Azure Functions, Logic Apps, Azure Stack, and .Net come together for the next stage of PaaS both in the cloud and on-premises

Microsoft’s adoption of serverless computing is a big piece of Azure maturing as a platform. There’s a lot going on here, as architectures and services evolve to take advantage of the unique capabilities of the cloud and we as users and developers migrate away from traditional server architectures.

Mark Russinovich, Microsoft’s CTO of Azure, has a distinct view on the evolution of cloud as a platform. “Infrastructure as a service [IaaS] is table stakes,” he said at an Azure Serverless computing event at Microsoft’s Redmond, Wash., headquarters last week, “Platform as a service [PaaS] is the next step, offering runtimes and developing on them, an API and an endpoint, where you consume services.” That’s where we are today, where we still define the resources we use when we build cloud applications.

Then comes serverless computing. “Serverless is the next generation of computing, the point of maximum value,” Russinovich said.

What he’s talking about is abstracting applications from the underlying servers, where code is event-driven and scales on demand, charged by the operation rather than by the resources used. As he said, “I don’t have to worry about the servers. The platform gives me the resources as I need them.” That’s the real definition of serverless computing: The servers and OS are still there, but as a user and a developer you don’t need to care about them.

Serverless computing is the next phase of virtualization

You can look at it as a logical evolution of virtualization. As the public cloud has matured, it’s gone from one relatively simple type of virtual machine and one specific type of underlying hardware to specialized servers that can support IaaS implementations for all kinds of use cases, such as high-performance computing servers with massive GPUs for parallel processing and for scientific computing working with numerical methods, or such as arrays of hundreds of tiny servers powering massive web presences.

That same underlying flexibility powers the current generation of PaaS, where applications and code run independently of the underlying hardware while still requiring you to know what the underlying servers can do. To get the most out of PaaS (that is, to get the right fit for your code), you still need to choose servers and storage.

With serverless computing, you can go a step further, concentrating on only the code you’re running, knowing that it’s ephemeral and you’re using it to process and route data from one source to another application. Microsoft’s serverless implementations have an explicit lifespan, so you don’t rely on them being persistent, only on them being there when you need them. If you try to use a specific instance outside that limited life, you get an error message because the application and its hosting container will be gone.

Three serverless computing models

Nir Mashkowski, principal group manager for Azure App Service, noted three usage patterns for Azure’s serverless offerings.

The first, and most common, pattern is what he calls “brownfield” implementations. They are put together by enterprises as part of an overall cloud application strategy, using Azure Functions and Logic Apps as an integration tool, linking old apps and new and on-premises systems and cloud.

The second pattern is greenfield implementations, which are typically the province of startups, using Azure Functions as part of a back-end platform—that is, as switches and routers moving data from one part of an application to another.

The third pattern is for internet of things applications. It is a combination of the two, using Azure Functions to handle signals from devices, triggering actions in response to specific inputs.

For enterprises wanting a quick on-ramp to serverless computing, Azure Functions’ closely related sibling Logic Apps is an intriguing alternative. Drawing on the same low-code foundations as the more business-focused Flow, it gives you a visual designer with support for conditional expressions and loops. (You can even can run the designer inside Visual Studio.)

Like Azure Functions, Logic Apps is event-triggered and can be used to coordinate a sequence of Azure functions. Wrapping serverless code in a workflow adds more control, especially if it’s used to apply conditions to a trigger—for example, launching one function if a trigger is at the low end of a range of values, another if it’s at the high end.

In the cloud and on-premises: Portable serverless computing

Russinovich described three organizations working with serverless computing:

• Accuweather uses it to handle its server logs, replicating them between datacenters and handing them off to analysis tools.
• Similarly, Plexure, a marketing company, uses it to handle feeds from point-of-sale systems, replacing a complex stack of tools with a workflow that drives information from one service to the next.
• At the other end of the scale, the Missing Children Society of Canada used Logic Apps to build a bot that could bring research about missing kids together from various sources, including social media, in a project that took a mere four days to deliver.

