Do you find it difficult to keep up-to-date on the frequent updates and changes in the Microsoft Azure cloud? If so, Build Azure Weekly is the solution you’ve been looking for! Build Azure Weekly is a weekly newsletter that includes all the latest Microsoft Azure Service Updates from the week in addition to links to many other blog articles, podcasts and videos from all over the Internet.
If you want to receive the newsletter in your email every week, then you’ll absolutely want to Subscribe!
Service Fabric is going Open Source
Microsoft Service Fabric originally grew out of the “Azure Fabric” that runs the underlying automation layer of the Azure datacenters. Service Fabric is used internally by Microsoft to host many different Azure services. Over time, Microsoft has released Service Fabric as a separate product that allows for Microservice architectures to be more easily hosted using both Windows and Linux operating systems.
Over the last couple years, there’s been a bit of talk and confusion about where Service Fabric fits within the future of the Microsoft Azure landscape. Most of this has originated from the way that many of the different products within Microsoft Azure are really starting to embrace Docker Containers, and even Kubernetes for orchestration of those containers. With these many services utilizing Containers, it has seemed that Microsoft is possibly shifting focus away from Service Fabric, and maybe Service Fabric will be phased out or deprecated.
Service Fabric deprivation is not something that is happening. Microsoft is continuing to invest in Service Fabric, and will continue to build out it’s features and support. An interesting evolution of this effort is the recent announcement that Microsoft Service Fabric is going open source under the MIT license.
While it’ll be interesting to see what Microsoft does with future versions / releases of Service Fabric, it’ll be just as interesting to see what the Open Source community does with being able to eventually contribute to the project.
You can view the open source project for Microsoft Service Fabric over on GitHub: https://github.com/Microsoft/service-fabric
The Weeks Top Links
Here are some of the most notable links from the week:
- Service Fabric is going open source via Service Fabric Team
- Azure Availability Zones Public Preview by Dan Patrick
- Azure CLI 2.0: Convert VM to Managed Disks by Chris Pietschmann
- Microsoft and 21Vianet reinforce long-term cooperation on cloud services in China by Microsoft Azure Blog
- Microsoft to add new Azure regions in Germany, Switzerland, UAE via ZDNet
- Azure Strategy and Implementation Guide – free download by Joachim Hafner
- Setting up Application Insights took 10 minutes. It created two days of work for me. by Scott Hanselman
- Microsoft and Azure at the Game Developers Conference via Microsoft Azure Blog
Azure Service Updates
Here’s a list of the Microsoft Azure Service Updates from over the past week:
- General availability: Azure Cosmos DB Data Explorer
- Azure Resource Manager API is available
- Azure Monitor metrics integration
- General availability: Power BI Embedded in Microsoft Azure Government Cloud
- General availability: Power BI Embedded in Microsoft Azure Germany
- Instance Metadata Service includes support for zones and virtual machine scale sets
- App Service updating PHP to latest versions
- Power BI Embedded supports row-level security for tiles and dashboards
- Power BI Embedded Update Report API
- Power BI Embedded tile embedding enhancements
- Phased loading of embedded content in Power BI Embedded
- Power BI Embedded mobile layout support
- Power BI Embedded APIs for visual-level filters
- Power BI Embedded capacity APIs
- Power BI Embedded Query Parameters API
- OData and SharePoint Online data sources supported in Power BI Embedded
- Power BI Embedded single-visual embedding
- Power BI Embedded custom layout
- General availability: Support for large disk backup and improvements for backup/restore
- Azure Backup is now available in France
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Blog Articles
Here’s a collection of some of the most note worthy blog articles posted over the past week:
Infrastructure as a Service (IaaS)
- Azure Availability Zones Public Preview by Dan Patrick
