Migrating Large-Scale Services to the Cloud

This book reveals the technical challenges and successful implementation details of migrating MSN, Microsoft’s consumer content portal–a business with 450 million worldwide users–into the Cloud. Following a technique long used in aviation, medicine, and other fields, MSN’s Chief Technical Officer, Eric Passmore, describes the set of release, deployment, monitoring, and mitigation checklists used to build cloud services supporting hundreds of millions of users on Azure, Microsoft’s Public Cloud.

An undertaking of this scale–involving services supported by a large team of engineers–involves unique challenges and risks. This book demonstrates through personal experience how to cut through the theory and provides checklists as a surprisingly simple antidote to the competing methodologies.

This book works at two levels.

• At a fundamental level, businesses need to be successful in the cloud if they want to seize new opportunities and transform their business to compete successfully. This book provides a framework for success by identifying the “hidden” work as part of moving to the cloud.
• At a more practical, level there is an incredible hunger for simple to follow, “how-to” information on Cloud migration. This book is a reference guide to reduce risk and achieve success without requiring the busy reader to wade through theory.

It contains simple to follow, “how-to” information on cloud migration. It is a reference guide to achieving success, and any team can modify these tasks to fit the needs of their own organization.

Who This Book is For

Technology professionals who deploy services in the cloud or are thinking of moving to the cloud. Professionals in the DevOps and Cloud services fields need these skills to succeed in their current jobs or advance their careers.

Table of Contents

Chapter 1: The Story of MSN
Chapter 2: Brave New World
Chapter 3: A Three-Step Process for Large-Scale Cloud Services
Chapter 4: Success
Chapter 5: What We Learned
Chapter 6: Pre-Release and Deployment Checklist
Chapter 7: Monitoring and Alerting Checklist
Chapter 8: Mitigation Checklist