Competing Clouds in Seattle
Move over coffee, Seattle may soon be known for its cloud resources for .NET developers--kind of apropos given the weather.
This week, Amazon Web Services made several announcements that promise to make life easier for .NET developers.
The new AWS SDK for .NET offers libraries, Visual Studio project templates, C# code samples, and documentation in a single download. The .NET libraries are described by the company as "almost identical" to the existing C# and VB.NET libraries. AWS recommends that developers switch to the new SDK to take advantage of ongoing updates and bug fixes.
The AWS SDK can be used with Simple Storage Service, Elastic Compute Cloud (includes CloudWatch, Elastic Load Balancing and Auto Scaling), Simple Queue Service, SimpleDB, Relational Database Service and Virtual Private Cloud. It supports .NET 2.0 (and later) and VS Professional 2008 and higher, VS C# 2008 Express Edition and VS Web Developer 2008 Express Edition.
The company also launched a Windows and .NET Developer Center and a .NET forum.
You can find a great overview of what's come down the pike in the last five years from AWS by reading lead evangelist Jeff Barr's blog.
AWS also announced its plans to expand into Asia Pacific this week with localized data centers, starting in Singapore in Q1 2010. In early November, Microsoft announced plans to open a cloud computing center in Taiwan, in conjunction with the Economic Ministry of Affairs, to facilitate testing and research for regional hardware manufacturers. The memorandum of understanding indicates that the goal is to set up the Software and Services Excellence Center in Taipei by the end of 2009.
Storm chasers take note: AWS' latest Windows and .NET formations typically roll in the week before Microsoft's cloud-related gatherings, in this case PDC09. The commercialization of Windows Azure is expected on Tuesday, although actual billing for services is not slated to start until February 1, 2010, according to Microsoft. Last year, AWS added Windows Server support to EC2 the week prior to PDC08, where Windows Azure was first unveiled.
There's no doubt this cloud competition is beneficial to .NET developers. Is your outlook cloudy? Partly cloudy--on-premises and the cloud? What's on your Web services agenda for 2010? Express your plans and perspectives below or drop me a line at krichards@1105media.com
Posted by Kathleen Richards on 11/13/2009 at 4:55 PM