CAUG Oct 2016

Access with Azure SQL Database V12 - Part II

Updates to Report:

Free Trial $200 credit expires after 30 days - surprise! StackOverflow post on dealing with expired trial. Switch from free to pay-as-you-go requires ticket.
To restore Azure V12 .bacpac files you need an updated version of SQL Server Management Studio (SSMS). See Stack Overflow post: Unable to import SQL Azure V12 BACPAC: "type Microsoft.Data.Tools.Schema.Sql.SqlAzureV12DatabaseSchemaProvider is not valid"
Was able to backup to Azure container blob
Plan B options for pulling data back down to Access backend: VBA to transfer data from Azure BE to Access BE.
Costs: about $1-$2/day, so not cheap. Microsoft's Azure Pricing Calculator
Adding Stored Procedures to off-load slow queries to the server: create and manage using SSMS - there's no native interface in Azure for this. Interface different from that for SSEE backend.
How best to the new leverage cloud-based backend for new web-centric applications? Microsoft PowerApp - successor to InfoPath and (Access Web Apps?). Azure Portal Availability Chart (@ Microsoft Azure) gives the options.

Questions/Annoyances:

Azure storage is available in the trial.
error for expired trial should make that clear; error handling needs in frontend?
response time varied, unclear why.
go with ACCDB? Doesn't seem to work as well with MDB.
"not yet available in the portal" use Classic Portal messages.
not the best free trial program: Google free trial is $300/60 days; AWS - free-tier lasts 1 year.
pricing calculator
keys for sharing .bacpac file are at container, not blob, level?

Notes:

Don't need to UNION if using RSVP rather than attendance