One of the more interesting aspects of both Azure Functions and Logic Apps is that they’re not limited to running purely in the cloud. Functions themselves can be developed and tested locally, with full support in Visual Studio, and both Azure Functions and Logic Apps will be supported by on-premises Azure Stack hybrid cloud systems.

Inside the Azure datacenters, its serverless options are all containerized for rapid deployment. That same model will come to your own servers, with Azure Functions able to run on any server, taking advantage of containers for rapid deployment.

Currently, Azure Functions is based on the full .Net Framework release, so there’s a minimum requirement of Windows Server Core as a host. But that’s going to change over the next few months with an open source release based on .Net Core and the upcoming .Net Standard 2.0 libraries. With those in hand, you’ll be able to run Azure Functions in containers based on Windows Server Nano, as well as on .Net Core running on Linux. You’ll be able to migrate code from on-premises to hybrid cloud and to the public cloud depending on the workload and on the billing model you choose.

Such a cross-platform serverless solution that runs locally and in the cloud starts looking very interesting, giving you the tools to build and test on-premises,then scale up to running on Azure (or even on Linux servers running on Amazon Web Services).

There’s a lot to be said for portability, and by working with REST and JSON as generic input and output bindings, Microsoft’s containerized serverless implementation appears to avoid the cloud lock-in of its AWS and Google competitors while still giving you direct links to Azure services.

By Simon Bisson, source by InfoWorld

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All customers can now access the Azure hybrid use discounts previously limited to companies that had enterprise agreements with Microsoft

IT professionals who want help getting a handle on a potential cloud migration have a new tool from Microsoft. The company is offering a Cloud Migration Assessment service that walks customers through an evaluation of the resources they currently use, in order to determine what a move to the cloud would cost.

Microsoft’s cost calculation is driven in part by the Azure Hybrid Use Benefit, which lets customers apply their existing Windows Server licenses with Software Assurance to virtual machines running in Microsoft’s cloud. That means customers only have to pay the base price for the compute resources they use.

Also starting Wednesday, all customers can invoke the discount from the Azure Management Portal. In the past, this type of deployment of discounted virtual machine images was limited to companies who have enterprise agreements with Microsoft. Others had to use Azure PowerShell to configure the discounts.

The moves are part of Microsoft’s overall push to get its enterprise customers to move more of their workloads from on-premises servers to the Azure public cloud. The tech titan has been emphasizing tools for running hybrid cloud configurations for quite some time.

“In the past year, we’ve seen lots of other vendors also starting to talk about hybrid and realizing that it’s central to the vast majority of organizations’ IT strategies,” Julia White, Microsoft’s corporate vice president for Azure marketing, said. “And this push here, whether it be the migration tools or in general, better amplifying and clarifying our hybrid capabilities, is all in the essence of recognizing that [hybrid] is the approach for most customers, and it needs to be done in a way that can be durable.”

The Cloud Migration Assessment tool lets users manually enter the compute, networking and storage resources that they’re already using, or import the same information from an Excel file that’s either user-composed or generated by the Microsoft Assessment and Planning Toolkit.

Microsoft’s tool takes that information and provides users with a graph that shows them a model for the costs of continuing to run a data center, along with how much they’ll pay for running the same workloads in Azure. The tool offers a set of default assumptions about how much an on-premises deployment costs, but customers who have information about the costs associated with their environment can input those, instead.

In order to get access to the tool, users have to hand over their name, contact information, and the name of their company. Microsoft will use that to follow up with users about their experience, and will also work to connect those companies with partner businesses that can help with migration if that makes sense.

“Much like Microsoft in general, we remain very partner-led,” White said. “And so, when we can match a great partner with a customer that needs them, that’s what we aim to do.”

On top of all this, Microsoft also announced that its Azure Site Recovery migration tool will be updated in the coming weeks so that users can more easily use AHUB discounts when migrating from other environments. When that update goes through, users will be able to “tag” Windows Server VMs that they’re migrating for hybrid use discounts. That may entice people to move their Windows Server virtual machines from AWS and on-premises hardware into Azure by making it easier to do so.

