How has the programming model evolved with SDS?
Previously, SDS supported a flexible, Entity based data model. After getting valuable customer feedback it was apparent that there was a need for a fully relational data model in the cloud. SDS represents the move from the ACE programming model to a relational data model with many familiar SQL Server-like programming concepts. Developers will be able to utilize existing Transact-SQL code to access their data in the cloud. They will also create and modify applications that utilize existing Transact-SQL code to interact with the fully relational cloud database service. In addition, they can expose REST and SOAP services on top of their data easily using existing data access frameworks, such as ADO.NET Data Services.