Are you looking for a simpler, more efficient way to author infrastructure resources in Azure?
Azure Bicep First Look course
If so, youβre in luck. Azure Bicep is here to help. Bicep is a new domain-specific language (DSL) for deploying resources in Azure. Itβs also a much cleaner, more concise language than ARM JSONβcloud admins and DevOps professionals, rejoice!
As it was the case last year,Β Microsoft IgniteΒ is back and held digitally free of charge, during Nov 2-4 π π
Microsoft Ignite is a signature event and held virtually for a global audience across a variety of industries to experience the latest and greatest technologies. It is an event where you could get a sneak peek at new products and services that will be coming in the future.
Microsoft Ignite 2021 – Cloud Skills Challenge
Cloud Skills Challenge
This year you could choose from 12 tech challenges and select the one that is right for you. Once you complete that challenge you will earn a free Microsoft Certification exam that can be applied to your choice from a select list of options:
Azure Developer Challenge
Azure Admin Challenge
Identity + Information Protection Challenge
Teams Admin Challenge
Teams Voice Engineer Challenge
Azure Database Admin Challenge
Desktop and Device Management Challenge
Windows Server Hybrid Admin Challenge
Dynamics 365 Sales Consultant Challenge
Dynamics 365 Supply Chain Mgmt Challenge
Power Platform Developer Challenge
Security Operations Analyst Challenge
When does the challenge begin?
The listed challenges will begin on November 2, 2021 and end on November 30, 2021. You can start your registration here to join the challenge.
What happens when I complete my Cloud Skills challenge?
If you complete your challenge before it ends, one Microsoft Certification exam will be associated with your Learn profile on December 7, 2021. You will be notified via email when it becomes available.
What are the Terms and Conditions?
Check out the Official rules; including Terms and Conditions with FAQ in this web page.
Summary
Thatβs it friends, buckle up to complete your challenge before Nov 30, 2021 to earn new skills and receive a complementary Azure exam award π.
Good Luck π€ in your new Cloud Skills Challenge !
I was prompted to update my CLI and wanted to share this easy experience with everyone.
There is an easy straightforward process to check & update your favourite Azure CLI in a few minutes without leaving the command line tool of your choice.
There are 2 commands that you would ever need going forward, assuming that your version of CLI is already “2.x”.
Check your az cli version
Just run the az version --help command first.
Check the AZ CLI version
Running update on AZ CLI
Next, run the az upgrade command and press key Y when prompted to continue.
Upgrade the AZ CLI version
And finally, check the updated version and its extensions if needed.
Verify upraded version and Bicep
In case your AZ CLI is up to date, you could always run az bicep upgrade command and get the job done.
Stay tuned for more Azure automation & Security related posts.
There might be some technical knowledge gaps when we start to learn a new cloud service or its features. One way to minimize it – is to study for a certification exam or read a book that has a more holistic approach into the technology.
Well, while not all of you might agree with this approach of reading the book, certain books can open a completely new perspective into your vision. Of course, there is a risk that over-time, the cloud services described in the book might be phased out, merged or re-named (like, Azure Data Warehouse service got evolution into Azure Synapse Analytics) into some other services.
In addition, hands-on learning is the recommended approach to masterΒ your knowledge and get technical depth into the subject matter area.
Anyway, no matter what approach works best for you, the “Azure Strategy and Implementation Guide 4th Edition” is an essential handbook to cloud transformation with Azure that you don’t want to miss out on.
As it is a common case in technology, there are many different scenarios for running your workloads on Azure to meet your company’s business needs. This book puts renewed emphasis on the importance of using design principles and how crucial planning is – when moving resources to Azure.
The authors of the book use the Microsoft Azure Well-Architected Framework, and recommend to adopting best practices to improve the quality of your workloads in the cloud.
That said, let’s have a look into the chapters:
βοΈ Introduction to Azure βοΈ Automation and governance in Azure βοΈ Modernizing with hybrid cloud and multicloud βοΈ Cloud migration: Planning, implementation, and best practices βοΈ Enabling secure, remote work with Microsoft Azure AD and WVD βοΈ Security fundamentals to help protect against cybercrime βοΈ Offers, support, resources, and tips to optimize cost in Azure
I hope those listing sparkled your interest to read the book. Well, without any overdue check the download link and put it on your device.
