Azure v2 Worker Role?

Question

I deployed an Azure Worker Role running OWIN into a Cloud Service for very fast HTTP serving. The Cloud Service exists in the "classic" environment at manage.windowsazure.com.

I would like to deploy the same lightweight application using the new ARM bits so it can be fully managed at portal.azure.com. I don't want to use a Web Application because that includes IIS.

What is the correct Platform-as-a-Service object to use in the ARM and the new portal that gives the same performance as an old Cloud Service Worker Role?

Thanks.

Answer 1

There isn't a Platform-as-a-Service object to use for this in ARM. Some Infrastructure-as-a-Service options are:

1. Create a regular Windows Azure Resource Manager VM in the new portal and set it up as an OWIN host.

2. Create an Azure Resource Manager template to deploy an OWIN host to a VM or a VM Scale Set. The template would use the custom script extension and/or DSC to do the setup. This would be a good re-usable solution, but someone would need to write the template for the first time.

3. The lightest weight solution would be to have the server running in a Docker container on Windows. You could then choose use the VM for other purposes running in other containers or purely as a container host. Note this only runs on only runs on Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview 3. See http://anthonychu.ca/post/web-api-owin-self-host-docker-windows-containers/

Edit - Note that Service Fabric is the recommended PaaS solution in Azure Resource Manager. It is not a direct equivalent of PaaS v1 but a rich service for developing micro-service based applications: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/services/service-fabric/

Answer 2

Not sure what you mean by V2 (new portal? ARM?). The portal is an independent tool, so I'm guessing you mean ARM. ARM doesn't support Cloud Service deployments currently, but you can still deploy either from Visual Studio (using the same interface you've used in the past, in visual studio) or from the portal, as a "classic" resource (which, underneath, uses the classic Azure management API).

In the portal, you'll find Cloud service (classic):

Now you can add a new cloud service:

And fill out the various parameters: