Azure Weekly Newsletter Issue #321

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@HowardvRooijen | @endjin

AI + Machine Learning

Covering: Anomaly detector, Azure Bot Service, Azure Machine Learning, Azure Open Datasets, Bing APIs, Cognitive Services, Computer Vision, Content moderator, Custom vision, Data Science Virtual Machines, Face, Form Recogniser, Immersive Reader, Ink Recogniser, Language Understanding (LUIS), Machine Learning Studio, Microsoft Genomics, ML.NET, Personaliser, Project Cortex, QnA Maker, Speaker Recognition, Speech-to-Text, Speech translation, Text Analytics, Text to Speech , Translator Speech, Translator Text

• Xun Wang writes about Big data preparation in Azure Machine Learning – powered by Azure Synapse Analytics
• Krishna Doss explains how to Localize your website with Microsoft Translator
• Inderjit Rana discusses Azure Cognitive Services with data in VNET Protected Storage

Analytics

Covering: Apache Spark for HDInsight, Apache Storm for HDInsight, Azure Analysis Services, Azure Data Explorer, Azure Data Share, Azure Databricks, Azure Stream Analytics, Azure Synapse Analytics, Data Catalog, Data Factory, Data Lake Analytics, Event Hubs, HDInsight, .NET for Apache Spark, R Server for HDInsight, Azure Purview

• John Steen introduces The GREATEST and LEAST T-SQL functions in Azure Synapse Analytics
• On SQL Server Central, Diponkar Paul walks through how to Dynamically Add a Timestamp To Files in Azure Data Factory
• The Azure Updates Team highlights that Azure Data Factory has announced Data Flow general availability in two new Azure regions
• On Channel 9, Aaron Nelson (@SQLvariant) talks about how to How to Parameterize Notebooks for Automation in Azure Data Studio
• Jovan Popovic (@jocapc) describes how to Query serverless SQL pool from an Apache Spark Scala notebook
• On the Azure blog, Erin Chapple (@erinchapple) highlights: Microsoft brings Azure supercomputing to UK Met Office

Compute

Covering: Azure CycleCloud, Azure Dedicated Host, Azure Functions, Azure VMware Solution by CloudSimple, Batch, Cloud Services, Linux Virtual Machines, SAP HANA on Azure Large Instances, Service Fabric, Virtual Machines, Virtual Machine Scale Sets

• Aysha Keen writes about the General Availability of M-series Msv2/Mdsv2 Medium Memory VMs for memory-optimized workloads
• On Code Project, Dawid Borycki discusses Java on Azure: A Complete Serverless Cloud Native Application
• Thomas Maurer (@thomasmaurer) explains how to Create a Windows 10 development virtual machine
• The Azure Updates Team announces that Azure Virtual Machines DCsv2-series are now available in public preview in Azure Government and the general availability of new M-series Msv2/Mdsv2 Medium Memory VMs for memory-optimized workloads
• James Dumont le Douarec walks through a VM Scale Set with a local Azure Custom Script pushed via Terraform

Containers

Covering: Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Azure Red Hat OpenShift, CNAB, CNCF, Container Instances, Container Registry, Porter, WSL, Web App for Containers

• On the DEV site, Donovan Brown (@DonovanBrown) and Jay Gordon demystify Helm
• Daniel Neumann (@neumanndaniel) explains how to Implement rate limiting with Istio on Azure Kubernetes Service
• On the Azure Medium blog, Agraj Mangal discusses how to Secure your Microservices on AKS (part 2)
• Aidan Finn (@joe_elway) talks about Building Azure VM Images Using Packer & Azure Files

Databases

Covering: Azure Cosmos DB, Azure Database for MariaDB, Azure Database for MySQL, Azure Database for PostgreSQL, Azure SQL Database, Azure SQL Database Edge, Azure Cache for Redis, SQL Data Warehouse, SQL Server on virtual machines, SQL Server Stretch Database, Table storage

• Jose M Jurado (@jmjuradodiaz) runs through how to Bulk Insert using Python in Azure SQL
• Meagan Longoria (@mmarie) describes Altering a Computed Column in a Temporal Table in Azure SQL
• On Channel 9, Jakub Ferenc talks about how Oriflame uses Microservices and CosmosDB on Azure to scale their global eCommerce platform
• Julio Calderón writes about How-to auto-scale Azure SQL Databases
• Michael Crump (@mbcrump) describes How to develop apps with Azure Database for PostgreSQL using best practices

Developer Tools

Covering: App Configuration, Azure Lab Services, CLIs, Developer tool integrations, SDKs, Visual Studio, Visual Studio Code, Visual Studio Online

