When will more data centre's around the globe become available?

Question

Hi,

I finally got my invite code and the setup side of things is well documented and was quite easy. Gave me a good reason to change datatypes such as Image's to Varbinary's and etc plus review the dB's Indexing.  The only bad user experience I got was a blank white screen as Todd Anglin pointed out each time I tried to login... all of yesterday morning, but seems that's been fixed.


I read you dont have any SLA on for perf metrics and this is something being looking into. In this CTP period its pretty important for us to see the advantages of having multiple data centre's to get a feel for how powerful Azure is as a CDN. Is there currently only one data centre? and is this in South Central USA?


The windows application I built and have setup to work with SQL Azure in this trial period isn't hosted on the cloud. It takes approx 10 seconds to save and open windows. Seeing there appears to be only one data centre (and I live the other side of the world to it, down under) I cannot get a accurate indication of what the speeds will be like when the 100 or so data centre's go live? Can you give us a rough ETA when more data centre's become available around the globe? A list per country would be fantastic.

The next version of my application I plan on doing in Silverlight but am concerned if I allow it to be run OutOfBrowser (as many of our customers dont want their staff to be on the internet all day) perf will suffer and this makes us question whether running an app locally  against a cloud based database is a good idea?

I'd really like to hear others thoughts on the "Code Near vs Code Far" scenario, and if there is any gain in SQL Azure if your not running your app in the cloud.

Cheers

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Jeremy - MCP | MCAD.Net | MCSD.Net

Answer 1

Hello,
About data centers - read this article: http://news.softpedia.com/news/Windows-Azure-to-Launch-in-21-Markets-in-November-2009-116944.shtml
I don't kwno why is it so hard to find on MS sites, but anyway - it gives an idea where there will be DataCenters.
After PDC'09 launch: Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, Denmark, Finland, France, Germany, Ireland, India, Italy, Japan, Netherlands, New Zealand, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, Switzerland, UK, and the United States.

By March'2010: Brazil, Chile, Colombia, Czech Republic, Greece, Hong Kong, Hungary, Israel, South Korea, Malaysia, Mexico, Poland, Puerto Rico, Romania, Singapore, and Taiwan.

Pretty clear with pretty clear time frame ;)

About SQL Azure portal outage Todd Anglin mentioned - it has been solved, as you have noticed.

And in general - if your application will be used in a country with datacenter I am sure it will run really smoothly with SQL Azure.
Moreover, I don't you will be able to have an Azure billing account in area where there is no datacenter. At least what is for now, when you login to Windows Azure portal (http://windows.azure.com/ ) there is a link "Blling" just next to your profile name (top right corner). Well it used to work before, right now I gives me network reset issues. But basically it opens the billing portal when you can create your account, and the list of available countries / regions is also there and you must choose a billing address in one of the available regions in order to register an Azure billing account.

Answer 2

Hi Anton,

Thanks for that link, it'd be good to see an official Microsoft doco.. I live in Australia and its November right now yet I only see one data centre available?

I'm glad the SQL Azure login is sorted as I mentioned that was the main user experience flaw I've seen thus far but I haven't tried the non-working Billing link as I read you can query the info from the master dB. Will try it out now.

If there is an official doco on the data centres? because current this is affecting the CTP for our company and its customers.

If anyone wishes to comment is on the "Code Near vs Code Far" scenario (who lives near South Central USA) that would be much appreciated.

Cheers

ps sorry to unpropose your answer Anton.

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Jeremy - MCP | MCAD.Net | MCSD.Net

Answer 3

Hi again,
Well, it is only mentioned that Windows Azure will be commercially available in Australia. It is not mentioned how many datacenters there will be. We can only make guesses on that.

Answer 4

Hi Anton,

Australia & NZ are so far away from the rest of the world. Perhaps in Europe you may be able to have an Azure billing account in an area where there is no datacenter, but I highly doubt it for Oz. I'd be keen for a Microsoftie to shed some light on the official roll out availability.

