Posted by Hartmut Wilms  From/InfoQ

Microsoft has announced SQL Server Data Services (SSDS) at MIX08. Being a storage service on the web, SSDS is Microsoft's Amazon S3 competitor.

SSDS is another Microsoft service running on the web in addition to BizTalk Services. Neil Hutson offers a concise summary of what SSDS is all about:

SSDS you can think of as a structured data store in the cloud(building block service), which is accessed using Internet protocols using a basic data manipulation language. SSDS is for developers and businesses that need scalable, easily programmable, and cost-effective data storage with robust database query capabilities.

The SQL Server Data Services offer a flexible data model, which is structured as follows: Customer > Account > Authority > Container > Entity. Customers are companies or individuals that use SSDS. Each customer might open an arbitrary amount of accounts, which is connected with a unique Windows Live Id. Authorities are a concept analogous to namespaces,  and are  a in the context of billing and geo-location. Containers are a unit of consistency, defining boundaries for search and update operations.  The smallest and fundamental data unit is the entity.

Neil Hudson describes this fundamental data unit as "a Flexible Entity Model, where no schema required and you can update name/value pairs (which is the smallest unit of storage)". The name/value pairs represent properties, whose type information can be changed on the fly. Properties maybe added at any time. SSDS supports "simple types such as decimal, string, bool, etc and all the properties are indexed".
Data can be accessed and altered in many ways:

• Microsoft Sync Framework (offline access)
• ADO.NET Data Services
• REST
• SOAP

Data can be manipulated by CRUD operations on authorities, containers, and entities. Queries can be executed based on a text base query language, whose syntax follows the LINQ pattern for C#.
Regarding the predominance of Amazon S3 on the web storage market Robert Scoble said:

It’s almost too late for the others to get into the game [of data storage on the web]. It’s amazing (or maybe it should be “amazoning”) to me that Ray Ozzie over at Microsoft has let Amazon have so much runway.

According to Jamie Thomson nothing's carved in stone, yet:

Can [Microsoft] stop Amazon? Who knows, it might slow them down a bit (when SSDS finally gets released - it hasn't even reached beta yet) but Amazon are already miles and miles ahead with this. Having said that, its difficult to know how far Amazon have got into the enterprise data storage market and that will be Microsoft's key battleground.

Further information can be found on the product web site and the SSDS whitepaper.

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SQL Server Data Service——微软对Amazon S3的反击

译/张海龙

微软在MIX08大会上已经宣布了SQL Server Data Services (SSDS)！作为一个Web存储服务，SSDS是微软与Amazon S3进行竞争的产品。

SSDS是继BizTalk Services之后，微软的另一个运行于Web之上的服务。Neil Hutson对到底什么是SSDS进行了简短的总结：

你可以认为SSDS是一个可以存储结构化数据的云（用以构建大型应用），你可以使用基本的数据操作语言通过互联网协议对它进行访问。SSDS是为那些对系统扩展性有要求、需要简化编程、及对数据存储有强健查询能力的需求而又对成本敏感的开发者和商业应用而设计。

SQL Server Data Service提供了一个灵活的数据模型，它被构建成这样的一种结构：Customer > Account > Authority > Container > Entity。Customer是使用SSDS的公司或独立开发者；每个Customer都可能会创建数量极多的账号；这些账号与一个唯一的Windows Live Id相关联；认证是一个与命名空间相似的概念，它与账单和Geo-Location定位系统相关联；Container则是保持一致性的单元，以确定搜索和更新操作的边界范围；最小和最基础的数据单元就是Entity。

Neil Hudson将这个最基础的数据单元称为“Flexible Entity Model，它对结构没有要求，你可以直接更新成对的name/value（这也就是最小的存储单位）”。成对的name/value代表着属性，其中的类型信息可以随时被改变。属性也可以随时添加。SSDS支持“简单的类型，如decimal、string、bool等，而且所有的属性都会被索引”。

数据可以通过多种方式进行访问和修改：

• Microsoft Sync Framework (离线访问)
• ADO.NET Data Services
• REST
• SOAP

在Authority、Container和Entity层，可以对数据进行CRUD操作。可以通过支持LINQ的C#语法的文本查询语言来进行查询。

对于Amazon S3在Web存储市场上的优势，Robert Scoble说到：

对于想参加Web存储服务“游戏”的人来说现在已经太晚了，微软的Ray Ozzie竟然让Amazon领跑如此之远，这真让我感到吃惊。

Jamie Thomson则认为尽管现在它还无法撼动Amazon，但是：

微软能成功阻击Amazon吗？谁知道呢，也许能让Amazon发展得慢一点（当然，这也要等SSDS最终发布了才有可能，现在它甚至连Beta版都还没有），但Amazon现在已经大大地超前了。话虽如此，但Amazon在企业级数据存储市场到底扎根有多深还很难说，而那里才是微软将来的主战场。

想得到更多信息，可以查看产品网站和SSDS白皮书。