Azure Service Fabric - Tutorial 1 - Introduction

Summary

This tutorial series dives into Azure Service Fabric, a platform for developing scalable, high-availability microservices. It covers the basics of microservices, the benefits of Service Fabric for replication and partitioning, and its support for container orchestration and distributed system challenges. The series also highlights Service Fabric's open-source nature, cross-platform capabilities, and its use in powering major applications like Cosmos DB and Skype. Aimed at developers, it emphasizes the growing demand for cloud and distributed computing skills, showcasing Service Fabric's programming model for developing stateful, stateless services, and APIs.

Takeaways

• 🌐 Azure Service Fabric is a platform-as-a-service for creating internet-scale, high-availability, and low-latency microservices.
• 🔍 A microservice is a small, single-responsibility service that processes a specific type of transaction or provides an API.
• 🔄 Service Fabric facilitates high availability, reliability, and scalability through service replication and partitioning.
• 🛠️ It is not a distributed database but a distributed application framework that complements distributed databases for building scalable applications.
• 👷‍♂️ Service Fabric handles challenges like container orchestration, failure detection, and reliable message delivery internally.
• 📚 The platform is open-source with an active GitHub repository contributed to by both Microsoft and the community.
• 🌍 It is versatile, running on Windows and Linux, on-premises or in other clouds, including AWS and Google Cloud Platform.
• 📈 Service Fabric scales well, capable of scaling to thousands of machines to handle significant loads and throughput.
• 🏢 Microsoft and various other large companies, such as BMW and Honeywell, use Service Fabric to power their applications.
• 💼 Learning Service Fabric is beneficial as cloud and distributed computing skills are in high demand and command higher salaries.
• 🛠️ The tutorial series will cover developing both container orchestration and distributed applications using Service Fabric, including stateful and stateless services, APIs, and actor model services.

Q & A

What is Azure Service Fabric?

Azure Service Fabric is a platform-as-a-service for building internet-scale, highly available, and low-latency microservices.

What is a microservice?

A microservice is a small, focused service that has one responsibility, such as processing a specific type of transaction or providing an API.

How does Service Fabric help achieve high availability, reliability, and scalability?

Service Fabric helps by allowing services to be easily replicated and partitioned, which means running multiple instances of the same service and having different instances handle different subsets of data.

What is the difference between Service Fabric and a distributed database like Apache Cassandra?

Service Fabric is a distributed application framework rather than a distributed database. It works well with distributed databases to create end-to-end scalable and reliable applications.

What problems does Service Fabric solve for large-scale distributed systems?

Service Fabric handles issues like container orchestration, failure detection, and reliable message delivery, allowing developers to focus on building the business logic of their applications.

Is Service Fabric open source?

Yes, Service Fabric is open source with an active GitHub repository that is contributed to by both Microsoft and the open-source community.

On which platforms can Service Fabric run?

Service Fabric can run on Windows and Linux, on-premise or in other clouds such as AWS or Google Cloud Platform, not just on Microsoft Azure.

How does Service Fabric scale?

Service Fabric scales very well and can be scaled to thousands of machines, allowing it to handle large loads and throughput on the system.

Which Microsoft applications are powered by Service Fabric?

Microsoft applications such as Cosmos DB, Skype, Event Hubs, Bing, and Cortana are powered by Service Fabric.

Why is learning about Azure Service Fabric beneficial for a developer?

Learning about Azure Service Fabric is beneficial as cloud and distributed computing skills are in high demand and can lead to higher salaries, according to a LinkedIn survey.

What programming model does Service Fabric provide for developing distributed applications?

Service Fabric provides a programming model that supports the development of stateful and stateless services, APIs, and services built on the actor model.

What tools and languages will be used predominantly in the tutorial series?

The tutorial series will predominantly use C#, Azure, and Visual Studio 2019, with an assumption of some knowledge of these tools and languages by the user.

Outlines

00:00

🚀 Introduction to Azure Service Fabric

This paragraph introduces the tutorial series focused on Azure Service Fabric, a platform for building scalable and reliable microservices. It explains the concept of microservices, which are small, single-responsibility services that can be replicated and partitioned to achieve high availability and scalability. The paragraph also highlights how Service Fabric simplifies the development of microservices by handling challenges like container orchestration and message delivery. It mentions that Service Fabric is open-source and can be used across different platforms and operating systems, including Windows and Linux, and in various cloud environments. The paragraph concludes by noting the importance of learning Service Fabric due to its demand in the job market and its use in powering various Microsoft and other companies' applications.

