Trabajando con CodeFirst en Azure App Service

Hola a todos,

Este es un post que debería empezar con algo así como, es mejor tener amigos que dinero. Gracias a Cheo y especialmente a Warnov por ayudarme a entender los cambios de Azure.

Escribo estas notas por que seguramente podrán ayudar a algunos de ustedes. Para quienes hemos trabajado con Azure Mobile Services usando CodeFirst y migraciones automáticas, seguro nos fue común encontrar el post de Fredrik Normén, indicando que debiamos asignar los permisos al usuario autogenerado por Azure.

A hoy las cosas han empezado a cambiar y ya Microsoft anunció la retirada de Azure Mobile Services para continuar con la evolución Azure App Service. Los cambios no son mayores en la construcción, pero si nos obligan a estar más concientes de lo que hacemos.

Ahora no todo se hace automaticamente con el paso a paso de Azure, cada componente y parte debemos crearla nosotros mismos. Es decir:

1. Debemos crear nuestro Mobile App en el portal nuevo

2. Creamos una base de datos y asociamos la base de datos siguiendo el paso a paso

Como vemos el cambio es simplemente que ahora debemos hacer las cosas manualmente, eso implica por lo tanto que debemos crear el login y usuario de base de datos para que nuestras migraciones de CodeFirst funcionen. Le explicación de los cambios en SQL Azure V12 está en MSDN.

Sin embargo los pasos son muy simples:

En la base de datos master creas un login:

CREATE LOGIN TuLogin WITH PASSWORD = 'YourPassword';

En tu base de datos creas el usuario asociado al login que acabaste de crear:

CREATE USER TuUsuario FOR LOGIN TuLogin 

EXEC sp_addrolemember N'db_owner', N'TuUsuario'

Por último hacemos lo que haciamos antes en Azure Mobile Services para que nuestras Migraciones Automáticas funcionen.

GRANT CONTROL ON SCHEMA::[dbo] TO TuUsuario 

Espero que esto les pueda resultar de ayuda, a veces nos malacostumbramos a que todo ocurra automáticamente sin entender que pasa y bueno, aunque es útil para aprendizaje e implementaciones de demos, es mejor ser más concientes de todo y tener el control cuando vamos a producción.

Algo adicional, no de SQL Azure si no del Api y que es muy importante, es que ahora el Api de AppService para Móvil no tiene una ApiKey para asegurar la conexión, por lo tanto además debemos implementar nuestra propia seguridad, sea oAuth o algun esquema de protección como HMAC Autentication

Hasta pronto

Consumiendo Servicios Web con Netduino

Se sorprenderán de como he empezado de una forma muy diferente a como comienzan todos los libros de Netduino, encendiendo y apagando LEDs, y es que básicamente lo que quiero que entiendan es que mi último interés es quedarme en temas de esa índole que son abordados en todos los libros de electrónica tanto de Arduino como de Netduino, seguramente también lo haremos, pero mi intención es que juntos nos trasportemos a entender como lograr la electrónica, el software y la nube trabajen para hacer el verdadero internet de las cosas.

La idea con este post es que también la gente que solo sabe electrónica entienda que hoy en día programar un backend para nuestros proyectos, ni siquiera necesita código. Nuestro backend será un servicio Node.js creado a través de los Wizard de Azure.

Así que bueno, para empezar vamos algo cool y simple, vamos a crear un servicio en Azure Mobile Service para que nuestro Netduino pueda enviar información.

En la consola de Azure encontrarán esa opción

 

Al seleccionar la opción nuevo se abre un submenú donde iniciamos la creación

Llenamos los datos de nuestro servicio

También de la base de datos que utilizará

 

Esperamos a que Azure finalice las  tareas necesarias

 

Hasta que nuestro servicio aparezca como listo para usarse

Al entrar a la pestaña de data podemos ver que no tenemos tablas creadas

Presionamos la opción adicionar tabla y le asignamos un nombre

Al confirmar que finalizamos empieza la creación de la tabla que no tarda mucho

 

 Podemos observar que la tabla no contiene registros

 

Al ir a la pestaña columnas vemos como azure crea algunos campos en nuestra tabla NoSql de forma automática. Presionamos el botón añadir columna para crear una propia.

Ahora damos un nombre a nuestra columna y elegimos el tipo de dato.

 

Después de confirmar verificamos que efectivamente la tabla tenga nuestra nueva columna

  

Para que nuestro demo sea más simple voy a cambiar los permisos de la tabla para que cualquiera pueda ingresar datos en ella.

