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.
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MVP Global Summit 2018 is this week!
Today kicks off the first day of the Microsoft MVP Global Summit 2018! The MVP Summit is an event where Microsoft invites all the currently active Microsoft MVP out to Redmond, WA to meet for the week. If you’re not familiar with the Microsoft MVP Program, please read my article “How to become a Microsoft MVP“. Also, if you are a Microsoft MVP, thanks for subscribing to Build Azure Weekly, and I’m going to attempt to meet as many of you as possible this week! It’s going to be awesome!
The MVP Global Summit is essentially a private conference for those who are currently awarded the Microsoft MVP award, as well as Microsoft Regional Directors (RDs) to attend. This year there are approximately 2,000 MVPs and RDs from over 80 countries worldwide coming to attend.
2,000 MVPs and RDs traveling from over 80 countries.
530+ sessions and workshops and presentations.
And too many unique moments to count.
The #MVPSummit, by the numbers.https://t.co/rERZ1sq3vj pic.twitter.com/D89VuI9qg5
— MVP Award Program (@MVPAward) March 1, 2018
The way the MVP Summit is run is that the presenters are all Microsoft employees from the various product teams. Then, MVPs get to attend sessions within their Award Categories / Expertise. Through this they get to meet product team members at Microsoft, network with other Microsoft MVPs and RDs, as well as offer feedback to the product teams. The Feedback aspect is really one of the big reasons Microsoft holds the MVP Global Summit each year. This provides a means for Microsoft to get early feedback and suggestions from leaders in the community to help make all the products and releases even better.
It is also worth noting that in order to attend, all MVPs must sign an NDA (non-disclosure agreement) with Microsoft, as the sessions are full of early previews of what’s coming over the next few months. As a result of the NDA, anything new and yet to be released publicly that is presented and talked about at the MVP Global Summit can be talked about publicly until Microsoft themselves releases it publicly. While I’m certain to learn about a ton of awesome stuff in the pipeline, I unfortunately will not be able to share any kind of summary of the event content in next weeks Build Azure Weekly. Just be sure to keep an eye out over the next few months for awesome announcements and releases that MVPs likely got an early sneak peak at during Summit. 🙂
For those of you attending the Microsoft MVP Global Summit 2018, I just got in a bunch of Build Azure sticker that I’ve brought with me. 🙂 No hoops to jump through to get a sticker. You just need to meet me in person and say “Hi”. I’m excited to meet everyone at the summit!
New @BuildAzure stickers arrived!! I’ll have them with me at #MVPSummit18 next week if anyone wants one. 😀 #MVPBuzz #Azure #Cloud https://t.co/yG159YzKVd https://t.co/oFtoaAWMCW pic.twitter.com/4qi1oK0hmr
— Chris Pietschmann (@crpietschmann) February 28, 2018
The Weeks Top Links
Here are some of the most notable links from the week:
- How to Setup an Ubuntu Linux VM in Azure with Remote Desktop (RDP) Access by Chris Pietschmann
- Apple not using Microsoft Azure anymore? by Chris Pietschmann
- The Countdown Is On – Get Ready for the MVP Global Summit! via MVP Award Program
- Students: Get career-ready with Azure for Students by Student Developer Evangelism Team
- Microsoft Teams Now Lets You Add Guest Users With Any Email by Mehedi Hassan
- Confidently plan your cloud migration: Azure Migrate is now generally available! by Shon Shah
- Azure Load Balancer to become more efficient by Raman Deep Singh
- 10 Golden Rules of MVP Summit by Jen Stirrup
Azure Service Updates
Here’s a list of the Microsoft Azure Service Updates from over the past week:
- General availability: Application consistent backup for Linux VMs by using Azure Backup
- Power BI Workspace Collections is being retired
- Public preview: Azure Backup integration with Azure Files
- GUID migration: Stream Analytics
- TCP Connections added to App Service diagnostics
- February update for Azure IoT Edge
Monthly Sponsor
The month of March marks 1 full year of Opsgility sponsoring Build Azure!! If you haven’t checked out what Opsgility has to offer yet, please click the link below and go check out the awesome training offered!
Are you looking for a clear and outlined path to learn Microsoft Azure? No matter if you’re a Developer, IT Pro, or Architect, Opsgility has courses that will help you learn how to build and implement solutions within Microsoft Azure more affectively and efficiently. The on-demand and instructor-led courses from Opsgility offer maximum flexibility to learn how you learn best, and to help your team grow into the cloud experts you need them to be in an efficient manner.
Opsgility is the leading Microsoft cloud technology trainer for developers and IT professionals, built around an esteemed network of industry experts and technical authors that includes Microsoft MVPs and Microsoft Insiders in more than 10 countries.
Get started today with Microsoft Dev Essentials and get 3 months Free of Opsgility on-demand streaming service!
