Chapter 15: Programming the Cloud

You've probably heard the saying the cloud is just someone else's computer. While it is somewhat true, it is also wildly off target. Cloud service providers offer virtual machines running in their data centers that you can use in exchange for money, so in that way, you are using someone else's computer. However, it misses the bigger picture of what a cloud service provider is. A cloud service provider is a collection of hundreds of application-hosting, data, compliance, and computing infrastructure services that run in hundreds of data centers across the globe and are exposed through a fully programmable API.

In this chapter, we will learn how to interact with a cloud API using Microsoft Azure. We'll start by learning a bit about the nature of the APIs, including how they are described and where to find additional documentation about them. We'll learn the fundamentals of identity, authentication, and authorization. We&apos...