Y ahora si lo que estabamos esperando empezar nuestro primer proyecto en Netduino. Como ven crear un proyecto de .NET Micro Framework es tan simple con cualquier proyecto de .NET en Visual Studio. Simplemente buscamos la sección y vemos todas las plantillas. Seleccionamos la que es acorde al Netduino que tenemos.

En el interior del proyecto encontramos algo familia, un punto de entrada Main típico de aplicaciones de consola.

Siendo nuestra intención probar si la red de nuestro Netduino quedo funcionando vamos a agregar dos referencias a nuestro proyecto, System.Http y System.IO

 

Además agregaremos un paquete de Nuget

 

Agregamos el Json.NETMF, para ayudarnos a serializar más facilmente.

Además creamos una entidad que nos permitrá guardar los datos en nuestra table. Ahora luce sencilla, sin embargo en otros laboratorios añadiremos más columnas. 

El código necesario para registrar datos en nuestra tabla se los pongo a continuación, es código .NET común el cual no es mi intención explicar pues es un consumo HTTP tradicional por POST. En verde resalto la línea que indica la Url con la que se debe apuntar a nuestro Azure Mobile Service.

using System;
using System.Net;
using System.Net.Sockets;
using System.Threading;
using Microsoft.SPOT;
using Microsoft.SPOT.Hardware;
using SecretLabs.NETMF.Hardware;
using SecretLabs.NETMF.Hardware.Netduino;
using Netduino.NetworkTest.Entities;
using System.IO;

namespace Netduino.NetworkTest
{
    public class Program
    {
        public static void Main()
        {
            try
            {
                EventLog eventLog = new EventLog()
                {
                    Description = "Hello Cloud"
                };
                string json = Json.NETMF.JsonSerializer
                    .SerializeObject(eventLog);

                Debug.Print("Message: " + json);

                var httpWebRequest = (HttpWebRequest)WebRequest
                    .Create(
                      "http://netduinotest.azure-mobile.net/tables/EventLog");

                httpWebRequest.Method = "POST";
                httpWebRequest.Accept = "application/json";
                httpWebRequest.ContentType = "application/json; charset=UTF-8";
                httpWebRequest.ContentLength = json.ToCharArray().Length;

                using (var streamWriter =
                    new StreamWriter(httpWebRequest.GetRequestStream()))
                {
                    streamWriter.Write(json);
                    streamWriter.Flush();
                    streamWriter.Close();
                }

                var httpResponse = (HttpWebResponse)httpWebRequest.GetResponse();
                using (var streamReader
                    = new StreamReader(httpResponse.GetResponseStream()))
                {
                    var result = streamReader.ReadToEnd();
                    Debug.Print(result);
                }
            }
            catch (Exception ex)
            {
                Debug.Print("Error: " + ex.Message);
            }
            finally
            {
                Thread.Sleep(Timeout.Infinite);
            }
        }
    }
}

En este punto revisamos la versión del .NET Micro Framework a usar, si aun no has actualizado tu Firmware, debes cambiarla a la correspondiente.

 

Además nos aseguramos que en la opción .NET Micro Framework este el método de transporte USB y este seleccionado nuestro Netduino

 Y ahora si, estamos listos para ejecutar nuestra app dando PLAY. En la ventana de salida podremos ver como inicia el despliegue de paquetes dentro del Netduino

Luego inicia la ejecución de nuestra aplicación y ups, así se vería un error. En el código que les copié ya está corregido, sin embargo cuando di ejecutar por primera vez olvide remover el HTTPS y dejar solo HTTP en la ruta del servicio de Azure Mobile Services. Como vemos en la imagen, el error es que no es soportado. Netduino no soporta SSL.

 

Volvemos a ejecutar la aplicación y ahora si tenemos una ejecución exitosa.

 

Si revisamos nuestro servicio en Azure, veremos el registro enviado desde nuestro Netduino

Azure Active Directory: Tomorrow’s Identity Management, Today

   By Debra Littlejohn Shinder

Identity and access management form the backbone of your network security plan, and now with the integration of on-premises and cloud-based services in a hybrid environment, organizations need a solution that will simplify user access to cloud apps and allow them to get to the resources they need no matter what type or brand of computing device they’re using. 

Microsoft’s answer to this is Azure Active Directory, which will not only enable your users to access your SaaS applications and Office 365 but also lets you publish your on-premises web apps so that they can be accessed from computers, tablets or smart phones running Windows, Android, iOS or OS X. 

Your on-premises Active Directory and other directory services can be synchronized automatically with Azure AD. You can sync users, groups and contacts to the cloud and Azure AD supports both directory sync with password synchronization and directory sync with single sign-on:

• Directory sync with password sync: users can sign into Azure AD with the same username and password they use for accessing the company network.