• Diego Colombo (@colombod) discusses Jupyter Notebooks and C# (.NET Interactive)
• On the Visual Studio blog, Amanda Silver (@amandaksilver) announces the first public preview of Visual Studio 2022
• On Channel 9, Claudia Regio (@ClaudiaRegio) talks about Getting Started with Jupyter Notebooks in VS Code
• Daeun Yim introduces The MySQL Flexible Server PowerShell Module
• On Visual Studio Magazine - Blogs, David Ramel (@dramel) discusses VS/ VSCode updates and announcements:
  Data Viewer Enhancements Lead VS Code April Jupyter Update,
  Visual Studio 2022: Faster, Leaner and 64-bit More Memory,
  VS Code Python Tooling Gets 'Most Requested' Feature: Poetry Support,
  What Do Devs Want for VS 2022? The Top 10 Feature Requests,
  Red Hat Adds Java Features to Visual Studio Code,
  Azure SDK Gets Communications Services Libraries, Based on Teams Tech 
  and collects some of the Feedback on Visual Studio 2022
• Sam Cogan (@samcogan) covers Debugging Pulumi Infrastructure as Code in Visual Studio

DevOps

Covering: Azure Artifacts, Azure Boards, Azure DevOps, Azure Pipelines, Azure Repos, Azure Test Plans, Azure DevTest Labs, DevOps tool integrations

• Barbara Forbes (@Ba4bes) walks through how to Deploy Bicep with Azure DevOps pipelines
• On the Microsoft DevOps blog, Angel Wong announces that the Personal Access Token Lifecycle APIs are now publicly available
• On the .NET Curry blog, Subodh Sohoni (@subodhsohoni) walks through Azure DevOps Delivery Plan 2.0
• Thomas Thornton (@tamstar1234) explains how to Get Public IP address of Azure DevOps hosted agent and Github-hosted runner
• On Code Project, Jeff Griffith blogs about Java on Azure: First Cloud Native Steps: Automated Build, Test, and Deploy
• On The Azure Podcast, Chris Reddington (@reddobowen) talks about GitHub Actions

Hybrid

Covering: Azure Arc, Azure Stack

• Richard M. Hicks (@richardhicks) writes about Always On VPN and Autopilot Hybrid Azure AD Join
• Lior Arviv explains how to Protect non-Azure resources using Azure Arc and Azure Security Center
• Manoj Prasad talks about Event Hub on Azure Stack Hub

Identity

Covering: Azure Active Directory (AD), Azure Active Directory B2C, Azure Active Directory Domain Services

• Melania Nitu discusses Revocation of the SSL certificate failed for AAD authentication
• Michael Griswold (@GrizzlyCM) runs through How to collect custom inventory from Azure AD Joined devices
• Pierre Roman (@pierreroman) describes SecretManagement and accessing Linux VMs in Azure
• Sonia Cuff (@soniacuff) blogs about Using Managed Identities in Azure Automation Accounts (preview)
• Somnath Ghosh discusses User identity passthrough authentication using ACLs

Integration

Covering: Azure API for FHIR, Event Grid, Logic Apps, Service Bus

• Trevor Davis (@vtrevordavis) discusses Azure VMware Solution & Azure Service Health

Internet of Things

Covering: Azure Digital Twins, Azure IoT Central, Azure IoT Edge, Azure IoT Hub, Azure IoT solution accelerators, Azure Maps, Azure Sphere, Azure Time Series Insights, IoT DevKit, WildernessLabs, Windows 10 IoT Core Services

• On Channel 9, Andy Rivas (@AndyRivMSFT) discusses how to Update IoT devices in an ISA-95 Industrial network
• Martin Tuip describes Building more agile factories with Azure IoT and Windows IoT
• Zachary Cavanell explains how to Build & Deploy to edge AI devices in minutes

Learning

Covering: Microsoft Certifications, Azure Certifications, Microsoft Learning Paths, Certification Pathway Information

• Jeffrey Raymond Kitt highlights: MVPs Tell Their Education Stories With MS Learn
• On the Azure blog, Azure (@azure) highlights: Azure Trivia is back and its bigger, better, and faster than ever
• On the DEV site, Frank Boucher (@FBoucheros) highlights the podcast: Hello World, Hello Earth
• Shahed Chowdhuri (@shahedC) highlights a new video series: Azure, Simplified.
• Jamie Maguire (@jamie_maguire1) discusses: Is Blogging Dead Should? You Start A Blog?

