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Microsoft rolls out Windows Azure toolkit for Android

By | August 31, 2011, 12:30pm PDT

Summary: Microsoft is rounding out its family of Windows Azure toolkits with a near-final test version of the toolkit for Android device developers.

Microsoft is making available for download a near-final version of its Windows Azure toolkit for Android device developers as of today, August 31.

This is the toolkit Microsoft officials said would be available in preview form as of June. The download site describes the release out today as version 0.8.

Why would a phone/device developers want Azure cloud access? Technical Evangelist Wade Wegner explained the case for Windows Phones this way in a blog post:

“In many ways, cloud computing levels the playing field. Any developer can tap into a larger – and virtually limitless – pool of resources from which to pull. For developers, Windows Azure – Microsoft’s cloud-computing platform – is a great compliment to mobile application development. Simply put, Windows Azure allows you to focus on your application. You don’t have to worry about managing or monitoring the operating system, just as you don’t have to worry about the hardware our network. As a managed service, Windows Azure takes care of things items for you.”

Everything in the newly release Azure toolkit for Android is built in Eclipse and uses the Android software development kit (SDK), Microsoft officials said. The library itself fully covers the Windows Azure storage application programming interfaces.

“The numbering sequence (0.8) is not consequential at the moment,” a spokesperson told me. “The only reason the toolkit is v0.8 is because 1) we haven’t yet built out the documentation for the API, and 2) the sample application (while fully functional) is still an extremely basic application and not as functional as the iOS/WP equivalents.”

Microsoft also delivered on August 31 updated versions of the Azure toolkits for Windows Phone and iOS. The Windows Phone update (version 1.3) includes support for SQL Azure as a membership provider and data source using OData; support for the Windows Phone Developer Tools 7.1 Release Candidate and more. The updated iOS toolkit (version 1. 2.1) can be used for both iPhone and iPad applications developed using Objective-C and XCode.

These Azure toolkits include native libraries, templates, sample applications and unit tests.

Microsoft also delivered late last week version 1.0 of its Windows Azure Toolkit for Social Games.

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Microsoft Corp., Microsoft Windows Azure, Microsoft Windows, Operating Systems, Software, Mary Jo Foley

Mary Jo has covered the tech industry for more than 25 years for a variety of publications and Web sites, and is a frequent guest on radio, TV and podcasts, speaking about all things Microsoft-related. She is the author of Microsoft 2.0: How Microsoft plans to stay relevant in the post-Gates era (John Wiley & Sons, 2008).

Disclosure

Mary-Jo Foley

Freelance journalist/blogger Mary Jo Foley has nothing to disclose. WYSIWYG (what you see is what you get). I do not own Microsoft stock or stock in any of its partners or competitors. I have no business ventures that are sponsored by/funded by Microsoft or any of its partners or competitors.

Biography

Mary-Jo Foley

Mary Jo Foley has covered the tech industry for 25 years for a variety of publications, including ZDNet, eWeek and Baseline. She has kept close tabs on Microsoft strategy, products and technologies for the past 10 years. In the late 1990s, she penned the award-winning "At The Evil Empire" column for ZDNet, and more recently the Microsoft Watch blog for Ziff Davis.

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Talkback Most Recent of 7 Talkback(s)

  • RE: Microsoft rolls out Windows Azure toolkit for Android
    I love the fact that Microsoft continues to reposition itself both as a 'vertical software stack' provider and a 'horizontal services layer' provider that recognizes that no one company can dominate the cloud but app builders can use a selection of best-of-breed services from a number of different providers.
    ZDNet Gravatar
    BGwatson
    31st Aug
  • RE: Microsoft rolls out Windows Azure toolkit for Android
    @BGwatson Actually they are now implemented Windows Azure. Am wondering after Windows 8
    come out next year, will they after it start building windows 8 for phone version ?
    ZDNet Gravatar
    ceva90
    1st Sep
  • RE: Microsoft rolls out Windows Azure toolkit for Android
    @ceva90
    Well, let's see if they will....
    ZDNet Gravatar
    eschwartzk
    6th Sep
  • No one will use this
    My opinion as a Microsoft developer, is that most non-Microsoft developers hate Microsoft. I don't understand the reason for such hate considering Microsoft does such a great job of building awesome tools for their devs that are low-cost or free.

    My guessing that either they are Apple people, who couldn't stomach doing anything approved by Steve Jobs (their kids are named Steve, even the girls, and they paint their bedrooms purple and silver), or their are open source people who believe anyone making money off technology are evil. That's too black and white, of course, but probably not far from the truth.

    Anyway, bravo for Microsoft transitioning to support what is popular today, even if no one will use it.
    ZDNet Gravatar
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