Azure Weekly Issue 342: 26th September 2021

Following on from last week's OMIGOD vulnerability, Bruno Gabrielli highlights a Azure Monitor OMI Vulnerabilities Rapid Check Workbook.

It's been a long wait, but Azure Functions runtime 4.0 is now in public preview, and Mark Heath has a good blog post delving into the isolation model in "Is it time to start creating C# Azure Functions in isolated mode?". While we're on the subject of previews, Radu Vunvulea has published a usefil post on the differences between GA, Private and Public Preview on Azure Services and Features. Staying with Serverless, AzureServerlessConf - is running online Sep 29-30, each day targeting a different time zone.

Other interesting articles this week are: Azure Cosmos DB: autoscale, session state, monitoring, and more Azure Friday, Real-Time Streaming using Power BI Streaming Dataset, a re-badging of various high level AI / ML / Cognitive services is outlined in All you need to know about Azure Applied AI Services. Andreas Wolter has a nice post on Security concepts: Audit Trail, and something that will help anyone managing an Azure Virtual Desktop Environment - General Availability of Azure AD-joined VMs support. There is an interesting announcement in the IoT space: enable industrial device connectivity with thousands of partner-provided Azure IoT Plug and Play device profiles. Hopefully this will make as big an impact is PnP had in the consumer space (if anyone can remember how painful peripherals were before USB & PnP).

Finally, this week marked the end of endjin's summer internship programme. We had over 300 applications and whittled the candidates down to a cohort consisting of Amy, Klaudia, Charlotte and Thea. While Charlotte is studying Computer Science, the rest of the cohort are studying a mixture of Biomedical Engineering and Electronics Engineering. I encouraged them to keep a journal throughout the internship to document their internship, and while they started with no cloud experience and a tiny bit of exposure to data any python (most Universities seem to teach Python courses), their progress over the two months was impressive. They delivered huge amounts of value, and I would highly recommend running your own summer internship programme, if you need convincing, read their write-ups: Amy's summer as an intern endjineer, My internship experience, Charlotte's Internship Blog, From start to finish: my internship at 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

• On the DEV site, Ayşegül Yönet (@AysSomething) writes about All you need to know about Azure Applied AI Services

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

• Balaji Sankaran describes Performance Improvements to Apache Spark 3.1.2 in Azure Synapse
• Luis Soares covers Azure Synapse Pipelines for Social Media – YouTube example
• Kevin Chant blogs about Copy an Azure Data Factory pipeline to Synapse Studio
• Rui Cunha writes about How-To Deploy your Synapse Workspace Artifacts to a Managed VNET Synapse Workspace
• Chenye Charlie Zhu explains how to Operationalize and Provide SLA for Data Pipelines
• On the Codit blog, Holly Hamilton talks about Retrieving data from an SQL database in Azure Data Explorer
• Clinton Ford (@clintonwford) covers Creating a Databricks SQL Dashboard to Analyze NYC Taxi Data
• On SQL Server Central, Eduardo Pivaral writes about Real-Time Streaming using Power BI Streaming Dataset

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

• The Azure Updates Team announces Azure Functions runtime 4.0 is now in public preview
• Mark Heath (@mark_heath) asks Is it time to start creating C# Azure Functions in isolated mode?
• Nitya Narasimhan (@ntiya) announces AzureServerlessConf - Join us online Sep 29-30, 2021
• Simon Waight (@simonwaight) explains how to Build a Serverless Gaming Console Stock Checker with Playwright, Azure Functions and Twilio
• On the Azure podcast, Ravi Kashyap chats about SAP on Azure in Episode 395.
• The Azure Updates Team writes about General availability: Oracle consistent snapshots using Azure VM Backup

Containers

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

• Daniel Neumann (@neumanndaniel) talks about Azure Policy for Kubernetes – custom policies on Azure Arc enabled Kubernetes
• Thomas Thornton (@tamstar1234) writes about From Zero to GitOps with AKS – Azure Back to School Session
• Thomas Maurer (@thomasmaurer) writes about Centrally design, deploy, and operate Kubernetes apps and clusters anywhere using Azure Arc

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

• On Channel 9, Kirill Gavrylyuk, Matias Quaranta, Deborah Chen, and Estefani Arroyo join Scott Hanselman to provide another set of updates for Azure Cosmos DB in Azure Cosmos DB: autoscale, session state, monitoring, and more Azure Friday
• The Azure Updates Team announces Azure SQL Database: General availability updates for late September 2021, and Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Flexible Server: Terraform support in public preview, and Azure Database for MySQL: Azure Pipelines support in public preview, and Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Flexible Server: Azure Pipelines in public preview, and Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Hyperscale Citus now includes PgBouncer version 1.16 and Azure Resource Health for Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Flexible Server in public preview
• Kelly OConnor explains how to Optimize ROI by migrating to Azure Database for MySQL
• Greg Low (@greglow) says ADF: Use MSIs not SQL Logins whenever possible
• On SQL Server Central, Robert Sheldon describes The Azure SQL portfolio
• Kellyn Gorman (@DBAKevlar) covers Oracle on Azure- Unix to Linux and Options

Developer Tools

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

• On the DEV site, Abhishek Gupta (@abhi_tweeter) explains how to Enhance local development experience using the Azure Cosmos DB Linux emulator and VS Code
• The Intune Support Team explains how to Build a macOS onboarding splash screen with Microsoft Endpoint Manager and Octory
• Yichao Wu talks about Azure Stream Analytics Tool for Visual Studio Code is general available now
• David Ramel (@dramel) writes about Visual Studio 2022 Themes Revamped with Tool to Convert VS Code Themes
• Madhura Bharadwaj explains how to Customize Azure Cloud Shell Bash Environment
• Gregor Suttie (@gregor_suttie) discusses Work from home setup: mission accomplished