By Blair Hanley Frank, source by InfoWorld

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Public cloud vendors want your workloads forever. Here’s how to create a viable exit strategy

Last month I noted that the big AWS outage proved one cloud isn’t enough. This week, I’d like to go a bit further into the topic and talk about some of the things you can do concretely to embrace the cloud without betting the farm.

It’s not just about outages. Any vendor who has you by the data will eventually extract the maximum value from the relationship. Sometimes the most important question in a business relationship is: “What’s your exit strategy?” Here are my best answers, arranged by cloud type.

For IaaS

1. Use Docker or a similar solution. You should have relocatable containers that you can rebuild and deploy at a whim. This is a critical if you want to protect yourself against lock-in.
2. Avoid direct database integration. OK, your app needs a store, but no two apps should talk to the same operational store. Those sorts of connections and protocols tend to build a house of cards. You can’t move anything until you move the database — but everything goes down once you do, or you end up with a split brain situation.

For IaaS/PaaS

3. Implement API/REST integration. Rest easy that you are connecting over HTTPS and making standard, easily relocatable web calls.
4. Externalize configuration. Don’t hard-code the scheme, server, or domain into your URLs. Anything else that’s environmental should be externalized.
5. Use common APIs. If you’re using NodeJS and Express or other, similar, well-known APIs, then you’re pretty safe from vendor lock-in. If you start using platform-provided services, you’ve got a bigger problem.

For SaaS

6. Ensure there’s a standard method for data export. By that I really mean a way that you could feasibly import your data into another system.
7. Test the method of data export. That they theoretically let you grab a dump of data isn’t really that promising. I’ve seen vendors that offered it, but then the dump feature didn’t actually work on any kind of reasonable timeline and the data was trash by the time it did.
8. Favor solutions with well-known, stable REST APIs. Realistically, you’re not likely to dump, import, and move all in one shot. You may need some custom glue code where you grab and transport.

For everything cloud

9. Favor open source technologies. If the core technology, APIs, and functionality are provided by a healthy open source project, you have a lot better chance of leaving if you need to. This means architectural choices (for example, using Kafka instead of Kinesis).
10. Avoid dependence on unique cloud vendor technology. Sometimes your architectural ties are more process than code. These tend to leak into API calls or other operational management procedures. For instance, maybe you don’t use AWS’ Elastic Map Reduce, because it’s frankly not the greatest financial deal and it’s somewhat flakey. Maybe you just shouldn’t use it because it’s different from what you’d use on any other cloud platform.
11. Use fixed IPs and DNS names tied to your company, not the provider.Using an IP and a DNS name is sort of internet 101. Having virtual instances that go down and come up with a new IP isn’t very resilient not to mention relocatable.
12. Use messaging where possible. If you can do something on more of a message basis, where a service that’s down can be tolerated, do that. It means while you are moving you can forward things somewhere else.
13. Two clouds. As I said before, it is easier to move if you start with at least two different vendors. That’s harder to do with SaaS, but pretty operable with IaaS/PaaS.

The bottom line is that you should favor open source, open standards, and open APIs over vendor-specific solutions. Use microservices architecture or at least the principles thereof. Always maintain your cloud provider exit strategy, and you’ll have a very advantageous relationship with your cloud provider. Always assume your cloud vendor follows the Ferengi Rules of Acquisition.

By  Andrew C. Oliver, source by InfoWorld

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The deal will help Microsoft better support the Google-originated orchestration system

Microsoft is acquiring Deis, a company that makes tools to work with the Kubernetes open-source container orchestration system. The deal, announced Monday, marks Microsoft’s continued interest in container orchestration.

Deis creates tools that aim to simplify the development of modern, containerized applications. Containers allow developers to write an application for an isolated, portable runtime that is supposed to be easily transferrable from a workstation to a server environment.

Tools like Deis’s Workflow, Helm, and Steward are supposed to ease the complex process of managing multi-container applications. They build on top of Kubernetes, the popular open-source container orchestration system that Google released in 2014. Deis plans to continue its contributions to those tools as part of Microsoft, company CTO Gabe Monroy said in a blog post.

