Computing Reviews
Today's Issue Hot Topics Search Browse Recommended My Account Log In
Review Help
Search
Microservices with Azure : build highly maintainable and scalable enterprise-grade apps
Tanasseri N., Rai R., Packt Publishing, Birmingham, UK, 2017. 310 pp. Type: Book (978-1-787121-14-0)
Date Reviewed: Aug 17 2018

This introductory book on microservices and Microsoft Azure Service Fabric will help readers understand good development practices, that is, using proven architectural patterns to address common architectural challenges associated with the microservices architecture.

The first two chapters lay the foundations of microservices and Microsoft Azure. Chapter 1 covers foundational concepts of microservices and application usage. It highlights the need for seamless scalability to handle the increasing demands of computing, storage, and network infrastructure; addresses key drawbacks of service-oriented architecture (SOA), especially cohesion of services; and shows how microservices handle these drawbacks (isolation of services) using a sample real-world SOA application. Chapter 2 summarizes some challenges for a microservices hosting platform, microservices application life cycle management, and ways to simplify the development of microservices. It is also a brief primer on using Microsoft Azure as a platform for hosting Internet-scale applications.

The next four chapters, on Microsoft Azure Service Fabric, are the heart of the book. Readers are introduced to various programming models available in Azure Service Fabric, which acts as an orchestrator for managing microservices. Chapter 3 introduces the basic concepts and architecture of Azure Service Fabric, including infrastructure, system services, programming models, and creating a cluster on Azure. Chapter 4, on building Service Fabric applications, summarizes service discovery and the communication protocols needed, and presents the building and deployment of applications on a Service Fabric cluster as guest executables. Also addressed are topics such as configuring the manifest for custom endpoints, load balancers, health checks, and deploying guest executables and guest containers on Service Fabric. Chapter 5 presents the Reliable Services programming model, used for building microservices hosted on Service Fabric; both stateless and stateful service architectures and life cycles are treated here. Chapter 6 introduces Service Fabric’s Reliable Actors programming model. It presents the actor framework and the virtual actor model, including how it is used to save state and maintain distribution and failover, and discusses communication among actors and with clients, as well as asynchronous communication drivers (timers, reminders, and events).

The next two chapters introduce microservices architecture patterns and discuss several practical architecture patterns. Chapter 7 discusses the classification of architectural patterns for microservices, with recommendations for choosing the right one. Chapter 8 discusses common architecture patterns that can be applied on microservices-based systems. It presents a catalog of design patterns, including several patterns for optimization, operation, and implementation challenges.

The final four chapters address essential concepts such as DevOps, security, and nanoservices. Chapter 9 covers microservices deployment on a Service Fabric cluster, and chapter 10 reviews the setup, diagnostics, and monitoring of a Service Fabric application. DevOps, continuous integration, and continuous deployment using Visual Studio Team Services are presented in chapter 11. Chapter 12 is on serverless computing and building microservices using Azure functions.

To summarize, this book is well written and practitioners will enjoy reading it. However, microservices will work better when coupled with the complementary principles of domain-driven design and the fundamentally good design principles of increased cohesion and decreased coupling, that is, adhering to principles of communication relevancy/minimalism between the congruent system parts.

Reviewers:  Srini RamaswamyHarish ViswanathanHarish Viswanathan Review #: CR146209 (1811-0549)
Bookmark and Share
  Reviewer Selected
Featured Reviewer
 
 
Cloud Computing (C.2.4 ... )
 
Would you recommend this review?
yes
no
Other reviews under "Cloud Computing": Date
Cloud security and privacy: an enterprise perspective on risks and compliance
Mather T., Kumaraswamy S., Latif S., O’Reilly Media, Inc., Sebastopol, CA, 2009.  336, Type: Book (9780596802769), Reviews: (1 of 3)
Dec 14 2009
Cloud security and privacy: an enterprise perspective on risks and compliance
Mather T., Kumaraswamy S., Latif S., O’Reilly Media, Inc., Sebastopol, CA, 2009.  336, Type: Book (9780596802769), Reviews: (2 of 3)
Jan 26 2010
Cloud security and privacy: an enterprise perspective on risks and compliance
Mather T., Kumaraswamy S., Latif S., O’Reilly Media, Inc., Sebastopol, CA, 2009.  336, Type: Book (9780596802769), Reviews: (3 of 3)
Mar 18 2010
more...

E-Mail This Printer-Friendly
Send Your Comments
Contact Us
Reproduction in whole or in part without permission is prohibited.   Copyright 1999-2024 ThinkLoud®
Terms of Use
| Privacy Policy