Microsoft introduced the first Service Update for its Cloud-based data platform on February 17th, 2010, and customers embracing Windows Azure should expect more refreshes to the components of the Cloud platform, although there’s no telling at which rate they will be delivered. Service Update 1 for SQL Azure was made available at just a couple of weeks since Microsoft started charging customers for its Cloud platform, namely the general availability deadline. David Robinson, SQL Azure senior program manager, notes that the software giant has been taking feedback into account and incorporating input into SU1.
“In addition to a few bug fixes, we have added the following new features: troubleshooting and Supportability DMVs, ability to move between editions, idle session timeouts, and long running transactions,” Robinson stated.

Microsoft announced that it had wrapped up Windows Azure at the Professional Developers Conference 2009 in Los Angeles, but the Cloud platform remained in Community Technology Preview stage until January 2010. At the start of this year, the CTP tag was removed entirely, but it took the company another month before it started making customers pay for their Windows Azure usage.

With the advent of SU1 for SQL Azure, companies leveraging the Cloud platform can now use Dynamic Management Views (DMVs) return state information for monitoring purposes, and track the health of databases. Of course, the data returned by DMVs can also be used to diagnose problems, and optimize performance.

“One of the most requested features was the ability to move up and down between a Web or Business edition database. This provides you greater flexibility and if you approach the upper limits of the Web edition database, you can easily upgrade with a single command. You can also downgrade if your database is below the allowed size limit,” Robinson explained.

“We have increased the idle connection timeout from 5 to 30 minutes. This will improve your experience while using connection pooling and other interactive tools,” he added. “Based on customer feedback, we have improved our algorithm for terminating long running transactions. These changes will substantially increase the quality of service and allow you to import and export much larger amounts of data without having to resort to breaking your data down into chunks.”