Microsoft has invested a great deal already in technology that lets developers create applications that run in Windows and Linux containers. The company expects Deis’ technology to help with the use of those existing tools, according to a blog post by Scott Guthrie, the executive vice president of Microsoft’s Cloud and Enterprise division.

Deis’ Kubernetes expertise will be a key benefit for Microsoft, which has been investing in the popular open-source container orchestration system.

Microsoft acquired the company from Engine Yard, a platform-as-a-service provider that previously purchased Deis in 2015. The companies didn’t disclose the terms of the deal.

The news comes roughly a couple months after Microsoft announced the general availability of Kubernetes in Azure Container Service, its platform-as-a-service offering for containerized applications. Last week, the company also announced the general availability of Azure Container Registry, a service that lets customers store and manage different container images in the cloud.

By  Blair Hanley Frank, source by ComputerWorld

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IBM follows Google and Microsoft in offering hosted Kubernetes as a service, with direct access to the container orchestration system’s APIs

It’s only a matter of time before every major cloud vendor offers a version of Kubernetes as a service. Now it’s IBM’s turn.

This morning IBM announced the next logical step in its work with Docker containers: Kubernetes support on its Bluemix Container Service. Currently available in a limited beta, its feature set should match Google’s and Microsoft’s offerings.

Kubernetes, the Bluemix way

Previously, the default for managing Docker containers on Bluemix Container Service was to spin them up individually by hand or to use Bluemix’s container groups metaphor, where Bluemix directly managed multiple containers running the same image.

Kubernetes is meant to provide several advantages for container deployments: easier scaling, better visibility into the state of a cluster, and so on. IBM says its implementation of Kubernetes on Bluemix includes everything users would expect from a stock Kubernetes deployment, as well as some IBM-specific features.

For example, see how it deploys master nodes, the parts of a cluster that accept commands and delegate them to the other machines in the cluster. IBM claims master nodes in its Kubernetes implementation are “highly available and fully managed by IBM”—presumably in contrast to simply providing and supporting a VM with Kubernetes that’s spun and run by the customer.

Some features for Bluemix Container Service are essentially conventional Docker/Kubernetes features writ large—such as a per-organization Docker private image registry with image scanning and vulnerability detection built in, or support for Kubernetes secrets (API keys and more) when communicating with other Bluemix resources. Other features, like “binding of Bluemix services, such as Watson APIs, Blockchain, data services, or internet of things” to Kubernetes-deployed apps, more prominently promote Bluemix, allowing Kubernetes-powered apps plug into Bluemix-exclusive services.

Why mess with a good thing?

IBM arrives late to a party that already includes Google and Microsoft. Google has had a leg up on everyone else in offering Kubernetes as a service because it invented the underlying technology. It also worked to Google’s advantage that its public cloud was relatively sparse; it could provide Kubernetes support on its cloud without having to make concessions to many legacy components.

Microsoft late last year added Kubernetes for its container services, after originally supporting Docker Swarm and Mesosphere DC/OS as orchestration solutions. Microsoft delayed its entry because a lot of behind-the-scenes work was needed to add Kubernetes support to Azure and to open-source that work. Kubernetes clusters themselves are provisioned and managed on Azure by way of a QuickStart template, rather than a dedicated managed service.

Amazon’s ECS (EC2 Container Services) doesn’t have a dedicated Kubernetes service; instead it offers a more general Docker as a service, with orchestration and scheduling provided by ECS itself, or through the Blox projects.

Though late to the party, IBM is taking one crucial step for any cloud incarnation of an open source service: It’s allowing the user to lift the hood and plug directly into the original API set. That’s important with cloud container services like Kubernetes, since the promise of a cloud built from open components was that workloads wouldn’t become dependent on the clouds where they’re hosted.

Granted, IBM—or any cloud provider—could try to make a strong case for its cloud versus someone else’s by promoting how well Kubernetes runs at scale on its cloud and works with the proprietary services to enrich those applications. But having Kubernetes at the core and in a form others know is still the most worthwhile draw.

