SQL Azure - the good, the bad and the ugly.

1. Microsoft Azure SQL Database –
SQL Azure :
The Good,
The Bad and the Ugly.
Pini Krisher DBA TL at etoro (www.etoro.com)
@krisherpi
pinik@naya-tech.co.il

2. Agenda:
• 10 minutes of basic introduction.
• 10 minutes of ways to work with SQL Azure
• 10 minutes of good
• 10 minutes of bad
• 10 minutes of Ugly
• 10 minutes of some conclusions.

3. Basic Introduction
• What is Cloud Computing.
• Types of Cloud Computing.
• Vendors
• DataBases on AZURE

4. • What is the Cloud Computing?
• Pay as you go
• Scale – UP/DOWN/IN/OUT
• Backups
• Upgrades
• Access from any ware
• SLA
• Storage
• Types
• SAAS
• IAAS
• PAAS

5. Cloud is not 1 huge machine

6. • Vendors
• AWS-Amazon Web Services
• Rackspace
• Google
• HP Cloud
• Dell
• Microsoft Azure
• Ect….

7. DATABASES on AZURE
Windows Azure SQL Databases - PAAS
SQL Server on VM - IAAS
Windows Azure Storage DocumentDB - NoSQL

8. Ways to work with SQL Azure
• SQL Azure is PAAS!
• What is PAAS in DB world?
• Azure Portal * 2
• Web portal
• SSMS
• PS

9. PAAS
Microsoft Azure SQL Databases =
SQL Azure

10. What is PAAS in DB world
You can not connect to the server
You can not manage hardware
You can not control hardware
No clusters etc.…
So… what DBA’s can do?
Nothing in infrastructure - there are 3 replicas…
Applicative work: adding Indexes, short transaction
etc.…
Performance tuning
High queries by CPU ,IO etc.…

11. Azure Portal
Create Server
Create DB – 3 ways (from portal, ssms, vs2012)
Location
Tier
Size – 1-500 GB
Security
Basic monitoring (monitoring in other tools like Quest)
Connection strings from the portal
Backups to BLOB

12. • Monitoring
• Tools
• Portals

13. Web protal
Connect – silver light – to 1 DB or to server
Run T-sql
Basic monitoring
Query plans
Add indexes
See DATA
Change schema

14. SSMS
All actions but backup

15. PS
All actions

16. The Good

17. The Good
No OS
No Upgrades
Any One, Anywhere can query DB
From Smartphone you can monitor
Scale-Up
DR
VM - templates
New features – looks at the blog (Auditing, Automation)
…. Or not 
http://azure.Microsoft.com/blog/

19. The bad

20. The bad
No regular backups
No read replica within the data center
Features that are not supported
Co administrator in Azure can change lots
of things.
Changes in Azure can bring your bill up –
without changing anything.
Fair share policy.
Scale out only via code

21. And The Ugly

22. And The Ugly
Federations is retired
Not all T-sql supported (sequence)
New feathers are slow - for example EE or
backups only via PS.
SLA – good but when you need Restart –
you can not do it.
Many small DB’s with better DTU – cost as
500 GB DB’s

23. conclusions

24. conclusions
• SO… When should we use SQL AS PAAS ?
• Simple and small DB’s
• The high point after IPO or Elections
• Reduce storage costs/IT costs
• No MSFT agreements
• When we need Unlimited resources
• Easy to manage (But risky)
• Hybrid – some on privet cloud and some on public.
• No Bottlenecks at IT, Finance ect..

25. Usege
logs
Regular DB
Lots of small DB’s
Scale up – increase DB size
Scale out – Shard
Devops

26. Price ???
Pricing calculator