Month: January 2012

SQL Azure and Query plans / Performance

By Marcel Meijer

I showed you a while ago the improved SQL Azure management portal. After having nothing in 2008, Project Houston was a great step towards a Cloud only management portal. But December 2011 they renewed the complete SQL Azure management portal. Besides a more Metro look-and-feel they added also some extreme helpful tools and utilities. When clicking on Administration in the lower left corner, you get an overview of your Database health etc. Information about the utilization of your database, connections and users. In this case the database was fairly new and unused, so the query usage is empty. On a … Continue reading SQL Azure and Query plans / Performance

Silverlight vs HTML5

By Marcel Meijer

A fellow MVP once mailed: “I’ve got friends that were heavy into SLdevelopment that now do none. It’s gone from their #1 technology to now being banned for development within their company. What changed? The first time that one of their clients said “now show me how it looks on my iPad” and they had no answer.” I think this counts for every plugin based technology (Flash, Java (to some extend)). The success of the iPad and the combination iPad/Safari shows the vulnerability of tooling that depend on functionality of browser plugin’s. I think it is not wise to advise … Continue reading Silverlight vs HTML5

Windows Azure management via WP7

By Marcel Meijer

At this moment Windows Azure services can be monitored and management via the Windows Azure management portal. But the portal is implemented via Silverlight, which is less accessible with a browser with no support of plugins. The Windows Azure platform has a rich API to support management REST calls to control and manage your services. The API is very helpful to implement tooling on different platforms. There are also PowerShell Cmdlets or Cerebrata Cmdlets to perform most of the management tasks. If you want to use the API from a Windows forms app it is rather simple. Here is a … Continue reading Windows Azure management via WP7

SQL Azure Reporting Preview

By Marcel Meijer

What the Windows Azure platform missed, was an implementation of SQL Server Reporting Services (SSRS). That doesn’t mean reports are not able, there is no service for storing those reports. With Visual Studio 2010 are you able to create a report (RDLC) and this report can connect to a SQL Azure database. By storing the report (RDLC) on Windows Azure storage, you could change the report definition without doing a full deploy of your Windows Azure service. But now SQL Azure Reporting is coming. There already was a CTP available, but now Reporting is avail in a real Preview vorm. … Continue reading SQL Azure Reporting Preview

Office 365 en Mobile

By Marcel Meijer

Office 365 is Microsofts online Office hosted in the Cloud. The previous version was called BPOS (Business Productivity Online Services), but Office 365 contains the latest and greatest versions of the on premise software. With Microsoft Online Services you always work online with the best software of Microsoft for a fixed price per user per month. This service is from verzorgd and the data is in the datacenters of Microsoft also in Ireland and the Netherlands. Microsoft Online Services offers Office 365 (plan P1), for professionals and small organizations, with the following functionalities: Email, agenda and contacts: fast and trusted … Continue reading Office 365 en Mobile

Windows Phone 7

By Marcel Meijer

Since the first appearance of the Windows Phone 7 in the Netherlands I am the proud owner of a HTC Trophy. After that I bought a Samsung Omnia 7 and just a few months ago a Nokia Lumia 800. The biggest difference between the three. The Samsung has the biggest screen. Although it is also a amoled it looks lighter then the Nokia. The pictures does not make it complete clear, but there is a difference in colors between them. Samsung and Nokia are close. For now I like the Nokia more then the others. The Samsung has a better … Continue reading Windows Phone 7