By Serdar Yegulalp, source by InfoWorld

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SaaS and PaaS are still the stars, though, and its cloud is still dwarfed by AWS’ revenue

Oracle’s third quarter financial results continue to show that the company’s future is in the cloud. On Wednesday, the company reported massive growth in its software- and platform-as-a-service businesses, promising further gains as its customers do away with their data centers.

The company’s SaaS and PaaS revenue from December 2016 through February 2017 was a little over $1 billion, up from $583 million during the same period a year prior. Its infrastructure-as-a-service business brought in $178 million during the same period, bringing the company’s total cloud revenue for the quarter to almost $1.2 billion.

IaaS lets customers rent raw compute power for the applications they’re building. PaaS offerings are tailored for particular tasks and include products like Oracle’s Exadata Database Cloud Service, IT Analytics Cloud, Business Intelligence Cloud and Internet of Things Cloud.

All together, the cloud offerings added up to 13 percent of Oracle’s $9.2 billion in total quarterly revenue, up from $9 billion during the same period a year ago. Oracle’s total profit for the quarter was roughly $2.2 billion, up from about $2.1 billion.

Blair Hanley-Frank

One of the major stories coming out of the enterprise tech titan’s financial report on Wednesday is its high expectations for its cloud infrastructure services. Oracle CEO Safra Catz told financial analysts on a conference call that the company’s IaaS business is expected to grow 25 percent to 29 percent year over year, not accounting for an expected negative impact from foreign exchange rates.

That expected growth is driven by interest in IaaS products from Oracle PaaS customers, Catz said. If the company comes through on that promise, it would be a massive spike in growth for a business that has seen steady but unimpressive sales gains over the past year.

Customers may be more interested now than before in part because of the company’s Bare Metal Cloud infrastructure offering, introduced at its OpenWorld conference in San Francisco last year. It’s designed to provide customers with the ability to purchase high-performance compute resources from Oracle data centers.

That service is a key part of Oracle’s plan to compete against the bigger players in the cloud industry like Amazon Web Services, Microsoft, IBM and Google Cloud Platform. Oracle Chairman and CTO Larry Ellison called out AWS specifically in the company’s earnings press release on Wednesday.

“Our new Gen2 IaaS is both faster and lower-cost than Amazon Web Services. And now our biggest customers can run their largest and most demanding Oracle database workloads in the Oracle Cloud — something that is absolutely impossible to do in the Amazon Cloud,” he said.

Drawing direct price comparisons between Oracle Bare Metal Cloud and AWS is difficult, since the companies don’t offer comparable virtual or physical machine shapes.

But Oracle has to deal with reality: Amazon’s latest earnings report showed AWS’s quarterly revenue was more than $3.5 billion, up 47 percent year over year. It’s not a perfect comparison, given the strength of Oracle’s cloud SaaS business and Amazon’s lack of competing products in the ERP, HCM and CRM sector.

But it does highlight one of the major issues with Oracle’s offering: The company’s marquee IaaS offering is late to the game. Even its first-generation Oracle Compute Cloud has only been on the market since 2015. Compare that to AWS’ Elastic Compute Cloud (EC2), which launched in 2006.

One of the key issues with the Bare Metal Cloud offering is geographic reach. Right now, it’s only available from a single region, the U.S. southwest. Oracle has promised additional (and increasingly rapid) expansion of its physical footprint.

Meanwhile, AWS has 16 cloud regions, Azure has 34, and Google has 6. All of those providers have plans to launch several more over the course of this year. (It’s not a perfect comparison, since Oracle’s first-generation IaaS offering is available in other regions and competitors like Azure don’t strictly follow Oracle’s model of three availability domains per region.)

Broad geographic availability is important for reducing application latency for customers outside the U.S., in addition to satisfying data residency compliance requirements for customers in other countries.

Oracle CTO Larry Ellison said that he expects increased cloud growth over the next five years as the company’s database customers continue to move away from on-premises technology deployments.

By Blair Hanley Frank, source by ComputerWorld

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