Using a free pass, you can start using Microsoft Azure now. Discover how easy it is to set up an Azure account with these step-by-step instructions It is easy!

Windows Azure can seem daunting to many developers seeking to take their first steps into cloud computing. The perception that Windows Azure is too big and too different is a fallacy. This walk-through shows you just how easy it can be.

Windows Azure, by default, runs code in low trust. In this article, we explore how to enable running an Azure service with full trust.

Knowing the knobs and hooks available for web and worker roles in Azure can be very helpful to administer complex configuration settings. This article walks us through an understanding of these advanced roles and how we can use them in our Windows Azure based cloud services.

Not only does Windows Azure provide a reliable platform to host and execute services, it even provides a set of Service management APIs to help create application which can be used to monitor these services. In this article, we will walk through the creation of a simple monitoring application which will list our Azure services running in the cloud.

Windows Azure offers a plethora of programming modes to harness the power of cloud computing. In this article, we explore how to create a WCF service running on Windows Azure.

Windows Azure provides ability to cache blobs in its Content Delivery Network service. In this article, we explore Windows Azure Content Delivery Network Service and see how we can use it in our applications.

Windows Azure provides secure, scalable and easy to access services for durable storage in the cloud. In this article, we explore how we can programmatically store a file in Windows Azure storage.

Windows Azure provides a variety of storage services. In this article, we will learn more about the Windows Azure Blob service.

Silverlight is the application framework that allows us to create apps that provide rich interaction in a web environment. One of the most important concepts in this technology that one must clearly understand is Databinding. This article will explain the composition, creation and inner workings of databinding in Silverlight.

Windows Azure Connect allows Azure developers to enable IP-level network connectivity between Azure services and external resources. This article discusses how you can go around using Windows Azure Connect to create a virtual network of all our computing assets.

Early previews of Windows 8 have caused quite a stir in the developer community due to the emphasis on HTML5 and JavaScript as the "primary" way for building new apps for the Windows 8 platform. At the Microsoft Worldwide Partner Conference there was a slightly different picture presented.

Microsoft SQL Azure Reporting is a cloud-based reporting platform which can work with SQL Azure. This article walks you through how use SQL Azure Reporting to present your cloud-hosted data.

Developers targeting Windows Azure often need to access diagnostic data from their Windows Azure application. This article walks the reader through the steps Windows Azure application developers can take to capture diagnostic data in their application.

Developers targeting to use Microsoft's Azure computing platform will have questions around how to migrate their on-premise data to SQL Azure. This article walks through the steps to move data from existing on-premise installations to SQL Azure.

Developers desiring to build cloud applications based on Azure technologies will benefit from understanding how they can leverage SQL Azure for their database needs. In this article, we will show you how to build a cloud application--with data access--using SQL Azure.

The Viewbox control was introduced in Silverlight initially as a part of the Silverlight toolkit and now has been included with Silverlight 4.0. Read this article to learn about the Silverlight ViewBox control and how to use it in a Silverlight application.

Early previews of Windows 8 have caused quite the stir in the developer community. The uproar is mainly due to the emphasis on HTML5 and JavaScript as the “primary” way for building new applications for the Windows 8 platform. In this article we discuss Windows 8 and tell you what you can look forward to as a developer.

Developers who are building applications for the Windows Azure platform would also be interested in the database offering, SQL Azure. This article provides an overview of the SQL Azure editions, various subscription types and pricing structure.

The cloud computing platform from Microsoft, called Azure, provides data storage and processing capabilities. This article provides an insight to SQL Azure.

AutoComplete text functionality has become a popular part of application development. Read this article to learn about implementation of AutoComplete functionality in Silverlight using an AutoCompleteBox control.

In this article I will explain about the Managed Extensibility Framework (MEF) and demonstrate the its use in Silverlight. I will also provide the source code of a sample Silverlight application implementing the MEF concept.

Microsoft Silverlight now supports Windows Notification. Read through this article to learn about implementing Silverlight 4.0 Windows notification functionality in an Out-Of-Browser application.

Developers targeting the newly revamped Windows Phone platform will benefit from knowing the minimum hardware capabilities specified. Having knowledge of these capabilities will allow application developers to better target their applications to take advantage of these capabilities. In this article, we will walk through the various hardware specifications outlined for the Windows Phone devices.

Data validation is always an important task while developing an application of any sort. In this article I will explain the concept of data validation in Silverlight 4.0 applications.