windows Azure AppFabric is broken down into two main feature offerings simply called the service bus and access control. Some new features are coming online in the very near future; the main one I’ll discuss is the Windows Azure AppFabric Caching.

Windows Azure AppFabric
Windows Azure AppFabric

That’s all I have right now, and would love any feedback on things I should mention, discuss or otherwise add to this write up.  I’m thinking of using it as an intro to AppFabric in some of the pending presentations I have coming up.  So please throw in some feedback on what else you might like.  -thanks

Windows Azure Web, Worker, and CGI Roles – How They Work

This is a write up I’ve put together of how the roles in Windows Azure work.  As far as I know, this is all correct – but if there are any Windows Azure Team Members out there that wouldn’t mind providing some feedback about specifics or adding to the details I have here – please do add comments!  🙂

Windows 2008 and Hyper-V

Windows Azure is built on top of Windows 2008 & Hyper-V. Hyper-V provides virtualization to the various instance types and allocation of resources to those instances. Windows 2008 provides the core operating system functionality for those systems and the Windows Azure Platform Roles and Storage.

The hypervisor that a Hyper-V installation implements does a few unique things compared to many of the other virtualization offerings in the industry. Xen (The Open Source Virtualization Software that Amazon Web Services use) & VMWare both use a shared resource model for utilization of physical resources within a system. This allows for more virtualized instances to be started per physical machine, but can sometimes allow hardware contention. On the other hand Hyper-V pins a particular amount of resources to a virtualized instance, which decreases the number of instances allowed on a physical machine. This enables Hyper-V to prevent hardware contention though. Both designs have their plusses and minuses and in cloud computing these design choices are rarely evident. The context however is important to know when working with high end computing within the cloud.

Windows Azure Fabric Controller

The Windows Azure Fabric Controller is kind of the magic glue that holds all the pieces of Windows Azure together. The Azure Fabric Controller automates all of the load balancing, switches, networking, and other networking configuration. Usually within an IaaS environment you’d have to setup the load balancer, static IP address, internal DNS that would allow for connection and routing by the external DNS, the switch configurations, configuring the DMZ, and a host of other configuration & ongoing maintenance is needed. With the Windows Azure Platform and the Fabric Controller, all of that is taken care of entirely. Maintenance for these things goes to zero.

The Windows Azure Fabric Controller has several primary tasks: networking, hardware, and operating system management, service modeling, and life cycle management of systems.

The low level hardware that the Windows Azure Fabric Controller manages includes switches, load balancers, nodes, load balancers, and other network elements. In addition it manipulates the appropriate internal DNS and other routing needed for communication within the cloud so that each URI is accessed seamlessly from the outside.

The service modeling that the fabric controller provides is a to map the topology of services, port usage, and as mentioned before the internal communication within the cloud. All of this is done by the Fabric Controller without any interaction other than creating an instance or storage service within Windows Azure.

The operating system management from the Fabric Controller involves patching the operating system to assure that security, memory and storage, and other integral operating system features are maintained and optimized. This allows the operating system to maintain uptime and application performance characteristics that are optimal.

Finally the Fabric Controller has the responsibility for service life cycle. This includes updates and configuration changes for domains and fault domains. The Fabric Controller does so in a way to maintain uptime for the services.

Each role has at least one instance running. A role however can have multiple instances, with a theoretically limitless number. In this way, the Fabric Controller, if an instance stops responding is recycled and a new instance takes over. This can sometimes take several minutes, and is a core reason behind the 99.99% uptime SLA requiring two instances within a role to be running. In addition to this the instance that is recycled is rebuilt from scratch, thus destroying any data that would be stored on the role instance itself. This is when Windows Azure Storage plays a pivotal role in maintaining Windows Azure Cloud Applications.

Web Role

The Windows Azure Web Role is designed as a simply to deploy IIS web site or services hosting platform feature. The Windows Azure Web Role can provide hosting for any .NET related web site such as; ASP.NET, ASP.NET MVC, MonoRails, and more.

The Windows Azure Web Role is provides this service hosting with a minimal amount of maintenance required. No routing or load balancing setup is needed; everything is handled by the Windows Azure Fabric Controller.

Uses: Hosting ASP.NET, ASP.NET MVC, MonoRails, or other .NET related web site in a managed, high uptime, highly resilient, controlled environment.

Worker Role

A worker role can be used to host any number of things that need to pull, push, or run continuously without any particular input. A service role can be used to setup a schedule or other type of service. This provides a role dedicated to what could closely be compared to a Windows Service. The options and capabilities of a Worker Role however vastly exceed a simple Windows Service.

CGI Role

This service role is designed to allow execution of technology stacks such as Ruby on Rails, PHP, Java, and other non-Microsoft options.

Windows Azure Storage

Windows Azure Storage is broken into three distinct features within the service. Windows Azure provides tables, blob, and queue for storage needs. Any of the Windows Azure Roles can also connect to the storage to maintain data across service lifecycle reboots, refreshes, and any temporary loss of a Windows Azure Role.

A note about Windows Azure Storage compared to most Cloud Storage Providers: None of the Azure Storage Services are “eventually consistent”. When a write is done, it is instantly visible to all subsequent readers. This simplifies coding but slows down the data storage mechanisms more than eventually consistent data architectures.

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