Azure Weekly

Issue #247 - 20th October 2019

This week, Gunjan Jain has announced the general availability of larger, more powerful standard file shares for Azure Files, providing significant perf improvements over the earlier versions. We've also been told that Azure Monitor has added Worker Service SDK and new ASP.NET core metrics, providing: support for more applications types, new alertable metrics, support for ASP.NET Core 3.0 and cross-vendor distributed tracing.

Elsewhere, we've been told that there is a new Machine Learning Execute Pipeline activity in Azure Data Factory, and Scott Hanselman has spoken about this with Gaurav Malhotra. Elsewhere, Jeff Hollan has described how to Develop Azure Functions using .NET Core 3.0, providing some tips and noting down some of the currently known issues.

I'm currently embarking on some research around use cases for Expression Trees in .NET for some thought leadership I'm writing. If you've used Expression Trees and have any interesting use cases, please fill out my survey!

⚙️ AI + Machine Learning

On the Azure blog, Amy Boyd (@AmyKateNicho) announces the Microsoft Azure AI hackathon's winning projects
On Channel 9, Seth Juarez (@sethjuarez) talks about a Machine Learning Interpretability Toolkit with Mehrnoosh Sameki
On Code Project, Allister Beharry (@allisterbeharry) writes about Technical detection of violent threats in social news posts in near real-time
On the DEV site, Abhishek Gupta (@abhi_tweeter) provides a Tutorial: Use Azure Cognitive Services to build a translator app hosted on Azure App Service

🔎 Analytics

On the MSSQL Tips site, Fikrat Azizov provides a Azure Data Factory ForEach Activity Example
The Azure updates team posts a number of updates: Execute Azure Machine Learning service pipelines in Azure Data Factory pipelines, Azure Analysis Services QPU AutoScale is now available, Azure Stream Analytics is now available in US GOV Virgina region, Azure Stream Analytics is now available in Korea Central and Azure Stream Analytics is now available in France Central region
On Channel 9, Scott Hanselman (@shanselman) talks about How to execute Azure Machine Learning service pipelines in Azure Data Factory with Gaurav Malhotra
James Serra (@JamesSerra) describes the Databricks Delta Lake

🖥️ Compute

Thomas Maurer (@thomasmaurer) explains how to Deploy and Install Windows Admin Center in an Azure VM
The Azure updates team highlights the SR-IOV availability on NCv3 Virtual Machines SKU and the SR-IOV availability schedule on NCv3 Virtual Machines SKU
On the DEV site, Wassim Chegham (@manekinekko) explains how to Build Your Serverless Azure Function Apps With Bazel 1.0
On the Azure blog, Philip Tan writes about SAP on Azure–Designing for Efficiency and Operations
On Channel 9, Chris Segura (@IoTHybridCloud) describes how to Write Blockchain-Powered Azure Functions in Java leveraging Azure Key Vault with Ramya Pradhan

🚢 Containers

The Azure updates team writes that Azure Container Registry is now generally available in UAE North region
On Microsoft + Open Source, Mathieu Benoit provides a Tutorial: Calico Network Policies with Azure Kubernetes Service
Daniel Neumann (@neumanndaniel) explains how to Disable the Kubernetes dashboard on Azure Kubernetes Service
Stefan Roth (@stefanroth_net) discusses Azure Monitor – Monitoring Kubernetes AKS Sample Application Using Prometheus Scraping
On the DEV site, Jim Bennett (@jimbobbennett) writes that When life gives you containers, make WebAppade
Michael Crump (@mbcrump) posts Tip 229 - Develop multi-service applications on Kubernetes with Azure Dev Spaces

🗄️ Databases

On the Azure blog, John 'JG' Chirapurath (@OriginalJGC) blogs about Azure SQL Database: Continuous innovation and limitless scale at an unbeatable price
The Azure updates team writes that Service-aided subnet configuration for managed instance in Azure SQL Database is now in preview and writes about Performance-optimized storage configuration for SQL Server on Azure Virtual Machines
Jen Stirrup (@jenstirrup) covers AWS RDS vs Microsoft Azure SQL Database: What does it mean for the business?
On Channel 9, Colin Murphy and Alain Dormehl presents It's just SQL: Native Backup and Restore Data Exposed
Armin Reiter (@arminreiter) writes about Automatic data classification for Azure SQL Server
Ed Elliott (@EdDebug) describes SQLCover 0.5 - Fixes, smaller features and an exciting surprise

🛠️ Developer Tools

On the Azure blog, Matt McCleary writes that Azure Monitor adds Worker Service SDK, new ASP.NET core metrics
On the DEV site, Jeff Hollan (@jeffhollan) explains how to Develop Azure Functions using .NET Core 3.0
On the Visual Studio blog, Jacqueline Widdis (@JacqWiddis) writes about Visual Studio 2019 v16.4 Preview 2, Fall Sports, and Pumpkin Spice
Also on the Visual Studio blog, Zoher Ghadyali explains how to Debug JavaScript in Microsoft Edge from Visual Studio
On Microsoft Cloud Blogs, Alan Yu (@AlanYuSQL) writes that the Mssql extension for Visual Studio Code now has Object Explorer and IntelliCode
On the Visual Studio blog, Stephanie Su (@TheStephanieSu) writes about Document Management Improvements: Vertical document tabs are here
On the IoT Dev blog, Zhenwei Zhang describes how to Easily send random generated D2C messages to IoT Hub with Azure IoT Hub Tools

