Proof of Concept – Hosting C++ Batch Processors in Azure App Services

Client

Federal Government Agency – ICT Modernisation Program

Challenge

A federal government agency relied on a set of C++ batch processors for critical data processing tasks. While effective in their original environment, these processors presented several challenges:

• Limited scalability – constrained by fixed infrastructure.

• Minimal monitoring – little visibility into execution logs or failures.

• Integration hurdles – difficult to align with modern cloud-based systems.

• High operational cost – manual oversight required for routine execution.

The agency sought a Proof of Concept (POC) to explore how legacy batch workloads could be modernised, containerised, and orchestrated in the Azure cloud without requiring extensive re-engineering.

Azooa’s Approach

Azure App Services for Batch Hosting

Azooa proposed running the C++ processors within Azure App Services, leveraging containerisation to package both the legacy executables and supporting runtime dependencies. This enabled the processors to operate in a fully managed platform-as-a-service (PaaS) environment.

Background Worker Wrapper

To orchestrate execution, Azooa developed a .NET Background Worker wrapper. This layer handled:

• Launching and supervising the C++ batch jobs.

• Capturing logs, errors, and process exit codes.

• Scheduling recurring tasks and applying retry logic.

• Forwarding telemetry into Application Insights for monitoring.

Integration with Azure Services

The POC also demonstrated integration with Azure-native services to extend functionality:

• Azure Storage Queues for event-driven job triggering.

• Blob Storage for handling input and output data files.

• Application Insights for centralised monitoring, reporting, and diagnostics.

Secure Cloud Deployment

All components were deployed into the agency’s sovereign Azure tenancy, ensuring compliance with federal cloud security and audit requirements.

Outcome

The POC proved that:

• Legacy C++ processors could run reliably in Azure without code rewrites.

• Operational efficiency improved through automated scheduling and monitoring.

• Scalability was achieved by leveraging App Service scaling rules.

• Compliance was maintained, with logs and execution data retained for audit.

Why Azooa

Azooa has demonstrated the ability to bridge legacy workloads with modern cloud-native platforms. By wrapping critical C++ batch processors in a resilient orchestration framework, we enabled the federal government client to retain their existing investment in software while gaining the benefits of scalability, monitoring, and cloud integration.

Azooa – Modernising government workloads for the cloud era.