05:00

🛠 Setting Up a Local Service Fabric Cluster

In this paragraph, the focus shifts to the practical aspect of the tutorial series, where viewers will learn how to install and set up a local Service Fabric cluster on a Windows machine. The speaker thanks the audience for watching and encourages them to continue engaging with the content by subscribing to the channel. This sets the stage for the upcoming tutorial on local cluster setup, which is a crucial step for developers looking to work hands-on with Service Fabric and understand its capabilities in a local development environment.

Keywords

💡Distributed Systems

Distributed systems are a set of independent computers that work together to achieve a common goal. In the context of the video, distributed systems are integral to building applications that can scale and operate efficiently across multiple machines or nodes. The video discusses how Azure Service Fabric aids in the development of such systems, emphasizing the importance of high availability, reliability, and scalability.

💡Microservices

Microservices represent a software architecture style where a large application is broken down into smaller, independent services that perform a single function. The video explains that each microservice has one responsibility, which allows for easier management, development, and scaling. Azure Service Fabric supports microservices by providing tools to replicate and partition these services, enhancing the application's overall performance and reliability.

💡Service Fabric

Azure Service Fabric is a platform for building and managing distributed systems and microservices. It is highlighted in the video as a platform-as-a-service that facilitates the creation of scalable and reliable applications. The term is used to describe the service that offers features such as container orchestration, failure detection, and message delivery, which are crucial for the operation of modern distributed applications.

💡Replication

In the context of the video, replication refers to the process of running multiple instances of the same service simultaneously to enhance availability and fault tolerance. It is a technique used within Service Fabric to ensure that services remain operational even if some instances fail, thereby improving the robustness of distributed applications.

💡Partitioning

Partitioning is the process of dividing data or services into distinct parts, each managed by a separate instance of the service. The video mentions partitioning as a method to distribute the workload and ensure that different subsets of data are handled by different service instances, contributing to the overall scalability and efficiency of the system.

💡High Availability

High availability is the ability of a system to remain operational and functional with minimal downtime. The video describes how Service Fabric achieves high availability through the replication and partitioning of services, ensuring that applications continue to run smoothly even in the face of hardware or software failures.

💡Scalability

Scalability refers to a system's capability to handle growing amounts of work by adding resources or components. The video script emphasizes the importance of scalability in modern applications and how Service Fabric supports this by allowing services to scale out to thousands of machines, accommodating fluctuating loads and demands.

💡Container Orchestration

Container orchestration is the automation of container deployment, scaling, and management. The video mentions that Service Fabric handles container orchestration, similar to Kubernetes, which is essential for deploying and operating containers in a distributed environment. This feature is crucial for maintaining the efficiency and reliability of containerized applications.

💡Failure Detection

Failure detection is the process of identifying when a component of a system has stopped functioning correctly. The video script explains that Service Fabric has built-in mechanisms for failure detection, which is vital for maintaining system health and ensuring that issues are addressed promptly in a distributed system.

💡Reliable Message Delivery

Reliable message delivery ensures that messages sent between components of a distributed system are received accurately and completely. The video discusses how Service Fabric facilitates this through its internal mechanisms, which is important for maintaining the integrity of communication within distributed applications.

💡Open Source

Open source refers to software whose source code is available to the public, allowing anyone to view, use, modify, and distribute it. The video mentions that Service Fabric is open source and has an active GitHub repository, indicating that it is developed collaboratively by Microsoft and the open-source community, which contributes to its innovation and adaptability.

💡CI/CD Pipelines

CI/CD pipelines refer to the automation of the software development process, encompassing Continuous Integration and Continuous Deployment/Delivery. The video script mentions setting up CI/CD pipelines for automating deployments, which is an important practice for streamlining the development and release process of applications built with Service Fabric.

Highlights

Introduction to the tutorial series on distributed systems.

Focus on Azure Service Fabric, a platform-as-a-service for building internet-scale, low-latency microservices.

Explanation of microservices and their role in high availability, reliability, and scalability.

Service Fabric helps with replication and partitioning of services to achieve high availability and scalability.

Comparison of Service Fabric with Apache Cassandra, noting that Service Fabric is a distributed application framework.

Service Fabric simplifies container orchestration, failure detection, and reliable message delivery.

Service Fabric is open-source, with contributions from both Microsoft and the open-source community.

Service Fabric can run on Windows, Linux, on-premises, or in other cloud platforms like AWS and Google Cloud Platform.

Scalability of Service Fabric to thousands of machines, handling huge loads and throughput.

Microsoft uses Service Fabric for applications like Cosmos DB, Skype, Event Hubs, Bing, and Cortana.

Other companies using Service Fabric include BMW, Schneider Electric, Honeywell, and KPMG.