🔩 DevOps

On the Black Marble blog, Richard Fennell (@richardfennell) writes Cannot queue a new build on Azure DevOps Server 2019.1 due to the way a SQL cluster was setup
On the Microsoft DevOps blog, Sasha Rosenbaum (@DivineOps) lists the Top Stories from the Microsoft DevOps Community – 2019.10.11
On the Premier Developer blog, Ricardo de Almeida discusses Tracking Cross-team Projects Portfolio with Azure DevOps Boards
Sacha Barber discusses Getting reacquainted with Azure Devops

🎭 Identity

Freek Berson (@fberson) writes that MSIX app attach will fundamentally change working with application landscapes on Windows Virtual Desktop

💡 Internet of Things

The Azure updates team writes that Azure IoT Central is now available in Asia Pacific
On the DEV site, Anthony Chu writes about End-to-End Serverless Real-Time IoT with Python
On Channel 9, Olivier Bloch (@obloch) talks about IoT at Ignite: Big news and useful tips for IoT developers and operators with Ben Siler
On the Codit blog, Steef-Jan Wiggers (@SteefJan) blogs about Azure IoT – Setting up Yanzi Devices

⚖️ Management and Governance

Michael Jonsson (@Michael_Jonsson) describes Adding Azure Hybrid Benefit to the ARM Template Deployment
The Azure updates team writes a number of updates: Upcoming changes for Service Map data stored in Log Analytics, Updates to Azure Monitor for virtual machines preview before general availability release, Variable retention for Azure Monitor Application Insights is now generally available, Azure Monitor for VMs is now available in South Central US, West US, Central US, North Central US, East Asia, and Central India regions, Azure Monitor for containers is now available in Azure US Government region, Azure Advisor cost recommendation enhancements, Azure Monitor updates—Containers for China regions, Grafana dashboard template, Agent, Azure Monitor log analytics ingestion service undergoing maintenance from October 14 – 25, Azure Site Recovery—Updates for Windows servicing stack and SHA-2, Azure Backup support for large disks up to 32 TB is now generally available and OMS Agent for Linux October release is now available
Stanislav Zhelyazkov (@StanZhelyazkov) writes Azure Monitor Alert Series – Part 8 and describes how to Set Per Table Retention in Log Analytics via ARM Template
Stefan Roth (@stefanroth_net) writes about Azure Monitor – Install AKS Monitoring Grafana Dashboard With Azure AD Integration Using Helm
Mike Pfeiffer (@mike_pfeiffer) presents 043: Multi-cloud Architecture, Hybrid Deployments, & Infrastructure as Code
David O'Brien (@david_obrien) blogs about Using Pulumi on Azure Storage Accounts

🚌 Migration

On the .NET Curry blog, Vikram Pendse (@VikramPendse) discusses a Microsoft Azure Cloud Roadmap

📱 Mobile

Matthew Soucoup (@CodeMillMatt) writes Welcome to Partly Cloudy!
On Channel 9, Matt Soucoup (@CodeMillMatt) presents Hello News (Intro, project structure, and HTTP requests)
Also on Channel 9, James Montemagno (@JamesMontemagno) talks about Unit Conversion (Xamarin.Essentials API of the Week)
On Code Project, Laurent Bouffioux covers Xamarin SKIASharp: Guide to MVVM
Also on Channel 9, Abel Wang and James Montemagno talks about User Interface Testing DevOps for Mobile On .NET

🌐 Networking

On the Azure podcast, The Azure podcast team (@AzurePodcast) presents Episode 300 - Retrospective with Albert Greenberg
On the Kloud blog, Santhosh Kumar writes about Azure Front Door with WAF Policies – An overview
Aidan Finn (@joe_elway) writes about BGP with Microsoft Azure Virtual Networks & Firewalls

🔐 Security

the Azure updates team writes that Key Vault references in App Service and Azure Functions are now available
Adam Marczak (@MarczakIO) provides an Azure Key Vault Intro
On the Azure podcast, The Azure podcast team (@AzurePodcast) presents Episode 301 - Azure Sentinel with Sarah Young
John Joyner (@john_joyner) describes Using Azure Sentinel: How much does it cost
On the Azure blog, David Burt writes about a Trusted Cloud: security, privacy, compliance, resiliency, and IP

📦 Storage

On the MSSQL Tips site, Mohammed Moinudheen provides an Azure Storage Explorer Overview
On the Azure blog, Gunjan Jain (@gunjanjain123) announces the general availability of larger, more powerful standard file shares for Azure Files
Justin Yoo (@justinchronicle) writes about using the Azure Storage Emulator on Azure Pipelines

🔗 Web

Gunnar Peipman (@gpeipman) blogs about Publishing ASP.NET Core 3.0 application as self-contained executable to Azure App Service
On the DEV site, Anthony Chu (@nthonyChu) explains how to Add Real-time to your Java App with Azure SignalR Service
Kunal Chandratre talks about Azure Cost Optimization - Effective use of Azure App Service and App Service Plans