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Maybe google just knows me too well, but searching for “cloud” points me to answers about “cloud computing” before the fluffy stuff in the sky. Does this order apply to how our clients think as well? I don’t expect so, though I’ll be glad enough to stand corrected. Some definitions of “Cloud” that may prevail for many ...

It was pointed out to me recently that my critical position on SQL Data Services and support for Azure in general are inconsistent, so I thought that a bit of clarification is required. SQL Server is my database of choice and have been using it since version 4.21, which was long before it became mainstream and I even spent a couple of years on ...

In the battle of the public vs private clouds, the lines have been drawn between those that offer infrastructure for use in existing data centres and those that offer platforms and services in their own data centres.  The discussions, while technically based, are philosophical, passionate, opinionated and about the market laggards trying to ...

As much as I avidly support cloud technologies and as much as I prefer using SQL Server, I can’t come up with a convincing reason to use or recommend SQL Data Services. SDS simply has no compelling (or obvious) business case. The reason for this is a limitation built in to SDS of a database size from 5GB-10GB, with a promise from Microsoft that ...

This week Google announced immediate support for Java on AppEngine. While not surprising it does thrown down the gauntlet for PaaS (Platform as a Service) competitors such as Microosft’s Azure.  Technical details aside, there is a lot of Java code out there, a lot of Java developers and a whole new market to persue. A big part of Microsoft’s ...

The majority of .NET developers are web developers and web development definitely has complexity in terms the required breadth of technologies that a developer needs to master - html, css, javascript, database, and a whole host of other technical jiggery-pokery that needs to be dealt with.  However, even though there usually at least three ...

There is no doubt that SQL Data Services (SDS) looks, feels and smells very different to the SQL Server that we have grown accustomed to over the years.  The model is obviously different but there is little formal and clear description by Microsoft on what that model is – the pros and cons and the reasons for the change within the context of ...

SQL Server Data Services (SSDS) and Live Mesh are the two technologies that are uppermost in my mind at the moment. [My thoughts on SSDS are here and on Live Mesh here.] Hence then it didn't take me long to start wondering about the value of the two of them being integrated together. SSDS is a data storage platform and Live Mesh is a data ...

From Amazon SimpleDB documentation: Eventual Consistency Amazon SimpleDB keeps multiple copies of each domain. When data is written or updated [...] and Success is returned, all copies of the data are updated. However, it takes time for the update to propagate to all storage locations. The data will eventually be consistent, ...

Have you noticed yet that I'm getting excited about SSDS? More information is trickling out about SSDS day by day. Yesterday there was a presentation on SSDS at MIX08 by Nigel Ellis which was more in-depth than anything I'd seen or heard before because it talks about the underlying architecture that will be supporting this. Take this typical ...