2017 Hello Cloud Challenge
Competition year
Active Dates (GMT):
Online Competition
Master cloud computing with Microsoft Azure and you could win $1,000!
Cloud computing is changing the technology industry. When you start looking for your first job, will you have the cloud on your résumé? You will if you compete in our Hello Cloud Challenge!
Every month, one student will win our $1,000 sweepstakes. To compete, all you need to do is sign up for Azure (free, no credit card required) through Microsoft Imagine and then complete one or more of our Hello Cloud activities. Each activity you complete gives you another chance to win. And you only have to do each activity once – your name will still be in the sweepstakes month after month!
Register for our Hello Cloud contest today and you can get started!
The Hello Cloud activities are hands-on real world scenarios that will help you learn how to manage and deploy projects in the cloud!
Click here to view Activity 1!
Click here to view Activity 2!
Click here to view the winners!
Activity One: Socialize your Azure Web App
1. Deploy your own Azure web app. If you haven't already take a look at our blog for a step-by-step tutorial on how to deploy a web app to Azure from Visual Studio Community 2015.
2. Tweet the following message on Twitter: "I just entered for a chance to win $1000 with @MSFTImagine #HelloCloudSweepstakes by leveraging the power of #Azure! http://compete.imaginecup.microsoft.com/hellocloud”
3. Visit the Twitter developer’s page and learn how to obtain the embed code for your Hello Cloud tweet and copy and paste it into your Azure web app.
Sample Code:
<!DOCTYPEhtml>
<html>
<head>
<title>Hello Cloud Social Dashboard!</title>
<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en">
<p lang="en" dir="ltr">Enter now for your chance to win $1000 with <a href="https://twitter.com/MSFTImagine">@MSFTImagine</a> <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/HelloCloudSweepstakes?src=hash">#HelloCloudSweepstakes</a> by leveraging the power of <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/Azure?src=hash">#Azure</a>! <a href="https://t.co/9wsfbs7eFx">https://t.co/9wsfbs7eFx</a>
</p>
— Pablo (@IamPablo)
<a href="https://twitter.com/IamPablo/status/777728554347827200">
September 19, 2016
</a>
</blockquote>
<script async src="//platform.twitter.com/widgets.js" charset="utf-8">
</script>
</body>
</html>
4. When you’re ready, copy your web app’s URL (it’ll look something like http://myhellocloud.azurewebsites.net/ ) and paste it into our Hello Cloud contest submission form available from your Microsoft Imagine profile page. For contest purposes, if we draw your name we’ll click your URL and verify you have a web app running with your Hello Cloud embedded tweet. That’s it!
Activity Two: Azure Web Apps Lab
The Azure Web Apps Lab includes exercises where you will build a PHP website with Visual Studio Code, provision a MySQL Web App in Azure, and deploy the website to your Azure subscription
What is this project about?
Create a database driven photo sharing website in the cloud! Azure App Services is a set of services provided by Microsoft Azure to enable developers to easily build and deploy Web apps and mobile apps for various platforms and devices. Included in the App Service family are Azure Web Apps, which allow you to quickly and easily deploy Web sites built with tools and languages you’re already familiar with; Azure Mobile Apps, which provide data services, syncing services, notification services, and other back-end services for popular mobile operating systems; Azure API Apps, which simplify the writing, publishing, and consuming of cloud APIs; and Azure Logic Apps, which are great for automating business processes. In this lab, you will use the cross-platform Visual Studio Code editor to build a Web site that uses PHP server-side scripting. The site will allow you to upload, browse, and display photos, and it will store photos in a MySQL database. You will then provision a new Azure Web App to host the site. Finally, you will upload the site’s content to the newly provisioned Web App and view it in your browser.
What Technologies will I use?
This activity integrates a PHP coded website and a MySQL database with a web app hosted in Azure App Services. You will build out the PHP code, provision the MySQL App in Azure, and deploy the website to your Azure subscription. No prior experience with PHP, databases, or web development is required. To complete this activity you need a Microsoft Account, an Azure Subscription, and Visual Studio Code.
How do I participate?
Download and unzip the lab tutorial and open the Azure Web Apps HOL file. You will learn some basics about building a PHP website with Visual Studio Code and connecting it to MySQL database services. You can access links to additional content in the lab if you want to dig deeper. When you’re ready, copy the web app URL and paste it into our Hello Cloud Activity 2 submission field from your Imagine account page.
Click here to view the 2017 Hello Cloud Official Rules and Regulations
Past Hello Cloud Winners
Congratulations to the monthly Hello Cloud drawing winners:
- October Winner: Oluwatosin, Nigeria
- November Winner: Neha, United States
- December Winner: Amine, France
- January Winner: Sandra, Ghana
- February Winner: Kevin, Venezuela
- March Winner: Girish, India
- April Winner: Edgar, Argentina
- May Winner: Omar, Saudi Arabia
- June Winner: Tushar, India