Hopefully, you could get solid Azure cloud understanding from this book and lighten-up your cloud transformation journey.
How to get your Azure & Data Fundamentals (AZ-900 + DP-900) βπ€
(Attention:Β you could get aΒ free training + Azure exam voucherΒ by the end of this article)
Microsoft Azure is one of the fastest growing cloud solution providers in the world. It has an “Azure Fundamentals” certification – an entry level cloud certification. Candidates for this exam (AZ-900) should have foundational knowledge of cloud services and how those services are provided with Microsoft Azure.
Azure Fundamentals exam is an opportunity to prove knowledge of cloud concepts, core Azure services, Azure pricing, SLA, and lifecycle, and the fundamentals of cloud security, privacy, compliance, and trust.
Are you excited to start your Azure study?
Check these absolutely free resources below and get ready for this exam then π
Microsoft Virtual training events (checkΒ belowΒ πππ)
Well, next step will be the exam registration, that has a $99 cost in the USA. You could take this exam online, proctored through Pearson VUE or other exam providers.
I have a good news for you – for limited time, Microsoft generously provides complementary exam vouchers for its virtual event attendees. Thank you Microsoft for empowering people on their #cloudjourney!
We are continuing our cloud learning journey with Azure services today. Last year Azure Active Directory has introduced many useful features and we will talk about one of them that simplifies the identity governance.
“An Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) entitlement management is an identity governance feature that enables organizations to manage identity and access lifecycle at scale, by automating access request workflows, access assignments, reviews, and expiration. ” – Microsoft Azure AD Identity Governance
Entitlement management example with one catalog and two access packages
How can entitlement management help?
There are several ways how you could leverage these features for your Azure resource management activities. The easiest one to get started with is the delegation options:
βοΈ Delegate management of resources from high privileged account to managers βοΈ Govern access for users in your organization βοΈ Govern access for users outside your organization βοΈ Automate and simplify day-2-day management βοΈ View and report on resource assignments and access packages
Let’s consider following two common scenarios:
First Scenario: As administrator you want to delegate access governance from IT administrators to users who aren’t administrators. Check out the Video clip for step-by-step guidance.
Second Scenario: You would like to create an automated request process for your users to enable them request for an access package (set of Azure resources and accesses rights) to do their job.
The request process of access packages can be simply understood by a help of a following sample infographic.
A user request for access package (set of resources) to start doing work assignments
When I should use access packages?
It is not a silver bullet, so access packages do not replace other mechanisms for access assignment. However, following use-cases are most appropriate in situations where you would consider them:
Employees need time-limited access for a particular task. For example, you might use group-based licensing and a dynamic group to ensure all employees have an Exchange Online mailbox, and then use access packages for situations in which employees need additional access, such as to read departmental resources from another department.
Access that requires the approval of an employee’s manager or other designated individuals.
Departments wish to manage their own access policies for their resources without IT involvement.
Two or more organizations are collaborating on a project, and as a result, multiple users from one organization will need to be brought in via Azure AD B2B to access another organization’s resources.
Thank you for reading till this point. Stay tuned for more Cloud Security and Administration related posts.
The MCAS (Microsoft Cloud App Security) π‘οΈπ – helps to identify and combat cyberthreats across all your cloud services. This is a cloud access security broker (CASB) that provides multifunction visibility, control over data travel, and sophisticated analytics.
Here is a high level architecture diagram from Microsoft docs.
What are the main benefits of this cloud service?
Here are the main three benefits ot brings alone: βοΈ Discovery & Manage your apps βοΈ Govern access to apps and resources βοΈ Check compliance on your cloud apps
Who would resist to learn Azure cloud and utilize free services that have been annnces this month?
Yes, you have read this correct, there are 4 more servics added to exisiting 25+ always free and 12 months set of free products, up to the monthly limits.