• Directory sync with single sign-on:  users can use their company AD credentials to access both cloud and on-premises resources seamlessly. You can even have single sign-on across multiple AD forests using Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS). 

All of this convenience doesn’t come at the cost of security. Users can enjoy all the benefits of single sign-on and administrators can breathe easy knowing that the access channels are secured. 

You have the option of enabling Azure multi-factor authentication to provide more protection for your sensitive and confidential data and applications, and security monitoring will keep you apprised of what’s going on with both your cloud apps and your on-premises apps. 

Active Directory integration tools, Azure Active Directory Sync and Azure Active Directory Synchronization Tool (DirSync) have been replaced by Azure Active Directory Connect, which encompasses their same functionalities and can be downloaded from the Microsoft Azure web site. This tool lets you easily connect your on-premises directories with your Azure AD via a wizard-based interface that will deploy and configure all of the necessary components for you. 

Credit: Microsoft Azure Directory

Azure AD Connect has three parts: Sync Services, AD FS and the health monitoring service (Azure AD Connect Health). AD FS is optional; it’s used to create a hybrid solution with your on-premises AD FS deployment. In order to install Azure AD Connect, you’ll need to have Enterprise Administrator credentials, along with a subscription to Azure and Azure AD Premium (or the trial version). You’ll also need an Azure AD Global Admin account and your AD domain controller needs to be running Windows Server 2008 or above. 

The installation wizard will help you to select the type of synchronization that’s best for your organization (password sync or single sign-on), then it will install the software components that are needed in order to deploy the type of synchronization you chose. After the components are installed, it will verify the integration of the on-premises and cloud directories to ensure that everything is working. 

By default, Azure AD Connect installs an instance of SQL Server 2012 Express, creates the appropriate groups and assigns the necessary permissions to them. However, if you want, you can use a SQL server that you already have. You’ll need to specify its name in the options configuration section of the wizard. You also might want to create an account for the sync services to use instead of using the default account, so that you can choose your own password. When you use the default, Azure AD Connect generates a password automatically and you don’t know what it is. Usually you won’t need to, but there are some advanced tasks that do require you to know and enter the password. 

The quickest and easiest way to integrate your on-premises and cloud directories is to use the Express installation option. It is for single-forest configurations and uses the password hash sync type so users can log onto the cloud with the same password they use for the corporate network. It’s a quick and simple process with just six steps. If you want more options, you want to go with the Custom installation, which lets you choose Federation with AD FS or password sync, lets you add more directories to sync, and gives you far more flexibility and control over identities and features such as Azure AD app and attribute filtering, password and user writeback, and more. Writeback means that password changes made in Azure AD and users created in Azure AD will be written back to the on-premises directory. 

Azure Active Directory brings your on-premises and cloud assets together for maximizing the benefits of both. You can find much more good information about Azure at www.cloudcomputingadmin.com.

Author Profile

Debra Littlejohn Shinder, MCSE, MVP (Security) is a technology consultant, trainer and writer who has authored a number of books on computer operating systems, networking, and security.

She is also a tech editor, developmental editor and contributor to over 20 additional books. Her articles are regularly published on TechRepublic's TechProGuild Web site and WindowSecurity.com, and has appeared in print magazines such as Windows IT Pro (formerly Windows & .NET) Magazine.

New accelerated Microsoft courses from Firebrand

By Sarah Morgan


Become an Azure architect, learn how to install Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015 in your organisation then master NAV 2015’s financial application area. Study it all - twice as fast as traditional training - on three new accelerated Firebrand courses.

Firebrand is excited to bring these new accelerated Microsoft courses to our ever expanding training portfolio:

• Microsoft Specialist: Architecting Microsoft Azure Solutions – Only 3 days
• Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015 Financials - Only 6 Days
• Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015 Installation and Configuration - Only 2 Days

Microsoft Specialist: Architecting Microsoft Azure Solutions

Learn how to build websites, application storage and infrastructure with Azure – Microsoft’s global cloud platform that boasts over 90,000 new customer subscriptions per month.

The third Azure specialist course in Firebrand’s portfolio, Architecting Microsoft Azure Solutions will give you the skills you need to design public and hybrid cloud solutions.

Study Microsoft Official Curriculum, take your Microsoft exam 70-534 onsite at the end of your three day course, and return to work certified.

Become an Azure Architect in only three days!

Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015 Financials

Learn how to automate and streamline your business processes with Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015 financials. In just six days you’ll get the knowledge you need to manage your business with NAV 2015 and get to grips with new features like Tablet Client and Office365 integration.

