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As mentioned in the previous post announcing the Windows Azure AppFabric CTP October Release, we've just introduced Windows Azure AppFabric Caching, which provides a distributed, in-memory cache, implemented as a cloud service. 

Earlier this year we delivered Windows Server AppFabric Caching, which is our distributed caching solution for on-premises applications.  But what do you do if you want this capability in your cloud applications?  You could set up a caching technology on instances in the cloud, but you would end up installing, configuring, and managing your cache server instances yourself.  That really defeats one of the main goals of the cloud - to get away from managing all those details.

So as we looked for a caching solution in Windows Azure AppFabric, we wanted to deliver the same capabilities available in Windows Server AppFabric Caching, and in fact the same developer experience and APIs for Windows Azure applications, but in a way that provides the full benefit of cloud computing.  The obvious solution was to deliver Caching as a service. 

To start off, let's look at how you set up a cache. First you'll need to go to the Windows Azure AppFabric LABS environment developer portal (https://portal.appfabriclabs.com/ ) to set up a Project, and under that a Service Namespace. Then you simply click the "Cache" link to configure a cache for this namespace.

With no sweat on your part you now have a distributed cache set up for your application.  We take care of all the work of configuring, deploying, and maintaining the instances. 

The next screen gives you the Service URL for your cache and an Authentication token you can copy and paste into your application to grant it access to the cache. 

So how do you use Caching in your application?

First, the caching service comes with out-of-the-box ASP.NET providers for both session state and page output caching.  This makes it extremely easy to leverage these providers to quickly speed up your existing ASP.NET applications by simply updating your web.config files.  We even give you the configuration elements in the developer portal (see above) that you can cut and paste into your web.config files. 

You can also programmatically interact with the cache to store and retrieve data, using the same familiar API used in Windows Server AppFabric Caching.  The typical pattern used is called cache-aside, which simply means you check first if the data you need is in the cache before going to the database.  If it's in the cache, you use it, speeding up your application and alleviating load on the database.  If the data is not in the cache, you retrieve it from the database and store it in the cache so its available next the application needs it.

The delivery of Caching as a service can be seen as our first installment on the promise of AppFabric - to provide a consistent infrastructure for building and running applications whether they are running on-premises or in the cloud. You can expect more cross-pollination between Windows Server AppFabric and Windows Azure AppFabric in the future.

We invite you to play with the Caching CTP and give us feedback on how it works for you and what features you would like to see added.  One great way to give feedback is to fill out this survey on your distributed caching usage and needs.

As we move towards commercial launch, we'll look to add many of the features that make Windows Server AppFabric Caching extremely popular, such as High Availability, the ability to emit notifications to clients when they need to refresh their local cache, and more.

Today we are announcing the Windows Azure AppFabric CTP October Release, available in our LABS environment: https://portal.appfabriclabs.com.   

This release introduces an exciting new service called Windows Azure AppFabric Caching, some important new features for Service Bus, and some bug fixes for Access Control.  The Caching service is the first of several new services planned for AppFabric, several of which are being announced at PDC today. 

Taken together these new services take Windows Azure AppFabric beyond the scope of providing cloud connectivity and start to fulfill the vision of a comprehensive cloud middleware platform for developing, deploying and managing applications on the Windows Azure Platform.  You can learn more about Windows Azure AppFabric, including the new services announced today at PDC, on our new website - www.microsoft.com/appfabric/azure.

Here are the highlights of the release:

Caching: Windows Azure AppFabric Caching is a distributed, in-memory cache for applications running in Windows Azure. 

• It can significantly speed up access to data for your Windows Azure applications.
• It is delivered as a cloud service, so it's simple and requires no administration on your part to setup or maintain.
• It is based off of Windows Server AppFabric Caching capabilities, which means it is proven and uses a familiar programming model.

Service Bus: In this release we are introducing some new enhancements to the Service Bus:

• Durable Messaging - This gives larger storage capacity, larger message size, and durable persistence to Message Buffers.
• Load balancing - We now allow multiple listeners on the same connection point, which provides for load balancing solutions with no single point of failure.
• Improved Management- All management operations (for both Message Buffers and Connection Points) are now explicit, the management store is persistent and management data can be accessed through Atom Publishing Protocol / REST.

Note: this release of Service Bus is focused on getting feedback in these new features and does not support the full set of features available in production today.  We will be adding all of the production features back together with the new features in a future CTP release in LABS before releasing the full updated Service Bus to production.

