The cloud is all about interoperability, right? Microsoft has taken a step in that direction with the recent release of Windows Azure Starter Kit for Java, an Eclipse-based plug-in that enables Java developers to deploy their applications to the .NET-based Microsoft cloud. The community technology preview is available for Java developers to use with the Eclipse IDE; Microsoft is waiting for your feedback. The idea is to give developers writing in Ruby, PHP or Java an Eclipse-based solution for deploying onto the Azure platform. The starter kit includes an Apache Ant build extension that understands Azure configuration options to simplify deployment. Microsoft's goal, of course, is to have more applications running in the Azure cloud, which Microsoft hosts, as part of its all-in bet on cloud computing.