Some of the new Windows Azure enhancements announced at PDC include:  Virtual Machine Role, Elevated Privileges, Full IIS, Remote Desktop, Windows Azure Connect (formerly Project “Sydney”), Extra Small instances, a new Windows Azure Platform management portal, and more.  

These new enhancements and the new Windows Azure Tools for Visual Studio November release (version 1.3) are now available.  

Some of these features are generally available today to everyone, while others are staring to be rolled out as a beta or CTP.  You can find more details about these new features in the announcement on the Windows Azure team blog.

Windows Azure Platform Training Kit – November Update

The November release of the training kit includes several new hands-on labs for the new Windows Azure features and the new/updated services. All of them have been updated to use the new Windows Azure Tools for Visual Studio version 1.3 (November release). The updates in this training kit include:

·         [New lab] Advanced Web and Worker Role – shows how to use admin mode and startup tasks

·         [New lab] Connecting Apps With Windows Azure Connect – shows how to use Project Sydney

·         [New lab] Virtual Machine Role – shows how to get started with VM Role by creating and deploying a VHD

·         [New lab] Windows Azure CDN – simple introduction to the CDN

·         [New lab] Introduction to the Windows Azure AppFabric Service Bus Futures – shows how to use the new Service Bus features in the AppFabric labs environment

·         [New lab] Building Windows Azure Apps with Caching Service – shows how to use the new Windows Azure AppFabric Caching service

·         [New lab] Introduction to the AppFabric Access Control Service V2 – shows how to build a simple web application that supports multiple identity providers

·         [Updated] Introduction to Windows Azure – updated to use the new Windows Azure platform Portal

·         [Updated] Introduction to SQL Azure – updated to use the new Windows Azure platform Portal

You can download the November update of the Windows Azure Platform Training kit from here:  http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkID=130354

The HOLs are also directly published to MSDN to make it easier for developers to review and use the content without having to download an entire training kit package.  You can now browse to all of the HOLs online in MSDN here:  http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/?LinkId=207018

(thanks to James Conard)