- Using Azure Traffic Manager probes with IP Restrictions protecting the App by Jeff Sanders
- How to configure network for Azure SQL Managed Instance by Jovan Popovic
- Announcing backup and restore performance improvements and support for large disk backup by Trinadh Kotturu
- Azure Batch for oil and gas by Hussein Shel
- New isolated VM sizes now available by Joel Pelley
- NEW WHITEPAPER: Azure Virtual Datacenter: Lift and Shift Guide by Ed Price
Platform as a Service (PaaS)
- Azure Tips and Tricks Part 101 – Day 1 – An end to end scenario with Azure App Service, API Apps, SQL, VSTS and CI/CD by Michael Crump
- Azure Tips and Tricks Part 102 – Day 2 – An end to end scenario with Azure App Service, API Apps, SQL, VSTS and CI/CD by Michael Crump
- Azure Tips and Tricks Part 103 – Day 3 – An end to end scenario with Azure App Service, API Apps, SQL, VSTS and CI/CD by Michael Crump
- Azure Tips and Tricks Part 104 – Day 4 – An end to end scenario with Azure App Service, API Apps, SQL, VSTS and CI/CD by Michael Crump
- Setting up Application Insights took 10 minutes. It created two days of work for me. by Scott Hanselman
- Azure App Service – Options Method (and other HTTPS Verb) disabled / not working in Azure Web App by knethteo
- Client Directed Authentication with Azure Mobile Apps by Nicholas McCollum
- Updating PHP to latest versions by Eric Stenson
- Extensions to Application Insights Telemetry Collection by Isaac Levin
- Deprecating Service Management APIs support for Azure App Services by Naveed Aziz
Serverless and Functions as a Service (FaaS)
- Use the Serverless Cloud for ETL Scenarios by Jeremy Likness
Command-Line / ARM Templates
- Azure CLI 2.0: Convert VM to Managed Disks by Chris Pietschmann
- Azure Tip: Running the Azure CLI using Bash on Ubuntu, in Windows 10 by Tobias Zimmergren
- Azure Command Line Interface to manage Azure Service Bus resources? by Shubha Vijayasarathy
- Serving an HTML Page from Azure PowerShell Function by Martin Brandl
- Azure Tip: Installing and using the Azure CLI in VSCode by Tobias Zimmergren
- Manage Event Hubs resources using Azure Command Line Interface by Shubha Vijayarasarathy
- Manage Event Hubs resources using Azure Command Line Interface by Shubha Vijayasarathy
- Convert UnManaged to Managed Disk with Azure PowerShell by Wriju Ghosh
Azure Stack
- Azure App Service on Azure Stack Update One Released by Andrew Westgarth
Database / Big Data
- Demo – Azure SQL Database Managed Instance in action by Jovan Popovic
- Event Processor Host 2.0.1 is now live by Shubha Vijayasarathy
- Build Your First Planet-Scale App With Azure Cosmos DB by Johan Ahlen
Internet of Things (IoT)
- Azure Content Spotlight – Digital Transformation with Azure IoT by chilberto
- nRF24L01 Windows 10 IoT Core Field Gateway #AdafruitIO #IoTuesday via Adafruit Technologies
Machine Learning / Artificial Intelligence
- Demystifying Docker for Data Scientists – A Docker Tutorial for Your Deep Learning Projects by Shaheen Gauher
- Comparing Deep Learning Frameworks: A Rosetta Stone Approach by Ilia Karmanov
- Machine Learning in SQL Server by Riley Major
- Azure cloud data and AI services training roundup by Eric Hudson
- Exploring the Microsoft Graph with Python and AI by sendmarsh
- Cognitive Services Hands-On Lab by David Giard
- How Three Lines of Code and Windows Machine Learning Empower .NET Developers to Run AI Locally on Windows 10 Devices by Rosane Maffei Vallim
- Choosing a Channel for the Microsoft Bot Framework by They Call Me Mister James
- Pixel-Level Land Cover Classification Using the Geo AI Data Science Virtual Machine and Batch AI by Mary Wahl, Kolya Malkin, Siyu Yang, Patrick Flickinger, Wee Hyong Tok, Lucas Joppa, Nebojsa Jojic
- New machine-assisted text classification on Content Moderator now in public preview by Ashish Jhanwar
Development and DevOps
- How to organzie VSTS build output into seperate folders? by Tarun Arora
- GVFS for Mac by Saeed Noursalehi
- Build your own Hosted VSTS Agent Cloud: Part 4 – Customize by WouterDeKort
- DevOps – Azure API Management and VSTS, better together by stephane eyskens
- #HOWTO – Continuous delivery from GitHub to Azure AppService by Nico LD
- How VSTS is Accelerating the Engineering Group Behind Windows by Martin Woodward
- Configure Continuous Delivery(CD) to Azure right from the Visual Studio by Abhijit Jana
Quantum Computing
