
Microsoft Announces Azure Stack - simas
http://techcrunch.com/2015/05/04/microsoft-wants-to-bring-azure-to-your-data-center/
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tumba
This has been a consistent direction from Microsoft for some time. When
Microsoft talks about private cloud or hybrid cloud, they refer to a design
approach in which infrastructure and applications are separated. Even today,
using the latest versions of Windows Server and System Center, you can manage
physical hardware, storage and networking as a "fabric" and even offer self-
service server provisioning.

In large shops, this allows for a real separation of roles between
infrastructure and applications. I think this is a useful separation. Even in
small shops where the same people are doing everything, this mental separation
enables better management. Many small and medium sized businesses still
operate in the mode that deploying an application or a major upgrade involves
starting with deploying a new server.

~~~
justindz
I was in the Azure TAP program many years ago and they talked about this
extensively to the participants. I would echo the consistency of direction on
this. I had a vague sense that it was an attempt to quell enterprise fears
about the cloud and lock-in, but perhaps not.

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mc32
These kinds of developments can't make VMware happy. I have not understood why
VMware never made a big iaas play when it had the chance to compete before
others became established and established mindshare. I only guess they didn't
want to compete against themselves, which is understandable but shortsighted.

~~~
frostmatthew
> I only guess they didn't want to compete against themselves, which is
> understandable but shortsighted

I work on vCloud Air (VMware's IaaS offering) and this is just a guess (since
I wasn't here at the time) but I imagine it wasn't about "competing against
themselves."

It's easy to sit here in 2015 and say getting into IaaS early should have been
obvious but that's ignoring the reality of what IT departments were saying
they wanted. In 2008 88% of IT buyers preferred on-premise deployment, by 2014
that had declined to 13%[1].

FWIW early access to vCloud Hybrid Service (the original name of vCloud Air)
was available in June 2013[2] and obviously something like this isn't put
together overnight.

[1] [http://www.softwareadvice.com/buyerview/deployment-
preferenc...](http://www.softwareadvice.com/buyerview/deployment-preference-
report-2014/)

[2] [http://www.vmware.com/company/news/releases/vmw-vcloud-
hybri...](http://www.vmware.com/company/news/releases/vmw-vcloud-hybrid-
service-052113.html)

~~~
kgilpin
Personally I believe that the best insights don't come from customers. As Jobs
said, "Customers don't know what they want"

[http://www.forbes.com/sites/chunkamui/2011/10/17/five-
danger...](http://www.forbes.com/sites/chunkamui/2011/10/17/five-dangerous-
lessons-to-learn-from-steve-jobs/)

People working in IT data centers didn't work with cloud much, so they didn't
understand the advantages. It's very dangerous to do product design in an echo
chamber.

~~~
frostmatthew
> As Jobs said, "Customers don't know what they want"

I see (and somewhat agree with) your point, but you're quoting/linking an
article titled " _Five Dangerous Lessons to Learn From Steve Jobs_ " that
states just before the first bullet " _here are some of the worst lessons to
learn from Steve Jobs_ "

A better quote may be PG's " _Make something people want_ "[1] - and if ~90%
of the people you sell to are saying they want on-prem I'm not sure how
(without clairvoyance or hubris) you can say for sure "nah, they're all
wrong."

Amazon, Microsoft, and Google are _much_ larger than VMware and can afford to
put a lot more resources behind things that may never bear fruit - VMW had
$1.8B in revenue in 2008[2], MSFT had $60B[3].

[1] [http://paulgraham.com/good.html](http://paulgraham.com/good.html)

[2]
[http://ir.vmware.com/secfiling.cfm?filingID=1193125-09-38030...](http://ir.vmware.com/secfiling.cfm?filingID=1193125-09-38030&CIK=1124610)

[3]
[https://www.microsoft.com/Investor/EarningsAndFinancials/Tre...](https://www.microsoft.com/Investor/EarningsAndFinancials/TrendedHistory/AnnualStatements.aspx)

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h43k3r
Can anybody explain me in layman terms what this means?

I understand that Azure is Microsoft's Cloud Platform that provides services
through which you can deploy your application on cloud.

Does this mean that you can run Azure on your own datacenter like Microsoft is
doing currently?

~~~
sunananth_MSFT
I'm a product manager with Microsoft.

With the Azure Stack, you can deploy your applications on your on-premises
(private) cloud, just like you would do in Azure - you're essentially
retargeting the app. Our ultimate goal is to empower maximum application
agility.

To enable the same deployment experience, Microsoft is bringing the same Azure
portal, user experience framework, and underlying IaaS/PaaS APIs and services
to your on-premises environments. We're also being thoughtful in which
services we bring on-premises so that enterprise customers get maximum value.

We want to enable our customers and partners to run Azure in their datacenter
in a way that's appropriate to their business requirements. We understand that
not everybody operates at the hyper-scale that Microsoft does - as such, we
will translate Microsoft's cloud designs and bring them to customers so it's
easy to consume while enhancing flexibility and security in datacenter
operations.