DevOps

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

• Jeffrey Palermo (@jeffreypalermo) blogs about Joe Guadagno about the Latest in Azure DevOps in Episode 159 of the Azure DevOps podcast.
• Steve Buchanan (@buchatech) talks about Speaking at the Jamaica Azure User Group on Intro to GitOps and AKS
• On the Black Marble blog, Richard Fennell (@richardfennell) discusses Making SonarQube Quality Checks a required PR check on Azure DevOps
• On the Microsoft BI Tools blog, Joost van Rossum (@ssisjoost) blogs about DevOps Snack: Get Treeview of files on agent
• On Channel 9, April Edwards and Christopher Maneu talks about DevOps Lab Infra as Code in Action: Protect production resources
• Sander van de Velde describes How to create your own Deploy to Azure button

Hybrid

Covering: Azure Arc, Azure Stack

• Bruno Gabrielli covers Azure Monitor - OMI Vulnerabilities Rapid Check Workbook
• Silvio Di Benedetto discusses OMIGOD: a vulnerabilities within Azure VM Management Extensions
• Richard M. Hicks (@richardhicks) writes about Always On VPN Short Name Access Failure
• Jason Yi writes about Next Generation Performance Tools: VMFleet 2.0
• Zach Dvorak describes Understanding readiness for Windows 11 with Microsoft Endpoint Manager

Identity

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

• Alex Simons Azure announces Improved Identity Protection Signal Quality and Visibility

Integration

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

• Kurt Mackie (@kurmac) discusses Windows Server 2022 Integration with Azure Services in Summit Talk

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 the Azure blog, Tony Shakib (@TonyShakib) explains how to Enable industrial device connectivity with thousands of partner-provided Azure IoT Plug and Play device profiles
• Sander van de Velde writes about First look: The Things Network new Azure IoT Hub integration
• Justin Slade announces that the InnovateFPGA contest seeks sustainable solutions using Microsoft Azureand Intel IoT
• Nicole Kuntjoro discusses Azure Percept and beyond: How certification makes building IoT solutions easier
• The Azure Sphere Team writes about General availability: Azure Sphere OS version 21.09

Learning

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

• On Tech Community blog, The Student Developer Team writes about 20th anniversary of the Imagine Cup
• Also on Tech Community blog, The Student Developer Team says Meet a recent Microsoft Learn Student Ambassador graduate: Fanie Ndlovu and and Gihan Siriwardhana
• Rachel Wortman Morris blogs about Students: Get creative over break—earn Microsoft Certifications and academic credit
• On Channel 9, Bob Ward, Buck Woody, and Anna Hoffman talk about New Microsoft Learn Modules: Azure SQL IoT and Azure Arc-enabled data services
• John Savill (@NTFAQGuy) covers Resources to help with the various Azure Fundamental certifications
• Sarah Lean (@TechieLass) shares her Weekly Update - Surface Laptop Studio, Azure Reservations, Windows Server Exams

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 Public preview: Management Group Scope for Azure Reservations
• The Azure Updates Team blogs about Public preview: At-scale management of Azure Monitor alerts in Backup center
• On System Center Automation, Billy York blogs about Azure Monitor Agent, Microsoft Monitor Agent and Data Collection Rules and explains how to Deploy Azure Monitor Agent at Scale
• Radu Vunvulea (@RaduVunvulea) discusses Differences between GA, Private and Public Preview on Azure Services and Features

Media

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

Migration

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

• On SQL Server Central, "bake13" talks about Azure SQL Migrations using Azure Data Studio

Mobile

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

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

• Mohit Kumar talks about Introducing Network Security Dashboard for Azure Security Center
• On the Redmond magazine site, Gladys Rama highlights that Progress Buys Kemp Technologies

Security

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

• Stanislav Belov writes about Azure Defender PoC Series - Azure Defender for Servers
• On Azure Sentinel blog, Rod Trent describes Azure Sentinel Notebooks Ninja Part 3: Overview of the Pre-built Notebooks - the Grand List
• On Azure Sentinel Blog, Roberto Rodriguez (@Cyb3rWard0g) blogs about Azure Sentinel To-Go A Linux Lab with AUOMS Set Up to Learn About the OMI Vulnerability
• Andreas Wolter (@AndreasWolter) blogs about Security concept: Audit Trail

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

• The Azure Updates Team writes about General availability: Azure Archive Storage now available in three new regions: Norway East, UAE North, and Germany West Central

Web

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

• The Azure Updates Team covers Public preview: Distributed tracing for Java apps on Azure Functions Linux
• Selina Sun discusses Session lost due to ARRAffinity Cookies
• Yang Yu explains how to Integrate App Insights with Linux .NET Web App
• Daniel Kim blogs about the Journey Towards Cloud Architecture
• Hanli Ren explains how to Investigate Node.js Memory Leak issue in Linux App Service and explains how to Investigate Node.js High CPU issue in Linux App Service
• Michael Milirud writes about .NET Core 2.1 Application Insights auto-instrumentation support removal from App Services
• Sameer Doshi covers Launching a SMART App Demystified

Azure Virtual Desktop

Covering: Azure Virtual Desktop

• The Azure Updates Team announces General Availability of Azure AD-joined VMs support