Google has added a billing function to its App Engine cloud computing platform so that developers can exceed the free usage quotas. Google says it will soon be reducing, but not eliminating, the free quotas. The new free quota levels will take effect on May 25, 2009.Google announced Feb. 24 that the company has added billing to the
Google App Engine cloud computing
platform so developers can exceed the free
usage quotas that have been in place. Google also said it will soon be
reducing, but not eliminating, the free quotas.
With the new billing capability, "developers can now purchase
additional computing resources on App Engine, enabling apps to scale beyond our
free quotas," Brett
Slatkin, a member of the Google App Engine team, wrote in a blog
post. "This has been our most requested improvement to App Engine and
we're thrilled to deliver it, as
promised."
When Google delivered App Engine in April 2008 it was free, albeit with
usage quotas. And although the quotas remain, developers will now be able to
pay to exceed those quotas. Slatkin said developers will have to "pay for
only what your app consumes beyond the free thresholds—prorated up to the
nearest penny."
App Engine remains free to get started, Slatkin said. "However,
along with many performance improvements over the past 10 months, we've learned
that we overestimated our initial free quota values," he
said. "Therefore, in 90 days we will be reducing
the free quota resources. We believe these new levels will continue to
support a reasonably efficient application serving around 5 million page views
per month, completely free."
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