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)
- How to Setup an Ubuntu Linux VM in Azure with Remote Desktop (RDP) Access by Chris Pietschmann
- BizTalk Mapper Extensions UtilityPack is now available for BizTalk Server 2016 by Sandro Pereira
- Confidently plan your cloud migration: Azure Migrate is now generally available! by Shon Shah
- Use Azure Automation for creating Resource Groups despite having limited permissions only by Holger Sirtl
- StorSimple Data Manager now generally available by Vivek Darera
- Azure Load Balancer to become more efficient by Raman Deep Singh
- How To: Enable Web Application Firewall for your Application by j.niesen
Platform as a Service (PaaS)
- Deep Dive into TCP Connections in App Service Diagnostics by Jennifer Lee
- Azure Backup feature for Azure File Shares by Martynas Valkunas
- ASP.NET Core 2.1.0-preview1: Using ASP.NET Core Previews on Azure App Service by Glenn Condron
- Monitoring a Java App Service Web App by Kurt Schenk
- Deep Dive into TCP Connections in App Service Diagnostics via Jennifer Lee
- Bing Maps Dev APIs Winter Update 2018 via Bing Team
- Point Kudu to a Particular Web Worker Instance by Jeff Sanders
Serverless and Functions as a Service (FaaS)
- HOWTO: Develop Azure Functions Monitoring Azure Storage via Azure Event Grid by William Zhang
- Logic App SOAP Pass-through Custom Connector by David Burg
- Azure Tips and Tricks Part 99 – Creating an Email Subscription with Azure Functions – Writing the Frontend by Michael Crump
- Azure Tips and Tricks Part 98 – Creating an Email Subscription with Azure Functions – Storing Emails by Michael Crump
- Azure Tips and Tricks Part 97 – Generate a Weekly Digest Email for a Blog using Azure Functions, SendGrid and Azure Storage by Michael Crump
- Security Center Playbooks and Azure Functions Integration with Firewalls by Yuri Diogenes
- Support non-UTF payloads in Logic App with a conversion Azure Function by David Burg
- Calling Logic App from Cleo VLTrader by David Burg
- Reset trigger state for Logic Apps by David Burg
- Using Azure Serverless to copy data from Service Bus to Azure Data Lake by Christos Matskas
Software as a Service (SaaS)
- Microsoft Teams Now Lets You Add Guest Users With Any Email by Mehedi Hassan
- Microsoft could opt to release a free version of Teams after all by Mary Jo Foley
- Veeam Backup for Microsoft Office 365: Availability vs. Recoverability via IT Pro
Database / Big Data
- Azure Data Lake launches in the West Europe region by Stephen Wu
- HDInsight: How to enable Oozie UI in Ambari by Ashish Thapliyal
- HDInsight Tools for VSCode integrates with Ambari and HDInsight Enterprise Secure Package by Jenny Jiang
- Import Notebooks in Databricks by Vincent-Philippe Lauzon
- Azure Service Bus now integrates with Azure Event Grid! by Christian Wolf
- Using Amazon RedShift with Power BI by Krishnakumar Rukmangathon
- Updates to Azure Database for MySQL and Azure Database for PostgreSQL by Sunil Kamath
- Book excerpt: Basic text analytics using Power BI and Power Query in Excel via Microsoft Press
- You cannot publish more than 200 Dataset/Report together within an Workspace in Power BI service by Krishnakumar Rukmangathan
Internet of Things (IoT)
- Transform your industry with new Microsoft IoT in Action webinar series by Justin Slade
- Enabling IoT solutions that will last over the long term via Microsoft IoT
- Azure IoT Reference Architecture by Wriju Ghosh
- Build Azure IoT Solutions in Minutes by Wriju Ghosh
Machine Learning / Artificial Intelligence
- Now Available: Access to Source Code & Demos of AI-Infused Apps by Tara Shankar Jana
- Announcing new milestones for Microsoft Cognitive Services vision and search services in Azure by Joseph Sirosh
- Configuring Microsoft Machine Learning Server 9.3 to Operationalize Analytics using ARM Templates by Ramkumar Chandrasekaran
- Introducing the Microsoft Machine Learning Server 9.3 Release by Nagesh Pabbisetty
- Azure Machine Learning and the Team Data Science Process – Part 1 by BuckWoody
- Learn the fundamentals of Microsoft’s Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence services by Lee Stott
- AI Services Workshop – Get Setup by Martin Kearn
- Smart solutions 5: Basic integration of Dynamics NAV and an Azure Machine Learning Web Service by navteam
Development and DevOps
- Build your own Hosted VSTS Agent Cloud: Part 1 – Build by WouterDeKort
- Build your own Hosted VSTS Agent Cloud: Part 2 – Deploy by WouterDeKort
- VSTS/TFS Roadmap update for 2018 Q1 and Q2 by Alex Nichols
