Simulate a SQL Azure environment locally

Question

I´m planning to migrate an existing application to Windows Azure. I know about a lot of changes in architecture I have to do in my code.

Today my application uses a SQL 2k5 database, and I wish to use the SQL Azure infrastructure as a replacement for the SQL Server. However, I haven´t found any kind of "SQL Azure Express", an application that can create locally an environment with the same (or almost the same) features those SQL Azure has. The question is: is there a server that a I can download it and run on my local server? Where I can find it?

Answer 1

There is no locally-installable SQL Azure. However, you can easily develop locally and point to a SQL Azure database in the cloud. If you have an MSDN subscription, you get a 1GB or 5GB database included, depending on subscription.

You can also develop against SQL Express locally, but this won't give you complete feature parity. You'd need to reference the SQL Azure pages to explore the differences between SQL Server and SQL Azure. You'd also want to run your local SQL Server / SQL Express database through the SQL Azure Migration Wizard to spot differences.