By the end of this six day course, you’ll be able to setup and use the Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015 Finance application area. You’ll also learn:

• How to setup and use VAT, budgets, cash management & multiple currencies
• Basics of Sales and Purchase
• Basic functionalities, including sorting and filtering
• Management of roles and user rights
• Creation of fixed assets and how to use them in transactions

Learn how to manage your organisation’s finances with Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015 in only six days!


Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015 Installation and Configuration

On this accelerated two day course you’ll learn how to install and configure Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015. Built for small and medium sized businesses, NAV 2015 will manage your organisations finance, manufacturing, sales and more.

Make the most of the newest version of Dynamics NAV; get introduced to new features like an enhanced PowerShell API and single sign-on with Office365.

Learn how to install and configure Microsoft Dynamics NAV 2015, and configure multiple NAV 2015 client types, in just two days with Firebrand.


180+ courses and counting

Firebrand’s portfolio now exceeds 180 accelerated courses from vendors like Microsoft, Cisco, (ISC)2 and CompTIA.

We’re committed to developing new accelerated courses. To stay up to date with our newest and most cutting edge training follow us onTwitter, Facebook and Google+ and LinkedIn.

Find out how you can get certified at twice the speed and take a look at our full range of accelerated training.


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• Microsoft Dynamics CRM 2015 training now available from Firebrand
• Win Free Training for Life with Firebrand
• Firebrand instructors get double win at Cisco Instructor Excellence Award 2015

About the Author:        
Sarah writes for Firebrand Training on a number of IT related topics. This includes exams, training, certification trends, project management, certification, careers advice and the industry itself. Sarah has 11 years of experience in the IT industry. 

Microsoft Azure is down

By Sarah Morgan


Update 1: Many Azure hosted websites in Europe are still experiencing down time.
Update 2: Azure has fully recovered,

Run for the hills, Microsoft Azure is facing a temporary loss-of-service.

According to Microsoft's official Azure status page, the following issues are:

• Storage - North Europe and West Europe - Partial Service Interruption
• Websites - West Europe - Advisory (Limited Impact)
• Application Insights - Multi-Region - Advisory

Microsoft's Azure status page isn't entirely accurate...

8 hours ago, reports began to fly in regarding Microsoft's Azure cloud platform experiencing widespread outages. The issue affects all Azure customers with virtual machines in all regions other than the new Australian data center.

Both work and play have been affected by the outages, with hundreds reporting that Xbox live is also experiencing issues. Users have been unable to sign in or open the friends app.

Though the issues appear to have been fixed for 

UK based businesses took to Twitter to voice their concern over the ongoing downtime:

We do apologise however due to an issue with our suppliers Microsoft @azure our website is currently down #azuredown
— Anniversary Ideas (@anniversaryteam) November 19, 2014

Apologies our website is currently down - AZURE CLOUD ISSUES - Storage in North Europe and West Europe #AzureDown Hopefully fixed soon!!
— Contraband Events (@Contraband_Int) November 19, 2014

Azure North Europe - some of it working for us - but not the important bits! #azureoutage #azuredown #expletivedeleted
— Kevin Fairs (@technotart) November 19, 2014

About the Author:        
Sarah writes for Firebrand Training on a number of IT related topics. This includes exams, training, certification trends, project management, certification, careers advice and the industry itself. Sarah has 11 years of experience in the IT industry. 

How to become a Microsoft Azure Specialist

By Sarah Morgan

IT Professionals with experience and knowledge of cloud technologies are increasingly in demand. Demand for ‘cloud-ready’ IT professionals will grow by 26% annually through 2015, with as many as 7 million cloud-related jobs available worldwide, IDC report.

However, demand has outpaced supply. IT managers report that the reason they failed to fill an existing 1.7million cloud-related positions in 2012 was due to a lack of training and certification.

The IDC White Paper report that 56% of IT departments simply cannot find enough qualified staff to support their cloud projects. 

Two giants are currently fighting it out for dominance of this thriving technology sector – Microsoft and Amazon Web Services.

Though Amazon may be the current cloud leader, it’s all too clear that Microsoft is closing the gap.

Especially so when considering Microsoft noted in its last earnings call that cloud revenue grew 147% year-over-year. 

At WPC 2014, Microsoft also unveiled these impressive Azure statistics:

• 57% of Fortune 500 companies now use Azure
• 300,000+ active websites
• More than 30 trillion storage objects
• Over 1 million SQL databases in Azure
• 300 million Azure Active Directory users

With over $15 billion invested into building and maintaining datacentres across the globe, Microsoft is clearly committed to Azure. And it’s shows.

