Maarten Balliauw has posted about some new tools that Eclipse developers out there can use to develop applications on the Windows Azure platform - the Windows Azure Tools for Eclipse.

While working on the Windows Azure SDK for PHP, I had the opportunity to test-drive the development builds of the Windows Azure Tools for Eclipse. Today, the project has been released officially at www.windowsazure4e.org. Windows Azure Tools for Eclipse provides a series of wizards and utilities that allow developers to write, debug, and configure for and deploy PHP applications to Windows Azure.

The plugin also includes the SDK to give PHP applications a simple API to interface with Windows Azure. Maarten also points to some beginner tutorials to help you get started.