Building Web Services with Microsoft Azure

Quickly develop scalable, REST-based applications or services and learn how to manage them using Microsoft Azure
About This Book

• Explore the tools to rapidly build, deploy, and manage cloud solutions using Microsoft Azure
• Learn how to utilize Entity Framework, SQL Azure database, and other storage mechanisms to build out the data tier of your solution
• A step-by-step guide focused on delivering solutions to your cloud development lifecycle with the best practices for web services and APIs

Who This Book Is For
If you are a .NET developer who wants to develop end-to-end RESTful applications in the cloud, then this book is for you. A working knowledge of C# will help you get the most out of this book.
What You Will Learn

• Build RESTful services using the ASP.NET Web API and Microsoft Azure
• Host and monitor applications in Azure Websites and Azure Mobile Services
• Manage Web APIs using Azure API Management
• Utilize Azure Service Bus to provide elasticity to your applications as well as publish and subscribe features
• Utilize the Microsoft Azure Platform as a Service (PaaS) component in your custom solutions
• Get to grips with the basic characteristics of distributed systems
• Use Entity Framework as the data model
• Leverage your cloud-based storage and discover how to access and manipulate data in the cloud
• Explore the NoSQL options available in Microsoft Azure

In Detail
There's a plethora of development tools and frameworks available today. But Microsoft Azure provides a scalable and manageable platform for customers to easily deploy, monitor, and troubleshoot their cloud-based applications. Its seamless integration and inherent support for open source software make it an obvious choice for building cloud-based applications and services.
This book will take you through a full application development architecture. You'll start by creating, customizing, and extending HTTP-based web APIs and move on to host your web API with ASP.NET. Then, using a range of different features, you'll learn how to connect your applications with Microsoft Azure Service Bus. You'll learn more advanced topics such as creating Hybrid Services, Azure Storage data services, and the Entity Framework; you'll learn to create and manipulate data services, too. Finally, you'll leverage the full power of SQL database administration in Azure and gain more insights into managing your data.