- Quantum Computing – Scenarios by Vincent-Philippe Lauzon
Containers / Service Fabric
- Service Fabric is going open source via Service Fabric Team
- Deploying Your Dockerized Angular Application To Azure Using VSTS (Part II) by Wael Kdouh
- Monitoring your Kubernetes cluster running on Azure Container Service (AKS) using Log Analytics by Tobias Zimmergren
- Azure Container Services (AKS) – Getting Started with AKS and a private Azure Container Registry by Tobias Zimmergren
- Azure Container Services (AKS) – Upgrading your Kubernetes cluster by Tobias Zimmergren
- Azure Tip: List of supported VM Sizes in Azure Container Services (AKS) by Tobias Zimmergren
- Azure Tip: List of supported VM Sizes in Azure Container Services (AKS) by Tobias Zimmergren
Security
- GDPR Violations Are Hiding In Your Database – Here’s How To Find Them by Thomas LaRock
- Creating Wildcard SSL Certificates with Let’s Encrypt by Michael S. Hansen
- Heuristic DNS detections in Azure Security Center by John Booth
Learning / Certification
- LinkedIn Learning Unlocked 15 MVP-Authored Courses At The MVP Global Summit. Check Them Out Here. by MVP Award Program
- Four IT skills with sky-high prospects by Teresa Conte
Azure Government
- Private Function Apps in Azure Government using App Service Environment (ASE) by Michael S. Hansen
- New and improved Azure Log Analytics is now available in Azure Government by Sachin K Dubey
- Announcing Microsoft Jenkins Solution Template for Azure Government Cloud by Gerardo Saca
Events
- Building Relationships & Providing Feedback: Top Highlights From The 2018 MVP Global Summit! via MVP Award Program
- Microsoft and Azure at the Game Developers Conference via Microsoft Azure Blog
- Five webinars to catch you up on hybrid cloud by Venessa Alvarez
Other
- Five Ways the Cloud is Helping Cities Become More Sustainable via Microsoft Cloud Perspectives Blog Team
- New offers in Azure Marketplace – February 2018 by Christine Alford
- Microsoft and 21Vianet reinforce long-term cooperation on cloud services in China by Microsoft Azure Blog
- Microsoft to add new Azure regions in Germany, Switzerland, UAE via ZDNet
- Introduction to Azure App Consults by Noel Morris
- Azure Strategy and Implementation Guide – free download by Joachim Hafner
- Episode 3: IT IQ Series – How the cloud multiplies Australian schools’ resources by Microsoft Australia Education
- Debian, Kali Linux distributions now available in the Microsoft Store via ZDNet
Videos
Here are links to some of the videos that have been posted over the past week:
- SmartHotel360 – Modernizing Existing Apps with Azure Service Fabric | Visual Studio Toolbox via Channel 9
- Get started with the Azure SDK for Go | Azure Friday via Channel 9
- The Simplest Machine Learning | AI Show via Channel 9
- Internet of Things Patterns And Azure IoT Updates | Internet of Things Show via Channel 9
- Setting Up Azure ML Services and Data wrangling using Azure ML services [Part 2/4] | AI Show via Channel 9
- Time Series Insight for IoT apps | Internet of Things Show via Channel 9
- Local storage on Azure IoT Edge devices | Internet of Things Show via Channel 9
- Deploying Node to Docker on Azure | The DevOps Lab via Channel 9
Audio / Podcasts
To complete the collection of different mediums to allow you to consume your Azure news / info in any way you want, here’s a list of the podcasts released this week:
- Episode 220 – Logic Apps Update via The Azure Podcast
- Demystifying Serverless with Cecil Phillip via Hanselminutes
- Episode 54 – Microsoft 365 Government with Brian Levenson via Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast
- Azure Success Stories with Christos Matskas via .NET Rocks!
- Episode 242 | Office 365 Updates and New Azure Features via Microsoft Cloud Show
- The .NET Core 2 Road Map with Scott Hunter via .NET Rocks!
- Episode 219 – What’s New in Azure Backup? via The Azure Podcast
General Cloud / Related
Here’s some noteworthy links about Cloud computing and other related topics that aren’t necessarily specific to Microsoft Azure:
- A Faster New Raspberry Pi 3 is Now Available by Paul Thurrott
- AWS Documentation is Now Open Source and on GitHub by Jeff Bar
- Serious quantum computers are finally here. What are we going to do with them? via Adafruit Industries
Feedback
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