Cloud Workstations: Microsoft Dev Box is Now Available

Dev-optimized, cloud-based workstations called Microsoft Dev Box are now available for general use. This announcement was made at the Microsoft Build event, where several new features and enhancements were introduced. Microsoft Dev Box is designed to provide developers with ready-to-code workstations in the cloud, optimized for their specific use cases and productivity needs.

The Evolution of Developer Productivity

The journey towards creating dev-optimized virtual desktops started with the introduction of Azure DevTest Labs in 2016. This service allowed development teams to create virtual machines for various development and testing purposes. Over the years, customers built custom solutions on top of DevTest Labs, with one popular use case being the creation of persistent, preconfigured development environments. However, building these custom solutions required significant effort to add governance and management features, leading to the demand for a turnkey solution.

Self-Service Development Environments in the Cloud

In response to customer feedback, Visual Studio Codespaces was introduced in 2019. It offered preconfigured, container- and Linux-based development environments that could be quickly spun up from Visual Studio Code. While Codespaces gained popularity, developers also requested support for other IDEs, source code management, and tools. As a result, Codespaces expanded its support beyond Visual Studio Code and GitHub.

To address the challenges of enterprise-ready management and governance, as well as the need for access to all development tools in the cloud environment, Microsoft decided to utilize Windows 365 as the foundation for the new solution. Windows 365 provides Cloud PCs that securely stream personalized Windows desktops, apps, settings, and content from the Microsoft Cloud to any device, integrated with Microsoft Intune for IT administration.

In addition to enterprise management, the underlying hardware was considered. Storage performance was identified as a crucial factor impacting developer productivity, particularly during large builds. To address this, Microsoft Dev Box includes premium Solid-State Drives (SSDs) to ensure high-performance storage.

To simplify the configuration and deployment process, a new management layer was established, integrating with the Azure Compute Gallery. This enabled teams to organize images and networking configurations by project, allowing multiple tailored workstation configurations for a single project. Developers could choose a suitable configuration from the Developer Portal, eliminating the need to reach out to IT for provisioning new workstations.

Microsoft Dev Box also offers integration with Visual Studio and supports configuration-as-code customization, providing more control and flexibility for dev leads to configure dev boxes according to specific tasks and integrate with existing Git flows.

Before the general availability launch, Microsoft extensively tested Dev Box internally, stress-testing it against large repositories. Currently, there are over 10,000 engineers using Dev Box at Microsoft, and several customers have already adopted it in their production environments.

Regarding pricing, Microsoft learned from customer usage patterns and introduced flexible options. Full-time usage of Dev Box is charged at a predictable monthly price, while part-time usage follows a consumption-based, pay-as-you-go model with a monthly price cap. This allows developers to optimize their spend based on their specific usage needs.

FAQs

Microsoft Dev Box aims to provide developers with powerful, cloud-based workstations that are optimized for their requirements, while offering enterprise-grade management, flexibility, and pricing options.