What is Azure?

Microsoft is going all in on Cloud technology. Microsoft Azure is an open collection of compute, storage, data and networking running in a global network of Microsoft-managed datacentres. 

You may also know it as Azure Ad and Azure online backup but it’s role remains the same – it allows organisations to build infrastructure as a service (IAAS), Platform as a Service (PAAS) and Software as a Service Solutions (SAAS). 

Sound familiar?

If you have recently studied Windows Server 2012 R2 and the latest versions of System Centre and SQL, you might have already studied Azure. Microsoft has already begun to introduce Azure material across their certifications and exams. 

This highlights Microsoft’s commitment to Azure, and proves that an understanding of the software is becoming increasingly necessary in related certifications. After investing $15 billion into worldwide datacentres, it comes as no surprise. 

And in the last couple of months, Microsoft have released courses, exams and certifications specifically based around Azure. 

The two brand new Microsoft certifications are:

• Microsoft  Specialist: Implementing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions
• Microsoft Specialist: Developing Microsoft Azure Solutions

Microsoft Specialist: Developing Microsoft Azure Solutions

If you’re a developer looking to enhance your Web Applications and Windows Store Apps through building your own cloud services – this certification is for you. 

Or, if you hold the MCSD: Web Applications, this certification will prove a brilliant way to gain a greater understanding of the Azure platform. 

This Specialist course, built for developers, teaches you how to establish your own Azure virtual network environment. 

If you want to expand your development skills to cover Microsoft Azure, this is the certification for you. You’ll learn how to construct Azure Virtual Machines, create and host Azure websites and design resilient cloud applications. 

To achieve the certification you’ll have to pass the Microsoft Exam: 70-532. 

Microsoft Specialist: Implementing Microsoft Azure Infrastructure Solutions

Microsoft is now the second largest provider of cloud infrastructure solutions and this Specialist certification has been created to set you apart as a knowledgeable Cloud professional. 

You’ll learn how to migrate your existing on-premise infrastructure to Microsoft Azure as well as:

• Plan and implement data services based on SQL
• Deploy and configure websites
• Publish content through CDNs 
• Integrate on premises Windows AD with Azure AD

To achieve the certification you’ll have to pass the Microsoft Exam: 70-533. 

When can you get certified?

You can sit both the 70-533 and 70-532 exams and attain your respective certifications now. But bear in mind – you have two options for scheduling these exams: Pearson VUE and Prometric.

If you want to sit your exam after January 1, 2015 – book it with Pearson VUE. This is because after December 31, 2014, Microsoft will stop delivering their certification exams through Prometric.

Training providers are racing to cater for the demand for these new Microsoft Specialist certifications. We are proud to announce that Firebrand is one of the first to market - and will be running courses in the coming months.

How to know when you’re ready

These Microsoft Specialist certifications are not part of the traditional MTA, MCSA and MCSE / MCSD tracks. As a result, you won’t find any pre-requisites for these Azure certifications.

However, Firebrand instructor, Mike Brown has reviewed the curriculum of both Specialist certifications and strongly recommends an in depth understanding of virtualisation before taking on these exams. 

Because of this emphasis on virtualisation, if you possess the MCSA: Windows Server 2012 R2 certification, you’ll be better prepared than most for these new Azure Specialist courses. Those without this cert should consider it as a great introduction to virtualisation. 

Prepare for your Microsoft Specialist cert now

To get started on Microsoft Azure - take a look at the Microsoft Virtual Academy. You’ll find 28 Microsoft Azure short courses available which provide a great self-study introduction to the technology. 

Because these Azure certifications are so new and in-depth, you won’t find a great deal of external resources. As a result, self-study could prove unjustifiably tough. 

But, if you can prove your knowledge of Azure, you’ll be well placed to take full advantage of the driving demand for Cloud technology.

About the Author:        
Sarah writes for Firebrand Training on a number of IT related topics. This includes exams, training, certification trends, project management, certification, careers advice and the industry itself. Sarah has 11 years of experience in the IT industry. 

Microsoft to offer Linux on Azure

Microsoft has announced that it is going to offer Ubuntu, CentOS, and SUSE Linux on their Azure cloud. They will be supporting Linux VM and hosting framework support on Azure.

The Linux services on Azure will offer a number of Linux distributions including Suse Linux Enterprise Server 11 SP2, Canonical Ubuntu 12.04, OpenSuse 12.01, and CentOS 6.2 in addition to Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows Server 2012 Release Candidate.