- Event Hubs Clients for Java 1.0.0 is now live by Shubha Vijayasarathy
- VSTS and TFS roadmap update by Brian Harry
Quantum Computing
- Quantum Computing: Quick Reference Guide by Anita Ramanan
- Quantum Teleportation in Q# by Frances Tibble
- Quantum Gates and Circuits: The Crash Course by Anita Ramanan
Containers / Service Fabric
- Docker Tagging: Best practices for tagging and versioning docker images by Steve Lasker
- Deploying Kubernetes with Azure by Gareth Emslie
- B-series burstable VM support in AKS now available by Saurya Das
Security
- Reducing the latency of permissions inherited through AAD Group memberships by Rajesh Ramamurthy
- Secure Your Sensitive Business Information with Azure Key Vault by Srikantan Sankaran
- Using App Service Environment as a Private Reverse Proxy with User Authentication by Michael S. Hansen
Learning / Certification
- New LinkedIn Learning Course Explores MCSA and MCSE Certifications by Selina Winter
Azure Government
- Modernize your government agency with the latest in Azure and Microsoft 365 via Azure Gov Team
- On the Advantages of App Service Environment (ASE) for Government Web Apps by Michael S. Hansen
Events
- Microsoft Learn AI webinars in March and April 2018 by Lee Stott
- Transform your industry with new Microsoft IoT in Action webinar series by Justin Slade
- Artificial Intelligence Hackfest in Belgien by Gerhard.Goeschi
Other
- Apple not using Microsoft Azure anymore? by Chris Pietschmann
- Students: Get career-ready with Azure for Students by Student Developer Evangelism Team
- The Countdown Is On – Get Ready for the MVP Global Summit! via MVP Award Program
- Last week in Azure: NPM’s Service Endpoint Monitor in preview, and more by Rob Caron
- 10 Golden Rules of MVP Summit by Jen Stirrup
- Microsoft Writing Style Guide: A new guide for technical communication by Ken Cenerelli
Videos
Here are links to some of the videos that have been posted over the past week:
- Serverless APIs with Azure Function Proxies | Azure Friday via Channel 9
- Azure Content Spotlight – Microsoft 365 GDPR Protection Strategy by Sjoukje Zaal
- Developing for IoT devices with Visual Studio | Internet of Things Show via Channel 9
- TWC9: Times Square Edition, .NET Core 2.1 Preview 1, Microsoft Genomics, and more | This Week On Channel 9 via Channel 9
- Serverless APIs with Azure Function Proxies via Azure Friday
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 52 – Office 365 News for February 2018 via Microsoft Cloud IT Pro Podcast
- Voice Programming with Heather Downing via .NET Rocks!
- Episode 240 | New Microsoft Support for Startups along with Azure and SharePoint News via Microsoft Cloud Show
- The Docker Stack with Rob Richardson via .NET Rocks!
- Episode 218 – Ramping up on ARM templates via The Azure Podcast
- Developing Online Identity with Sarah Squire via Hanselminutes
General Cloud / Related
Here’s some noteworthy links about Cloud computing and other related topics that aren’t necessarily specific to Microsoft Azure:
- Microsoft is Helping Intel Distribute its Firmware Updates by Mehedi Hassan
- The UK and Australian Governments Are Now Monitoring Their Gov Domains on Have I Been Pwned by Troy Hunt
- Your IIoT Strategy Needs a Solid Data Governance Framework by Brian Buntz
- First Alpha release of CircuitPython 3.0.0! via Adafruit
- Geographic Information Systems (GIS) Field Upended by Neural Networks by Nicole Hemsoth
- VMware Crafts Compute And Storage Stacks For The Edge by Jeffrey Burt
- A Secure Supply Chain for Kubernetes by Jenny Fong
- Deep Learning on HPC Systems for Astronomy by Nicole Hemsoth
- The Engine Of HPC And Machine Learning by Timothy Prickett Morgan
- The Role of Machine Learning and Artificial Intelligence in the Enterprise Cloud via IT Pro
- Bringing GPUs To Bear On Bog Standard Relational Databases by Timothy Prickett Morgan
- Getting an ROI for Your IoT Cybersecurity Investment via IT Pro
- How the IoT and Related Tech Are Helping to Update the Energy Sector by Peter Daisyme
Feedback
Do you have any suggestions or general feedback on the Build Azure Weekly blog series? Please contact me and send it on over! Or tweet it over to @BuildAzure.
Please feel free to reach out and let me know your feedback on the Build Azure Weekly series. I post this weekly post as a service to others and really want to make it the best it can be.
You can also join the Build Azure Slack Group as well.
It’s going to be an awesome MVP Summit. I got my sticker 😉