Top 5 Courses to Learn Spring Cloud for Java Programmers in 2019

In this article, I am going to share some of the best courses to learn Spring Cloud to develop a cloud-based application in Java.

One of the common obstacles when it comes to learning a new technology is figuring out how to start. I used to have a preference for learning from books, but now I personally like to start with an online course to learn things.  It works better because you gain a lot from the instructor's experience and you also have a chance to ask questions to the instructor.

Once you know the basics of the new technology, Spring cloud in this case, you can pick a good Spring framework book like Cloud Native Java to further solidify your knowledge and understanding.

If you are interested in building a cloud-based application in Java and other JVM languages then you might have heard about Spring Cloud, if not, don't worry. In this article, I'll tell you about Spring Cloud and how it can help you to develop a Java application for the cloud.

What is Spring Cloud?

Spring Cloud is nothing but an open-source library form Pivotal under Spring umbrella to assist Java developers in creating cloud-based applications. Developing for cloud has its own problems and Spring Cloud's goal is to make it as easy as developing a local application, if not easier.

When you develop for the cloud, you don't personally need to worry about many things like hardware, installing OS, or installing the database, but your application still needs those. Cloud providers like Cloud Foundry and Heroku provide that, but you need to do some work to access those services and that's where Spring Cloud helps.

It provides elegant cloud connectors to easily access those services, which abstracts away all cloud-specific details and allows you to access those services using the host, port, and other connection details which you normally use while developing Java application.

For example, if you need a database for your application then you need to create a DataSource object based on the database service your cloud provider gives. Spring Cloud eliminates all the work needed to access and configure the service connector and lets you focus on using those services.

It comes with a CloudFoundry and Heroku implementation but it's extensible enough to support another Cloud provides. All you need to do is implement some interfaces and add the JAR into the classpath.

You don't need to fork or build Spring Cloud to support a new cloud provider. Josh Long has explained this in good detail on his recent book, Cloud Native Java, one of the must-reads for Java developers in 2018, which you can read after going through one of these Spring cloud courses.

Top 5 Spring Cloud Courses for Java Developers

Anyway, now that you know what Spring Cloud is and how it helps to create cloud-based Java applications, let's see some of the best courses to learn Spring Cloud from Udemy and Pluralsight, two of my favorite places for online learning.

1. Spring Cloud Fundamentals

If you are looking to develop a cloud-native Java application in 2019, then this is the best course to join.

In this course, Spring Cloud Fundamentals, author Dustin Schultz explains how Spring Cloud helps you to migrate your existing Java application to the cloud and develop Java applications for the cloud from scratch.

You will also learn about essential Spring cloud components for developing a microservice architecture and paters like service discovery (Netflix Eureka), distributed configuration (Spring Cloud Config Server), intelligent routing (Netflix Zuul), circuit-breaking (Netflix Hystrix), and client-side load balancing (Netflix Ribbon).

After finishing this course you would have enough experience to build a truly cloud-native application using Spring Cloud.

2. Java Microservices With Spring Cloud: Developing Services

This is a great course to start learning how to develop microservices in Java using Spring Cloud.

The instructor Richard Seroter is an authority on cloud and application integration space. He also works for Pivotal, the company behind the Spring framework and authored many blogs posts and books on Cloud and Application integration strategy.

In the Java Microservices with Spring Cloud: Developing Services course, you will learn about microservices and how Spring Boot and Spring Cloud helps you to develop microservices using the Java programming language.

You will also learn about different microservice patterns and chase down performance issues using distributed tracing, which will help you to build better Java microservices using Spring Boot and Spring Cloud. 

3. Microservices With Spring Cloud

If you want to develop microservices in Java using Spring Cloud then this is the perfect course for you.

In the Microservices with Spring Cloud course, instructor Ken Kruger will teach you about microservice architecture and what are pros and cons of it over traditional monolithic Java application.

Over the course, you will learn how to build a microservice application using Spring Cloud and using its various sub-projects like Spring Cloud Config Server, Eureka, Ribbon, Feign, Hystrix, and others.

The course will also teach you how to develop the Spring Boot application using web interfaces, REST and Spring Data.

It's also a hands-on course as you will solve the exercises and develop an application to apply the knowledge you will learn. 

4. Master Microservices With Spring Boot and Spring Cloud

This is another awesome course to learn about microservice development using Spring Cloud. In this course, you will start with RESTful web services and end with microservices.

The Master Microservices with Spring Boot and Spring Cloud course teaches you an array of libraries and frameworks starting with Spring Boot, RESTful web services to Spring Cloud.

You will learn Ribbon to implement client-side load balancing, Eureka for service discovering, and an API Gateway using Zuul. You will also learn distributed tracing with microservices with Spring cloud Sleuth and Zipkin.

5. Microservices With Spring Boot and Spring Cloud

This is a very focused course on Spring Cloud Microservice development and like previous courses, you will also learn about Spring Cloud and how it makes developing cloud-native Java application easy.

The course, Microservices with Spring Boot and Spring Cloud, starts with building a Spring Boot-based microservice application and then using Spring Cloud features like Eureka, Feign, Ribbon, Spring Cloud Config Server, and Hystirx circuit-breaker.

You not only learn about microservices, Spring Boot, and Spring Cloud but also get access to several interview questions and answers of design and architectural challenges questions to clear any interview.

Spring Cloud provides all the tools and library needed to develop Java applications for the cloud and experienced Java developers should take advantage of that.

Spring Cloud makes it really easy by eliminating all the hard work you need to access and configure individual services and that's why it is the best framework to develop Java applications for the cloud.

If you want to learn cloud-based Java application development using Spring Cloud in 2018, these are the perfect course to start with. I strongly recommend these courses to all Java and Spring developers with 2 to 5 years of experience, tech lead, and solution architects.

If you like these Spring Cloud courses then please share with your friend and colleagues. If you have any questions or feedback then please drop a note.