Welcome to Azure
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
- Azure HPC – CycleCloud 8.2.1 is now generally available Azure VMware SDDC
- Placement polices now generally available for Azure VMware Solution CycleCloud 8.2.1 This release contains a number of Slurm improvements
Containers
Covering: Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Azure Red Hat OpenShift, CNAB, CNCF, Container Instances, Container Registry, Porter, WSL, Web App for Containers
- General availability: Microsoft provides patches and new images for image nodes frequently (usually weekly), but your running nodes won’t get the new images unless you do a node image upgrade. Turning on the node-image channel will automatically update your node images whenever a new version is available AKS node image auto-upgrade.
- General availability: Azure Kubernetes Service will automatically rotate non-ca certificates on both the control plane and agent nodes before they expire with no downtime for the cluster. AKS auto-certificate rotation
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
- Azure Database for PostgreSQL – Hyperscale (Citus): New toolkit certifications generally available Azure PostgreSQL New toolkit certifications
- Enable long-term retention on your Azure SQL Managed Instance to store full backups for up to 10 years. Configure backup storage redundancy for Azure SQL Database to store backups on local, zone, or geo redundant storage Azure SQL—General availability updates for December 2021
DevOps
Covering: Azure Artifacts, Azure Boards, Azure DevOps, Azure Pipelines, Azure Repos, Azure Test Plans, Azure DevTest Labs, DevOps tool integrations
- Nitya Narasimhan ( @ntiya ) writes Let’s Automate Playwright Testing With GitHub Actions
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
- General availability: New capabilities in Network Watcher Diagnostic tools to evaluate AVNM Security rules ( Azure Virtual Network Manager (AVNM) )
- General availability: Azure Monitor logs allows you to collect data across your entire ecosystem including application and OS level telemetry, security logs, network logs, diagnostic logs from Azure resources, and custom logs. ( Audit Logs of Azure Monitor log queries )
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
- Tao Yang ( @MrTaoYang ) discusses Azure Resource Graph Query For Network Security Group Rules
- Umar Mohamed Usman blogs about Deploying API Management in an Internal mode
- The Azure Updates Team talks about India Central Availability Zones now generally available
- Sander van de Velde discusses Jump box part 1: Secure access to private cloud VM using Azure Bastion
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 announce Immutable storage with versioning for Blob Storage is now generally available
- The Azure Updates Team announce Azure Storage: Attribute-based Access Control ABAC conditions with principal attributes now in public preview
- The Azure Updates Team announce Azure Storage: Secure access to storage account from a virtual network/subnet in any region now in public preview
Web
Covering: API apps, API Management, App Service (Web), Azure Cognitive Search, Azure SignalR Service, Azure Spring Cloud, Web apps
- On the DEV site, Nitya Narasimhan ( @ntiya ) explains how to Let’s Build A Recipe Blog with Azure Static Web Apps & Hugo
- Joo Dinis describes Using API Management WebSockets
Useful Links
- Azure Resource Inventory – Azure Resource Inventory is a powerful script written in PowerShell to generate an Excel report of any Azure Environment you have read access
- Azure Quickstart Templates – Learn how to deploy to Azure using ARM Templates. Over 850 examples in this repo.
- Azure CNAB Quickstarts Library – You can deploy to the Cloud, on Prem and on the Edge using CNAB & Porter. This library provides a number of quickstart templates to help you get started, fast!
- Power BI Weekly – Interested in Power BI? Sign up to our sister newsletter Power BI Weekly to receive all the week’s Power BI news.
- Azure Resources – A fantastic collection of resources contained in this repo. Issue a PR if you have resources to share. Managed by Azure MVP Gregor Suttie.
- Azure Charts – Azure Charts is a set of auto-rebuilt charts to keep you updated on Azure changes, news, stats. Public updates, RSS channels and web pages are used as data sources
- The Developer’s Guide to Microsoft Azure (2nd Edition) – ebook from Microsoft showcasing architectural approaches and common design patterns you face when building modern applications.
- Azure Virtual Datacenter – ebook from Microsoft highlighting an approach to isolation, security, and trust in the Microsoft cloud.
- Cyber Security Demystified – ebook from Microsoft describing how to keep your organisation safe.
- Microsoft’s What is Azure poster – a visual overview of Azure’s services and features.
- Azure Architecture Center – guidance from the Patterns & Practices team covering API Design, API implementation, Autoscaling, Background jobs, CDN, Caching, Data partitioning, Monitoring and diagnostics, Retry, Scalability and availability.
- Azure Architect’s Reference – if you are an architect responsible for building an application on Azure, or are trying to figure out how you could migrate an application and need to dig deep into the workload, cost, security, capacity, availability, deployment and operational modelling this invaluable resource should be your first stop. An open source project, with contributions from several experienced architects, it gathers data from many different references into a single, useful guide that is constantly updated by the community.
- Azure Table Storage Design Guide – a guide from the storage team.
- Azure infrastructure services implementation guidelines – key design and implementation guidelines for deploying an IT workload in Azure infrastructure services.
- Azure Speed Test – a simple web tool that measures the latency between you and Azure Datacenters to suggest which might be fastest for you location.
- Azure Websites Cheatsheet – everything you need to know about configuring & managing Azure Websites on a single page.
- Data Migration Assistant – enables you to upgrade to a modern data platform by detecting compatibility issues that can impact database functionality on your new version of SQL Server and Azure SQL Database. It recommends performance and reliability improvements for your target environment.
- Azure SQL DTU Calculator – a tool to help you determine the number of DTUs for your existing SQL Server database(s) as well as a recommendation of the minimum performance level and service tier that you need before you migrate to Azure SQL Database.
- Microsoft Azure Symbol/Icon Set – a set of Visio and PowerPoint shapes for use in architecture diagrams / presentations.
