Azure Weekly

Azure Weekly Issue 401: 15th January 2023

It's quite a monster of an edition as is spans the last 4 weeks of content. First off a few articles of interest: a dive into how Windows has been re-engineered to produce "OneCore" which allows multiple SKUs to be built on top of this, including Cloud Host, used to power Azure Host Nodes in the data center: Azure Host OS – Cloud Host. There's a useful guide to Migrating to Isolated Durable Functions, and an announcement that Azure Container Registry is the first cloud registry to support the OCI Specifications 1.1. Jon George finally concludes his 6-part series on migrating an application from Azure Function to Azure Container Apps, provides conclusions and a table of options of recommendations if you face a similar situation.

Obviously one of the big themes for 2023 is going to be the global economic downturn; many organisations are trying to "do more with less", reducing headcount and budgets. One of the biggest challenges facing organisations who have gone "all in on the cloud" is that their IT budget has moved from CapEx to OpEx; meaning that IT costs are now essentially a function of headcount rather than an investment. The downside of this is that traditional "downturn playbooks" of deferring hardware refreshes or pushing out new IT programmes don't really work, so execs are going to have to come up with new approaches. Combine this with the fact that cloud computing is more a function of energy costs than hardware costs to the providers; Microsoft estimates $800 million in extra energy costs. Add this to rising interest rates, and Azure pricing is going to increase: Consistent global pricing for the Microsoft Cloud. In summary: GBP: +9%, DKK, EUR and NOK: +11%, SEK: +15%. Organisations are going to have to work even harder, as their projected cost saving efforts might be wiped out by these price increases.

Fortunately a lot of thought leadership is being produced on this topic; The Azure FinOps Guide is a good place to start. Azure already has tools in place to help you Optimize Azure Cost with Azure Cost Management. There's a great series on Architectural Cost Optimisation – Practical Design Steps for Architects and Developers: Part 1, and Part 2, and Part 3. If you've either tried to improve the density of your compute by migrating applications in Virtual Machines in to Containers in Kubernetes, or have started your cloud adoption journey in a Cloud Native way, you can still reduce the total cost of ownership TCO of your Azure Kubernetes Service AKS cluster and Manage the Cost of Kubernetes. I imagine we'll see a lot more thought leadership in this space in 2023.

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

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

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

Containers

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

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

Developer Tools

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

DevOps

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

Identity

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

Integration

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

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

Learning

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

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

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

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

Security

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

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

Web

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

Azure Virtual Desktop

Covering: Azure Virtual Desktop

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