Microsoft Azure: Your Window to the Cloud of opportunities

Being located centrally, yet being present globally is the unspoken rule at most organizations, and hence, to maintain their success, these organizations have put all their faith into Cloud Solutions, and have been reaping dividends. 

One of the major proponents of Cloud services in the world today, is Microsoft. With AZURE, their cloud-based Application platform, providing users a Cloud Operating System, integration with .NET services, and database services (SQL Azure), Microsoft has turned the tide in its favor by giving its users a plethora of cloud-based benefits to enjoy.

So, let’s take a look into the Azure framework and the assurance that it provides to users worldwide.

What is Microsoft Azure?

Azure, launched in February 2010, is Microsoft’s cloud-computing infrastructure and platform. Owing to its robust nature, Azure can be used as both PaaS (Platform-as-a-Service) and IaaS (Infrastructure-as-a-service). Most cloud services provided by other organizations mainly serve as an IaaS, which means that companies can gain access to infrastructure (Physical Hardware – power, networking and cooling) present in a data center. Azure provides the infrastructure facility as well as serving as a Platform to develop, deploy and manage applications. As mentioned above, Azure offers customizable Cloud OS, database, web servers and coding environments, in addition to integration with other Microsoft services like Visual Studio and .NET platforms.

Since February 2010, Azure has gone through a variety of changes and is now equipped to serve a range of diverse requests. 

• Building Websites: Developing a site while making use of a variety of web application and launch frameworks(asp.net) or open source options like WordPress. 

• Virtual Machines: If one requires additional computing capacity but doesn’t wish to overcrowd their own datacenter, they can use Azure services to run virtual machines on the cloud that house either Windows or Linux OS. 

• Mobile services: Azure employs features that radically quicken mobile application development. Coupled with it being open source (and Windows removing the mandatory requirement of having a “live” profile to access Microsoft applications), authentication is achieved through other Social Media channel accounts.

• Big Data: Azure can also be used to provide a platform for data warehousing and improving business analytics through BI (Intelligence) solutions involving enormous data amounts (Exabytes, Petabytes).

What are the Benefits of employing Azure as the Cloud Solution?

The Benefits of Azure can be broadly grouped into two categories – Technical and Organizational.

TECHNICAL:

• Azure has recently incorporated the Linux OS into its realms, but it remains primarily a windows-based tool. Because the majority of developers are highly familiar with the Windows OS and Windows-Based technologies (Visual Studio, ASP.NET), and owing to the fact that Azure mirrors a regular Windows environment, it remains an extremely popular choice for cloud based operations. 

• Azure has its own SDK complete with storage facilities. This gives developers the option to work and debug an application locally, before shifting to cloud.

• Azure is scalable and flexible. The applications created using Azure provide flexible accessibility to users that number even in the millions. Once an application is developed, the amount of processors that the application would use can be specified. But the scalability of Azure lets developers change that number as and when the need arises.

• The interoperability of Azure with other on-location applications enables the latter to use all available cloud services – like storage and communication. Since Open-ended platforms and Internet protocols are integral to Azure, it supports applications of all languages (Ruby, PHP and Java). 

• Security of the web applications is one of the primary reasons behind the Azure Design. The .NET ACS (Access Control Services) in association with the SAML (Security Assertion Markup Language) offer various means to allocate identities and defining access control rules and lists.

ORGANIZATIONAL

Quicker marketing timeline: Azure takes care of providing the infrastructure and platforms necessary to build robust applications. Hence, the only onerous on the companies is to build the application, thereby giving them enough time to market their application effectively.

Reduced Charges: Companies pay only for what they use, and when they use it. This greatly decreases the costs to be paid up front. Also, Microsoft offers a host of concessions to their consumers. This, too, reduces the incurred costs, in case the entire platform was hosted by the organization.

More scope for creativity: The quick deployment time on the Azure platform signifies that the changes are made and applied without any stoppages. Functionalities can be added on the go and changes can be made to scale. 

Taking cognizance of all the functionalities and benefits of the Azure platform, it is very easy to note why in just within 4 years of its launch, Azure has become the number one choice for organizations worldwide when it comes to Cloud Solutions. 

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