It’s a #windowsazure storage manager but not as we know it: Introducing ZUD.IO by @markrendle

The number of community projects around Windows Azure products is growing and that’s a good thing!! Yesterday Mark Rendle (@markrendle) announced a new online tool to manage your Windows Azure storage. And although he states the tooling is far from complete (but then again which software ever is J ), this tool already has got a nice couple of aces up it’s sleeve. Being a community guy, hence a little plug for the man and his online tool J

First of all: it’s still in early preview phase, so everything I write down here might be subject to change. Next to that you need to keep in mind that the tool need a registration from your side. All you need to do is follow the company behind the product and ask for a key. Easy no J.

To get started: Just browse to http://zud.io and read the simple welcome page. As you can see this tooling exists solely out of HTML and JavaScript.

This has an advange that any technology supports the tool, so you can literally run it anywhere and anyhow!

Once you’ve requested an access code you can get to the sign in part which asks for a live ID and trust this application to access your LiveID info (mail only).

Then you start with a blank screen. Like with any other Storage tool you need to add a storage account before you can start using it.

Just go and get your Storage accoutn name and shared key and enter it here

On the security side: passing your shared key shouldn’t alarm you here because following mechanism has been put in place to guarantee the privacy of your storage account. First of all no plain text storage of all storage account information. Also hash salts and encryption keys have been applied. To read more on the mechanism : see the products blog: http://blog.zud.io/security-in-zudio/

Once that’s done you can get down to business.

Once inside the first thing you notice is the design: it’s a pretty complimentary tool to the Windows Azure portal because of the same look ‘n feel, so you’ll feel immediately at home. You see a decent amount of tools already available and that you can manage all storage types: BLOBS, QUEUES and TABLES.

With each their own specific tasks and capabilities.

For Blobs:

For Queues:

For Tables:

I gave it a quick spin by using the blob storage tools. I added a folde in an already existing folder. A dialog ask for the folders name and when clicking create it immediately takes you inside the folder.

Then I just uploaded a simple image file.You get a nice dialog with multi uploading capabilities, which is quite handy. It follows up on the upload progress.

Once you’re done just press close and your files are there in your storage folder/container.

Knowing that this is still preview, I already see a lot of potential in this online tool. And if Mark keeps up to his promise (and IU Iknwo he does J, that’s for sure) then this tool will add a lot more of capabilities in the upcomming months.

My advice: help him out with testing the software by joining the preview and make it even better than it already is!