Management and Governance

Covering: Automation, Azure Advisor, Azure Backup, Azure Blueprints, Azure Lighthouse, Azure Managed Applications, Azure mobile app, Azure Monitor, Azure Policy, Azure Resource Manager, Azure Service Health, Azure Site Recovery, Cloud Shell, Cost Management, Microsoft Azure portal, Scheduler, Azure Purview

• The Azure Updates Team announces that Azure Purview resource set pattern rules are available in public preview and that Public preview: Azure Purview is now available in the UK South and Australia East region
• On Channel 9, Dalan Mendonca (@dalanMendonca) talks about how to Get a unified network monitoring experience with Network Insights
• Roy Gal covers Log Analytics - Functions upgraded
• On System Center Automation, Billy York blogs about Azure Monitor, Security Center, Sentinel Infrastructure as Code with Bicep
• On the Microsoft DevOps blog, Ana Margarita Medina (@Ana_M_Medina) provides an Intro to Chaos Engineering
• Justin Yoo (@justinchronicle) discusses Azure Bicep Refreshed
• Ravikanth Chaganti (@ravikanth) blogs about Bicep Language - Beyond Basics - Scoped Deployment, Modules and Conditional Deployment

Media

Covering: Azure Media Player, Content Protection, Encoding, Live and On-Demand Streaming, Media Analytics, Media Services, Video Indexer

• No content this week

Migration

Covering: Azure Database Migration Service, Azure Migrate, Data Box

• Jeffrey Palermo (@jeffreypalermo) discusses Microsoft's Cloud Native Global Black Belt Team
• On Channel 9, Brian Blanchard (@BrianBlanchard) and Sarah Lean discuss how to Efficiently manage your cloud operations using Cloud Adoption Framework

Mobile

Covering: App Service (Mobile), Mobile apps, Notification Hubs, Visual Studio App Centre, Xamarin

• On Channel 9, Ben Buttigieg (@benbtg) talks about Font Icon Embedding (Xamarin Quick Tips)
• Also on Channel 9, James Montemagno Gerald Versluis discusses User Stopped Typing Behavior (Xamarin Community Toolkit)

Networking

Covering: Application Gateway, Azure Bastion, Azure DNS, Azure ExpressRoute, Azure Firewall, Azure Firewall Manager, Azure Front Door, Azure Internet Analyzer, Azure Private Link, Content Delivery Network, Load Balancer, Network Watcher, Traffic Manager, Virtual Network, Virtual WAN, VPN Gateway, Web Application Firewall

• The Azure Updates Team announces Application Gateway URL Rewrite
• Charbel Nemnom (@charbelnemnom) explains how to Deploy Azure Network Address Translation (NAT) Gateway
• Camila Martins blogs about Azure Web Application Firewall: WAF config versus WAF policy

Security

Covering: Azure DDoS Protection, Azure Information Protection, Azure Sentinel, Key Vault, Security Center

• The Azure Updates Team announces Enhancements to encryption using customer managed keys for Azure Backup

Storage

Covering: Archive Storage, Avere vFXT for Azure, Azure Data Lake Store, Azure FXT Edge Filer, Azure HPC Cache, Azure NetApp Files, Blob Storage, Disk Storage, File Storage, Managed Disks, Queue Storage, Storage Accounts, Storage Explorer, StorSimple

• On the MSSQL Tips site, Ron L'Esteve walks through Designing an Azure Data Lake Store Gen2
• Henry Yan writes: Dont miss out on Azure Storage Day on April 29, 2021
• Prasun Aggarwal explains how to Enable Secure access to Azure Storage Account across multiple subscriptions
• Scott Jeschonek describes the Azure HPC Cache New Release

Web

Covering: API apps, API Management, App Service (Web), Azure Cognitive Search, Azure SignalR Service, Azure Spring Cloud, Web apps

• Meghali Chakraborty covers Setting up Client Certificate Authentication for WCF Service hosted as an Azure Web App
• Praveen Kumar Sreeram (@PrawinSreeram) covers Azure App Service – Profile a .Net Core Application hosted in Azure App Service – Linux
• The Azure Updates Team highlights that the Azure API Management Open source API Portal now generally available

Windows Virtual Desktop

Covering: Windows Virtual Desktop

• Freek Berson (@fberson) provides some Bicep code snippets for WVD
• Travis Roberts (@Ciraltos) blogs about Image Builder and WVD Session Hosts with One Azure DevOps Pipeline