Also not sure if this is true or not, perhaps someone could clarify or dispel the myth The data centres will be built from server's like this:
HP POD and apparently when 70% of the servers inside the shipping container die, they will bury them and build new data centre's on top of the old ones?

Edit: The figure of 100 data centres came from reading an article how Ray Ozzie had a list of 100 Dams around the world on his desk, cause these data centre's need so much power they'd have to be located next door to a Hydroelectricity plant.

Cheers

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Jeremy - MCP | MCAD.Net | MCSD.Net

Answer 5

Jeremy,

I did not catch why running Silverlight app out-of-browser will affect performance?

If you try to host you app in Windows Azure service, you should see better performance because both your data and the code that is using your data will be
on the Cloud. Now, if I understand right, it just takes a long time to get your data from the Cloud because of slow Internet at your location.

You still can run you app locally with data on SQL Azure. That way you do not have to worry about your physical SQL Server, files, logs, partitions, etc. But it is not going to be free.


Vadim

Answer 6

Vadim,

As I mentioned, I'm already running my app locally with the database hosted on the cloud... I reaslise performance will be better when running in a "Code Near" scenario.. I am trying to establish perf metrics on the "Code Far" scenario and I cant get a accurate indication when the server is located the other side of the world.

My internet speed is fine (d/l 1.5 MB per sec) and this is why I am writing for clarification on when more data centre's will become available closer to home?

Just a fyi: when you run a Silverlight application out of browser (OOB) it runs locally hence the "Code Far" scenario if the dB is on the cloud. There is a GetIsNetworkAvailable() method which helps when you want to do server side XAP updates or sync data if the app has a local dB. My application doesn't easy lend itself to having a dB locally and a dB on a server with replication syncing info. I've looked into SQL Server compact edition for this but it would involve quite a lot of work rewriting the application and would be inadequate for our customers that need to see/share data in almost real time to prevent conflicts.

Cheers

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Jeremy - MCP | MCAD.Net | MCSD.Net

Answer 7

Jeremy,

When you run Silverlight app out-of-browser you are running only Silverlight part locally. Your data layer is still hosted (or supposed to be). That is why I am still confused of how it can affect performance. May be you are just doing something very fency and not familiar to me, sorry.

Vadim

Answer 8

Hi Vadim,

"Your data layer is still hosted (or supposed to be)"

Where did you read this?

n.b. There is a GetIsNetworkAvailable() method which helps when you want to sync data if the app has a local dB . My application doesn't easy lend itself to having a dB locally and another dB on a server with replication syncing info.

Answer 9

Just out of curiosity where is it?

Answer 10

Where is what? The dB? the DAL? the silverlight app?

As I mentioned my app runs locally and the dB is on the cloud - thats where the perf bottle neck is.

As far as my next development is concerned. "When you run Silverlight app out-of-browser you are running only Silverlight part locally. Your data layer is still hosted " - this is right and consequently there is a performance loss when you run a silverlight app out-of-browser with the dB hosted on a server and accessing data over the internet. Ok, now if you've never heard of the concept of running a silverlight app with client side storage kindly read this post:

http://pietschsoft.com/post/2008/10/Silverlight-Client-Side-Database-via-LINQ-and-Isolated-Storage.aspx


Anyway enough digressing, this thread is asking when (if its this month) will more data centre's become available?

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Jeremy - MCP | MCAD.Net | MCSD.Net

Answer 11

Looping the thread back around to the original question about data centers.

The best external documentation I can find is at http://blogs.msdn.com/windowsazure/ and at http://blogs.msdn.com/windowsazure/archive/2009/07/14/confirming-commercial-availability-and-announcing-business-model.aspx.  Other than that, all I can say is that we are highly focused on making sure Azure is successful around the world.  That means that we are going to make sure there are data centers all around.

Evan


P.S.  If you want to follow up on the other question, please start a new thread.