Cloud and distributed computing skills are in high demand, making knowledge of Service Fabric valuable for developers.

Service Fabric provides container orchestration similar to Kubernetes and includes a built-in programming model.

The programming model allows for the development of stateful and stateless services, APIs, and services based on the actor model.

The tutorial will cover setting up a Service Fabric cluster locally on Windows and developing CI/CD pipelines for deployment.

Overview of using C#, Azure, and Visual Studio 2019, as well as other programming languages like Node.js and Python on Service Fabric.

Next video will demonstrate installing and setting up Service Fabric cluster locally on a Windows machine.

Transcripts

hi guys welcome back to another tutorial

series in this tutorial series we'll be

continuing to look at distributed

systems and this we'll be looking at as

or service fabric Azure service fabric

is a platform as-a-service

for building internet scale high troop

or low latency micro services so for

those who don't know a micro service is

a very small service that usually just

has one responsibility so it's just

responsible for performing one action

say processes in one type of transaction

or providing an API and using micro

services allows us to split our

application to achieve high availability

reliability and scalability service

fabric gives us a lot of help with this

and allows us to easily replicate which

means running multiple instances of the

same service at once partition which

means having different instances of the

same service handled different subsets

of our data and by replicating and

partitioning our services were able to

achieve the high availability

reliability and scalability that is

often demanded of today's modern

application that are always on

distributed and need to be very scalable

for loads that change from time to time

so in our previous tutorial series we

talked a lot about Apache Cassandra

which is a distributed database now

service fabric is is not really a

distributed database it's more of a

distributed application framework and

these work very well with distributed

databases who achieve an application

that's end and very scalable and very

reliable and service fabric helps us to

solve many of the problems that are

commonly associated with these

large-scale distributed systems so

things like container orchestration

failure detection and reliable message

delivery are all handled internally by

the service fabric platform and we can

just focus on building the business

logic that our application needs so we

can see on the service of fabric home

page here that as we said our service

fabric allows us to build and operate

always-on scalable distributed

applications and allows us to simplify

the development of our micro services

and orchestrate our containers and

unlike many of the Microsoft products

with the past service fabric is about

open source so there's

actually a github that's actively

contributed to by both Microsoft and the

open-source community so we can actually

see that here and we if we want we can

go and we can look into the source code

of service fabric we can look at all the

different files that are there and if we

want to get a deep dive into how service

fabric is actually built we can look at

that here and also service fabric can

run anywhere so it runs about Windows

and Linux it can run on premise or in

other cloud so we can actually boot up a

service fabric cluster in AWS or in

Google cloud platform

not just Microsoft Azure so just like

many ordered distributed systems service

fabric scales very well so we can scale

it to thousands of machines so this can

allow us to handle huge load and huge

true put on our system so who uses

service fabric obviously Microsoft uses

service fabric to power a lot of their

applications that are used widely so for

instance cosmos DB Skype event hubs Bing

and Cortana are all powered under the

hood buzzer or service fabric and it's

also used by a wide variety of order

companies or big companies like we can

see here on the service fabric web site

like BMW Schneider Electric Honeywell

KPMG and a host of other big and small

companies throughout the world apart for

getting a job in one of these companies

why would a developer want to learn

about Azure service fabric so if we can

look at this medium post which has

information here from LinkedIn survey we

can see that cloud and distributed

computing skills top the salary scale

for the most in-demand skills of 2018 so

this includes things like service fabric

kubernetes or anything that's kind of

deployed on the cloud and is related to

distributed systems this is obviously a

very in-demand skill so it's a skill a

lot of employers are looking for and

it's a skill that a lot of new

applications demand so in this tutorial

we'll look at both so as we said service

fabric provides both container

orchestration abilities similar to

something like kubernetes but also comes

with a built-in programming model which

helps developers quickly develop

distributed applications the programming

model allows us to develop stateful and

stateless services as well as api's and

services built on the actor model and

we'll go through each of these types of

services in this tutorial

series as well as looking how to run

independent container is using docker on

the service fabric cluster the tutorial

will assume the user has some knowledge

of c-sharp as well as Azure but in-depth

knowledge is not required and we'll be

using c-sharp azure and Visual Studio

2019 predominantly we also setup a multi

node cluster in the cloud and develop CI

CD pipelines to automate our deployment

in addition we also look at service

Arabic works with some other programming

languages like nodejs or Python and how

we can run on other operating systems

like Linux so in the next video we're

gonna look at how to install and set up

service fabric cluster locally on a

Windows machine so thanks for watching

the video guys if you enjoyed it please

keep watching and subscribe to the

channel