In the first part of this short series covering the RadControls for ASP.NET AJAX in the cloud, I showed you how you could quickly (and easily) start a new Azure Cloud Service project, add the RadControls, and then debug the project locally. The next step, of course, is taking that locally built and debugged project and deploying it to the “real” cloud fabric, hosted by Microsoft in their data center (not yet data centers…). That is where the rubber meets the proverbial road and we find out if the Telerik RadControls are really “cloud ready.”
HOW DO YOU DEPLOY TO AZURE?
Assuming you’ve built a new cloud service application (using the VS template) and you’ve debugged it locally and everything is working, you only need to complete these steps to deploy your app to the cloud:
Assuming you’ve done everything correctly and you’ve patiently waited on all of Azure’s seemingly endless processes to complete the processing, you’ll have a site running live on the cloud with the RadControls for ASP.NET AJAX providing their familiar rich-UI.
HOW ‘BOUT THE GOTCHAS?
There really aren’t any new gotchas here. The only thing that may surprise you is the waiting. You really do have to have some patience to deploy a project to Azure (at least during the CTP), so be prepared to wait for ten minutes or more for some Azure processes to finish. Otherwise, things are very straight forward. Visual Studio packages your files and configuration. Azure consumes those packages directly. You click buttons and your site runs (in theory).
I NEED VISUAL PROOF
For those of you hoping to “see it to believe it,” I’ve got you covered. I have created two videos (so far) that cover both creating and deploying a simple “app” with the RadControls for ASP.NET AJAX to Azure. Both videos will be on Telerik TV soon and I’ll be sure to add links to this post when they’re ready. Until then, have fun playing with Azure and don’t be afraid to use your RadControls for ASP.NET AJAX as you tackle the cloud!
Todd Anglin is Vice President of Product at Progress. Todd is responsible for leading the teams at Progress focused on NativeScript, a modern cross-platform solution for building native mobile apps with JavaScript. Todd is an author and frequent speaker on web and mobile app development. Follow Todd @toddanglin for his latest writings and industry insights.