Useful Links

• Azure Resource Inventory - Azure Resource Inventory is a powerful script written in PowerShell to generate an Excel report of any Azure Environment you have read access
• Azure Quickstart Templates - Learn how to deploy to Azure using ARM Templates. Over 850 examples in this repo.
• Azure CNAB Quickstarts Library - You can deploy to the Cloud, on Prem and on the Edge using CNAB & Porter. This library provides a number of quickstart templates to help you get started, fast!
• Power BI Weekly - Interested in Power BI? Sign up to our sister newsletter Power BI Weekly to receive all the week's Power BI news.
• Azure Resources - A fantastic collection of resources contained in this repo. Issue a PR if you have resources to share. Managed by Azure MVP Gregor Suttie.
• Azure Charts - Azure Charts is a set of auto-rebuilt charts to keep you updated on Azure changes, news, stats. Public updates, RSS channels and web pages are used as data sources
• The Developer’s Guide to Microsoft Azure (2nd Edition) - ebook from Microsoft showcasing architectural approaches and common design patterns you face when building modern applications.
• Azure Virtual Datacenter - ebook from Microsoft highlighting an approach to isolation, security, and trust in the Microsoft cloud.
• Cyber Security Demystified - ebook from Microsoft describing how to keep your organisation safe.
• Microsoft's What is Azure poster - a visual overview of Azure's services and features.
• Microsoft Azure Essentials: Fundamentals of Azure - a free ebook from Microsoft Press, by Michael S. Collier and Robin E. Shahan.
• Data Science in the Cloud with Microsoft Azure Machine Learning and R - a free ebook on Azure Machine Learning, by Stephen F. Elston.
• Protecting Data in Microsoft Azure - a whitepaper that describes the various mechanism you can you can leverage for managing sensitive data in the Azure platform.
• Azure Architecture Center - guidance from the Patterns & Practices team covering API Design, API implementation, Autoscaling, Background jobs, CDN, Caching, Data partitioning, Monitoring and diagnostics, Retry, Scalability and availability.
• Azure Architect's Reference - if you are an architect responsible for building an application on Azure, or are trying to figure out how you could migrate an application and need to dig deep into the workload, cost, security, capacity, availability, deployment and operational modelling this invaluable resource should be your first stop. An open source project, with contributions from several experienced architects, it gathers data from many different references into a single, useful guide that is constantly updated by the community.
• Azure Table Storage Design Guide - a guide from the storage team.
• Azure infrastructure services implementation guidelines - key design and implementation guidelines for deploying an IT workload in Azure infrastructure services.
• Azure Speed Test - a simple web tool that measures the latency between you and Azure Datacenters to suggest which might be fastest for you location.
• Azure Websites Cheatsheet - everything you need to know about configuring & managing Azure Websites on a single page.
• Data Migration Assistant - enables you to upgrade to a modern data platform by detecting compatibility issues that can impact database functionality on your new version of SQL Server and Azure SQL Database. It recommends performance and reliability improvements for your target environment.
• Azure SQL DTU Calculator - a tool to help you determine the number of DTUs for your existing SQL Server database(s) as well as a recommendation of the minimum performance level and service tier that you need before you migrate to Azure SQL Database.
• Microsoft Azure Symbol/Icon Set - a set of Visio and PowerPoint shapes for use in architecture diagrams / presentations.
• Service Bus Explorer - a free and open source tool for managing and exploring Azure Service Bus(including Event Hubs).
• Best practices for designing Azure Resource Manager Templates - guidance based on the whitepaper 'World Class ARM Templates Considerations and Proven Practices'.
• Microsoft Cloud Networking for Enterprise Architects - a downloadable guide to Azure networking, covering topics such as cloud migration and networking for PaaS and SaaS services
• Whitepapers for Power BI - numerous whitepapers ranging various Power BI topics
• Azure Serverless Computing Cookbook - ebook from Microsoft, including use cases, hands-on steps, and tutorials for quickly configuring your own serverless environments.
• Executive Summary: Enterprise Cloud Strategy - executive summary of the 140-page e-book from Microsoft. Learn about the basics of adopting a cloud computing strategy for your enterprise.
• Migrating SQL Server to Azure SQL Database Managed Instance—A Step-by-Step Guide - ebook from Microsoft providing breakdown of tactical steps for implementing a quick, simple, and low-impact data migration with Azure SQL Database Managed Instance.
• Azure Backup Deep Dive Whitepaper - a deep dive by Adin Ermie and Charbel Nemnom describing Azure Backup
• Azure Stack: An extension of Azure - whitepaper from Microsoft detailing how you can extend Azure Stack to make Azure services available on-premises
• Azure Strategy and Implementation Guide - For Azure users - ebook from Microsoft outlining recommended general architecture and cloud design principles, DevOps, approaches to service management, and overall governance.
• Azure Data Factory: SSIS in the Cloud - eBook from Microsoft explaining why you would want to migrate your existing SSIS workloads to Azure Data Factory and addressing common considerations and concerns. Includes technical details of creating an Azure-SSIS IR and then walk-throughs of how to upload, execute, and monitor your packages through Azure Data Factory
• Parallel Virtual File Systems on Microsoft Azure - ebook from Microsoft documenting the results of a series of performance tests on Azure to see how scalable Lustre, GlusterFS, and BeeGFS are
• Build and deploy a multi-container application in Azure Service Fabric - ebook from Microsoft which shows how to create a sample multi-container application using ASP.NET Core and Docker and deploy it on an Azure Service Fabric cluster.
• Azure ebook/whitepaper resources - White papers, analyst reports, and e-books landing page with an abundance of extra resources.
• Farmer - This is a DSL for ARM template creation - "Making repeatable Azure deployments easy"!