Access Control: This release contains only bug fixes for Access Control; no new functionality added since the LABS September Release.                                                                                                                                                 

Keep in mind that in the LABS environment there is no SLA, but accounts and usage of the services are free.  As always, we encourage you to check it out and let us know what you think of the new features.

The Windows Azure AppFabric Team

When:

    START: October 26, 2010, 8 am PST

    END:  October 28, 2010, 11 am PST

 Impact Alert:

  The AppFabric LABS environment (Service Bus, Access Control and portal) will be unavailable during this period. Additional impacts are described below.

Action Required:

Existing accounts and Service Namespaces will be available after the services are deployed.

You will have an additional -mgmt entry as follows:

Your ns.sb.AppFabricLabs.com will remain ns.sb.AppFabricLabs.com and an additional entry and corresponding relying party will be created as ns-mgmt.sb.AppFabricLabs.com

However, ACS Identity Providers, Rule Groups, Relying Parties, Service Keys, and Service Identities will NOT be persisted and restored after the maintenance. As the service will not support the bulk upload of rules from the previous version, the user will be responsible for both backing up and restoring any rules they care to reuse after the Windows Azure AppFabric LABS October Release.

Thank you for working in LABS and giving us valuable feedback.  Once the update becomes available, we'll post the details via this blog. 

Stay tuned for the upcoming LABS release! 

The Windows Azure AppFabric Team

In addition to addressing several deployment scenarios for 64-bit computers, Windows Azure AppFabric now enables integration of WCF services that use AppFabic Service Bus endpoints in IIS 7.5, with Windows® Server AppFabric. You can leverage Windows® Server AppFabric functionality to configure and monitor method invocations for the Service Bus endpoints.

Note that the name of the installer has changed:

·         Old Name:

WindowsAzureAppFabricSDK.msi

·         New names:

WindowsAzureAppFabricSDK-x64.msi

 WindowsAzureAppFabricSDK-x86.msi

Any automated deployment scripts you might have built that use the previous name will need to be updated to use the new naming. No other installer option has changed.

The Windows Azure AppFabric SDK September Release is available here for download.

The Windows Azure AppFabric Team

This release builds on the prior August release of the Access Control Service, and adds the following features:

·        Support for OAuth 2.0 Web Server and assertion profiles (https://tools.ietf.org/html/draft-ietf-oauth-v2-10)

·        Additional support for X.509 certificate authentication via WS-Trust and Service Identities

·        The ability to map Identity Providers to Relying Parties

·        Several updates to the Management Web Portal:

o   Upload a WS-Fed Metadata file through the portal

o   Additional fields uploading encrypting and decrypting certificates

o   Expanded support for machine keys (password, symmetric key, and X.509) and creation of valid usage dates

We’ve also added some more documentation and updated samples on our CodePlex project: https://acs.codeplex.com.

For more information about the Access Control Service, see the Channel 9 video at https://channel9.msdn.com/shows/Identity/Introducing-the-new-features-of-the-August-Labs-release-of-the-Access-Control-Service.

Like always, I encourage you to check it out and let the team know what you think.

The Windows Azure AppFabric Team

When:

    START: September 16, 2010, 10am PST

    END:  September 16, 2010, 6pm PST

Impact Alert:

    The AppFabric LABS environment (Service Bus, Access Control and portal) will be unavailable during this period. Additional impacts are described below.

Action Required:

Existing accounts and Service Namespaces will be available after the services are deployed.

However, ACS Identity Providers, Rule Groups, Relying Parties, Service Keys, and Service Identities will NOT be persisted and restored after the maintenance. Users will need independently back up their data if they wish to restore them after the Windows Azure AppFabric LABS September Release.

Thanks for working in LABS and giving us valuable feedback.  Once the update becomes available, we’ll post the details via this blog. 

Stay tuned for the upcoming LABS release!

The Windows Azure AppFabric Team

Adding a Ws2007HttpRelayBinding endpoint that uses TransportWithMessageCredential security mode to a ServiceHost that also exposes a local MEX endpoint (not visible through the Service Bus) using the mexHttpsBinding, causes the local MEX endpoint to stop working. Invoking the MEX endpoint results in an InvalidOperationException.

The fix is included in the updated SDK download.  If you are not experiencing this bug, there is no need to download the new version of the SDK.

The Windows Azure AppFabric Team