Data Access Incubation Projects

Project Codename “Astoria” - https://astoria.mslivelabs.com.

Microsoft Codename Astoria enables applications to expose data as a data service that can be consumed by web clients within a corporate network and across the internet. The data service is reachable over regular HTTP requests, and standard HTTP verbs such as GET, POST, PUT and DELETE are used to perform operations against the service. The payload format for the service is controllable by the application, but all options are simple, open formats such as plain XML and JSON. Web-friendly technologies make Astoria an ideal data back-end for AJAX-style applications, and other applications that need to operate against data that is across the web.
Pablo Castro's blog : Codename "Astoria": Data Services for the Web

Project Codename “Jasper”

Project Jasper is geared towards iterative and agile development. You can start interacting with the data in your database without having to create mapping files or define classes. You can build user interfaces by naming controls according to your model without worrying about binding code. Project Jasper is also extensible, allowing you to provide your own business logic and class model. Since Project Jasper is built on top of the ADO.NET Entity Framework, it supports rich queries and complex mapping.

To learn more about Project Jasper visit the ADO.NET Blog at https://blogs.msdn.com/adonet
To download the Project Jasper CTP visit https://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=471BB3AC-B31A-49CD-A567-F2E286715C8F&displaylang=en.