~~~
charlesnw
This is great news. Thank you very much for the explanation.

Will I be able to "burst" from on premise into Azure in this model? I'm in the
process of deploying cloudstack/Ubuntu MAAS now for my on premise (and
generally longer duration deployment) needs and using Azure for when I need
rapid setup/teardown or a large amount of capacity (on demand).

If I could have one stack locally and in "the cloud", I would be VERY happy
(especially if it's all tied in with AD, federated etc).

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jameshart
Microsoft always referred to Azure, from the beginning, as a new operating
system - it was, after all, originally branded as "Windows Azure". This
actually feels like it delivers on that promise - a datacenter operating
system.

This has the definite advantage of limiting fear of being 'locked in' in
deploying into Microsoft's Azure cloud - you can always run your application
on your own Azure fabric. So does this also open up the opportunity for
alternate Azure hosting providers to enter the market?

It also opens up the possibility of private-cloud versions of Microsoft's
cloud offerings. Office365 runs on Azure fabric; can Microsoft now package
that up as something you can deploy into your own Azure datacenter?

~~~
rbanffy
> This has the definite advantage of limiting fear of being 'locked in' in
> deploying into Microsoft's Azure cloud - you can always run your application
> on your own Azure fabric.

This lock-in is no different than the fear of being locked in into Amazon's
AWS, Google's or Rackspace's services (even App Engine has open-source source-
compatible equivalents out there). With the right tools (and there are open-
source ones), you can deploy your applications to machines (real, virtual,
containers) mostly anywhere.

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sjg007
Makes sense. I think this will be huge for them. Especially if administration
is easier than openstack.

~~~
ams6110
Yes. OpenStack is a nightmare for small shops without resources to have full-
time OpenStack admins. The configuration and deployment is complex, and
keeping it running demands a lot of attention. Plus the new releases every six
months, and desupport of anything more than two releases old, make you feel
like you're on a 100mph treadmill.

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istvan__
Amazing! This is again a smart move from MS. There is still a market segment
that does not want to move to the cloud but looking for cloud like services,
for example fast provisioning.

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cies
Dear MS.

Thanks for going open source with dotNet. We will use it on our Linuxes and
BSDs, with gratitude and joy.

But when it comes to your intention of bringing your non-open-source'ed
software to our data centers: we were actually almost finished taking them
out, and feel much better that way.

~~~
BF179580656B
Microsoft is on par with Linux and BSD machines. Until you are reading all the
source code, there's no point in switching to Linux or BSD if you're already
using Microsoft. Microsoft has the best and robust tools for the job.

~~~
devicenull
Not quite... when I run into an issue with my Linux machine, I can trace the
code all the way down to the kernel.

When I run into a problem with my Windows machine, I have to resort to random
searches and hoping that someone else has seen it.

~~~
BinaryIdiot
> I can trace the code all the way down to the kernel.

Maybe you can but do you? This requires not only figuring out how to compile
your ENTIRE stack but also doing it AND figuring out how to debug each piece
(since generic debugging tools are not the best). I understand there may be
major issues that require this level of insanity but the rarity is so
incredibly high and so few have enough domain knowledge to do it effectively
that I don't buy this argument at all.

~~~
scott00
There's a level of understanding and debugging possible from reading the
source without compiling/debugging that's not possible with access only to
binaries. I'm a .NET/Windows developer mostly, and I've found myself
consulting the .NET library reference source dozens of times over the past
year. This has been useful, despite the fact I've never compiled it. Five
years ago I would never have thought my work would require that level of
understanding. You may be surprised how fast you can find yourself in areas
where the internet doesn't provide ready answers when you start working on
unusual stuff. You may also be surprised how fast you can figure out code that
once seemed impenetrable when it's the next logical step in fixing an issue
you desperately want solved.

~~~
BinaryIdiot
> There's a level of understanding and debugging possible from reading the
> source without compiling/debugging that's not possible with access only to
> binaries. I'm a .NET/Windows developer mostly,[...]

I certainly agree with you but the claims of tracing the flow of execution
down to the kernel? That's extreme in my opinion. Obviously there are times
that's useful but for the majority of developers I can't imagine that's even
as frequent as a rare occurrence. At least in my personal experience I only
know maybe 2 people in my past experience who could actually do this. I just
don't think the majority of developers know how to step outside of a few
frameworks or languages.

At least Microsoft released the debug symbols for .Net back in 2012 so you've
been able to at least trace through your framework's source for a while now :)

