Azure

Microsoft Azure, often referred to as Azure (/ˈæʒər, ˈeɪʒər/ AZH-ər, AY-zhər, UK also /ˈæzjʊər, ˈeɪzjʊər/ AZ-ure, AY-zure), is a cloud computing platform run by Microsoft. It offers access, management, and the development of applications and services through global data centers. It also provides a range of capabilities, including software as a service (SaaS), platform as a service (PaaS), and infrastructure as a service (IaaS). Microsoft Azure supports many programming languages, tools, and frameworks, including Microsoft-specific and third-party software and systems. Azure was first introduced at the Professional Developers Conference (PDC) in October 2008 under the codename "Project Red Dog." It was officially launched as Windows Azure in February 2010 and later renamed Microsoft Azure on March 25, 2014. Services Microsoft Azure uses large-scale virtualization at Microsoft data centers worldwide and offers more than 600 services. Computer services Virtual machines, infrastructure as a service (IaaS) allowing users to launch general-purpose Microsoft Windows and Linux virtual machines, software as a service (SaaS) as well as preconfigured machine images for popular software packages. Starting in 2022, VMs are powered by Ampere Cloud-native processors. Most users run Linux on Azure, some of the many Linux distributions offered, including Microsoft's own Linux-based Azure Sphere. App services, platform as a service (PaaS) environment letting developers easily publish and manage websites. Websites, Azure Web Sites allows developers to build sites using ASP.NET, PHP, Node.js, Java, or Python and can be deployed using FTP, Git, Mercurial, Team Foundation Server or uploaded through the user portal. This feature was announced in preview form in June 2012 at the Meet Microsoft Azure event. Customers can create websites in PHP, ASP.NET, Node.js, or Python, or select from several open-source applications from a gallery to deploy. This comprises one aspect of the platform as a service (PaaS) offerings for the Microsoft Azure Platform. It was renamed Web Apps in April 2015. WebJobs are applications that can be deployed to an App Service environment to implement background processing that can be invoked on a schedule, on-demand, or run continuously.