Chapter 1. Introducing Google App Engine
Google App Engine is a web application hosting service. By “web application,” we mean an application or service accessed over the Web, usually with a web browser: storefronts with shopping carts, social networking sites, multiplayer games, mobile applications, survey applications, project management, collaboration, publishing, and all the other things we’re discovering are good uses for the Web. App Engine can serve traditional website content too, such as documents and images, but the environment is especially designed for real-time dynamic applications. Of course, a web browser is merely one kind of client: web application infrastructure is well suited to mobile applications, as well.
In particular, Google App Engine is designed to host applications with many simultaneous users. When an application can serve many simultaneous users without degrading performance, we say it scales. Applications written for App Engine scale automatically. As more people use the application, App Engine allocates more resources for the application and manages the use of those resources. The application itself does not need to know anything about the resources it is using.
Unlike traditional web hosting or self-managed servers, with Google App Engine, you only pay for the resources you use. Billed resources include CPU usage, storage per month, incoming and outgoing bandwidth, and several resources specific to App Engine services. To help you get started, every ...
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