Extending data to the cloud using Microsoft SQL Azure

Putting data into the cloud can be a secure, reliable, and painless way to comply with new government mandates and to share valuable information with citizens and employees.

Databases in the cloud

Government IT departments are undergoing many transformative changes today, including initiatives to better serve citizens and employees with more open, participatory systems. For instance, the Obama administrations Open Government Directive requires the release of at least three data sets to the public. The end goal is to help citizens better understand the efforts and results of government. While admirable, this is no small task: Agencies must build and maintain the infrastructure to support, manage, and secure information-sharing via the web. Cloud computinghosted services for storing and hosting applications and datais fast emerging as a way to help government agencies to meet these new requirements.
The profound benefits to agencies include simplified management, since the cloud provider takes care of installing, provisioning, securing, storing, and updating applicationsand ultimately, helping to ensure high performance. The cloud can give agencies and their constituents secure, web-based access to databaseswithout the need for additional hardware and software investments.

Seamless user experience in the cloud

The Windows Azure and SQL Azure platforms make it easy to set up cloud-based databases. With SQL Azure, users can access data in the cloud from an on-premise or web-based application. After the database has been created, you can use a wide variety of tools and application programming interfaces (APIs) to manage the data. Entire databases may also be hosted in the cloud for employees who need remote access. In this scenario, a remote workers local application accesses data thats hosted in the cloud, or their local application pulls data down from the cloud so the employee can work on it locally. How data is made available to end users is up to the application developer. For agency employees, remote access in the cloud is much easier and faster than a more complex and lengthy virtual private network (VPN) connection and can even enable them to use a mobile phone to pull up data that they collect from the field. As an added benefit, because the application also resides on site and the data can be synced regularly with the cloud application, IT can be more confident in the datas accuracy.

Cloud databases: A few simple steps for IT

For IT workers and database administrators, setting up a cloudbased database is straightforward: A developer or analyst can sign up for the Azure service online, where they can then create a SQL Azure server. The developer or analyst specifies the security and region information for the server. He or she uses another menu to create a database, which can be up to 10 gigabytes (GB) in size (and larger sizes will be available soon). IT can use SQL Enterprise Manager to manage their databases in the cloud. Data stored in SQL Azure can be accessed using the TDS + SSL protocol, which means you can access it from Microsoft open database connectivity (ODBC), OLE DB, ADO.NET, or PHP. Developers can sign up for the "Dallas" information service, an application built on top of Windows Azure and SQL Azure, which contains many different public data sets that can be imported into applications. Agencies can store their own data sets within the service for public access. Employees can use SQL Enterprise Manager to create tables in the cloud database or to change security settings, just as they would with an on-premise database. IT can also establish firewall settings for your organizations data.

Instead of days or weeks spent on server procurement and setup, software installation, and hardware racking, hosting data in the cloud takes just a few hours.

Tips for entering the cloud with confidence

Assign a database administrator to oversee your cloudbased applications and to manage user access and service levels, as you would for internally managed applications. Take the time to research your cloud provider. Select a partner that can clearly demonstrate the ability to manage and secure large stores of data, with consistent reliability and performance metrics. Understand the security features and options of the service. SQL Azure, for instance, includes a firewall that allows you to designate which IP addresses have access to your server. The Windows Azure development platform includes features that address data security and help developers to meet complex needs for identity management and access control.

Exploring possibilities in the cloud

Cloud computing can help your agency meet stringent compliance requirements within your existing IT budget. For instance, an agency may need to store data for archival purposes but may not have the capital budget to purchase and maintain a new server. Storing the data in the cloud at a thirdparty data center can help reduce that overhead considerably and can lessen the impact of large databases on internal network performance. Government IT departments can also help improve budget planning accuracy: In the cloud, an organization pays only for what it uses.

Microsoft in the cloud

Microsoft cloud infrastructure for hosting data is based on three core technologies: Windows Azure. This is a Windows-based environment for running applications and storing data on servers in Microsoft data centers. SQL Azure. SQL Azure allows on-premise and cloud applications to store relational and other types of data on Microsoft servers in Microsoft data centers. SQL Azure Data Sync allows organizations to replicate data between SQL Azure and Microsoft SQL Server applications. Windows Azure platform AppFabric. This cloud-based service allows organizations to securely connect external users to on-premise data (from your customer relationship management or supply chain management applications, for instance) in the cloud, without having to set up complicated identity management processes for moving data between firewalls.

In today's world, taxpayers place a high premium on transparency in government services. Flexible infrastructure options such as the cloud can help agencies more readily share information with citizens for a variety of useful goals: to help detect and report fraud, waste, or other criminal behavior; to facilitate participation in local community issues; and even to further scientific research. Sign up for SQL Azure today at http://www.microsoft.com/windowsazure/sqlazure/. Learn more at www.govsql.com.

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