Those services are listed on the infographic:
βοΈ Azure Key Vault βοΈ Azure Database for PostreSQL βοΈ Azure Media Services βοΈ Azure Database for MySQL
Have you used these new services in your labs or projects yet? If not, that is okay. Here is the brief description what you can do with these services listed above:
Azure Key Vault – helps teams to securely store and manage sensitive information such as keys, passwords, certificates, etc., in a centralized storage which are safeguarded by industry-standard algorithms, key lengths, and even hardware security modules.
Azure Database for PostreSQL – with Azure you can run your PostgreSQL Server workloads in a hosted virtual machine infrastructure as a service (IaaS) or as a hosted platform as a service (PaaS). The PaaS option has multiple deployment choices, each with multiple service tiers that you can use with Azure Database for PostreSQL.
Azure Database for MySQL – take the model tha we described above and apply it to MySQL. That how simple it is..
Azure Media Services – lets you deliver any media, on virtually any device, to anywhere in the world using the cloud. The collection of services provide encoding, live or on-demand streaming, content protection and indexing for video and audio content.
Which products are free for 12 months?
These products are free for 12 months, up to the monthly limits. Availability is based on resource and region.
Check out the details about each of these services on Microsoft Azure’s website.
There are many security and multi-cloud capability services under Microsoft Azure umbrella of services. In this post, I will reference the Microsoft documentation to clarify those capabilities on high-level. I hope this post will clarify intent and purpose of these capabilities for you.
Important: Please zoom into a infographic – as it is of a high quality and can be very informative in understanding the article.
Microsoftβs cross-platform or cloud security starts with endpoints and cloud visibility and controls: namely Endpoint management and Cloud Security Posture Management (CSPM) that provides insight across your multi-cloud and on-premises datacenter estate as well as Cloud Workload Protection capabilities
Next are the SIEM and XDR Strategy – where Microsoft provides integrated capabilities for the Security Operations / SOC to get the broad and deep visibility needed to rapidly detect, hunt for, and respond/recover to threats across clouds and platforms.
The following capability on the infographic is – Infrastructure Extended Detection and Response (XDR). These capabilities are provided through set of services, namely Azure Defender, Azure Arc, Microsoft 365 Defender with number of features combined under the suit of services.
Next set of capabilities are Identity Enablement and Security – where Azure Active Directory provides comprehensive solutions, including Zero Trust access control that explicitly verifies trustworthiness of devices (via XDR) and users via native UEBA, Threat Intelligence and analytics.
And finally, Information Protection capabilities – utilize the Microsoft Information Protection and Azure Purview services that provide a full lifecycle approach to discovering, classifying, protecting, and monitoring structured and unstructured data as your organization generates and leverages more data. These capabilities provide insights to drive mission completion and competitive advantage.
What would be your approach? Please, share in the comments section π #SharingIsCaringβ€οΈοΈ
Important: Please zoom into the infographic – as it is of a high quality and can be very informative in understanding this article.
I am getting ready bits and pieces of the presentation and demo code for the #GlobalAzure 2021 event.
This is going to be my second year in a row, presenting at this global event, and I am pumped to contribute with two new sessions this year.
Feel free to check out the details of each session and links here .
Session banner for upcoming presentation on Global Azure 2021
WHY bother to transfrom your exising Azure ARM templates into Bicep?
Easy to understand and maintain code for your Azure infrastructure
Day zero support for all resource types & API versions
Nice transparent abstractionΒ for the underlying platform
Awesome Tooling β VS Code extension for Bicep
Deep integration with other Azure Services
Preflight validation β both Bicep/ARM does preflight validation on entire template
Provides high level of confidence that your code is ‘syntactically valid’ before deploying
Support β starting from v.03, Bicep is 100% supported by Microsoft Support Plans
This time, I am looking forward to share level 200 talk and demos, where we will ALL deep dive into challenges of transforming exisiting ARM templates into Azure Bicep.
We will inspect the ARM JSON decompiler, which comes with Azure Bicep and how to make it work your way.
Stay tunes, i hope to see you all during the event!
