Conferences Archives

Speaking at Nordic Virtual Summit

17/01/202114/01/2021
by Martin Ehrnst

Nordic Virtual Summit is a free, community-based, virtual event focusing on everything Microsoft Cloud. With more than 40 speakers delivering content on Security and Compliance, Azure and Automation, and Endpoint Management. I am sure this will be one great event whether you work with infrastructure and/or client management.

2 Days of Quality Content – 100% Virtual – Community-Driven – World Class Speakers – Microsoft MVPs

Event-based automation for Operations

I am happy to announce that I will be speaking at Nordic Virtual Summit. On Wednesday, 02/10 I have a session on how you as an IT Pro can use Azure to perform automated tasks based on events. Being able to adopt some principals from the developer world to better handle operational tasks is a very good idea. And I will show you how.

Conferences

IT Pro announcements from Microsoft Build

20/05/202003/09/2020
by Martin Ehrnst

Microsoft Build is Microsoft prime developer conference, where Microsoft Ignite is the conference for your traditional IT pros. However, the traditional IT pro role has changed significantly in recent years, and Build is therefore interesting to us, and a lot of great “infrastructure” announcements were released at Build this year. Below I have picked out a few announcements I find most interesting.

Azure Resource Manager templates

ARM language improvements

Azure resource manager templates are very powerful. However, one of its Achilles heels is its verbosity. At build we got a small sneak peek on how Microsoft is looking in to improve ARM template language. Sign up here to get more information.

What-If analysis

I have deployed a lot of templates in recent years. And when I first saw a preview of the new what-if command I was thrilled. The ability to check what impact your template would make is a very important feature that is now available.

PowerShell or CLI inline in the templates

I’m not sure I like this one- the ability to actually write PowerShell or CLI scripts within ARM templates via Deployment Script is now in Public Preview.

ARM templates tend to be very complex already. And while this feature will solve a lot of issues, I am pretty sure we can manage to create a lot of new ones as well. I suggest a very humble approach to this feature.

Azure infrastructure

Azure Peering service generally available. Providing the fastest route from on-premises to your Azure resources. At first this looks like a new name for Express Route, but Azure Peering is not private. Instead it uses the largest ISPs around the world to quickly get you on Microsofts backbone.

Azure Arc enabled kubernetes

Azure Arc provides a range of capabilities for managing servers, Kubernetes, and Azure data services across clouds, datacenters, and edge locations.

Azure Arc was introduced at Microsoft Ignite in 2019. At build, Microsoft announced Arc for kubernetes in preview. With Arc for Kubernetes, we are able to use management tools in Azure like Azure policy and Azure monitor. For clusters running on-premises or in another cloud, public or private. For companies using for example RedHat OpenShift on-premises, and AKS in Azure. You can have a unified experience for both environments.

Azure Security and Azure AD

Azure AD now has a feature called ‘external identities’ in public preview. I’m not sure about all the news. But it seems to be a revamped Azure AD B2c. I will look more in to it later.

Azure Security Center is updated with a secure score API. To me this is great as integration to internal portals will be much easier. In other news, the ability to suppress alerts is now publicly available!

More Azure AD news can be found here

Build 2020 book of news

I will continue to update this list throughout Build and hopefully test drive some of the new features. In the meantime, you can find the complete list of Build 2020 announcements in the book of news

Community

Speaking at NIC 2020 vision

17/01/202017/01/2020
by Martin Ehrnst

Nordic Infrastructure Conference, or NIC for short. It is a leading technology conference in the Nordics

If you have been to NIC previously, you already know that the conference is packed with great speakers from the entire industry. It doesn’t matter if you work with Microsoft Azure or AWS. Technology is the focus of NIC Conf.

Whether you are an IT pro, looking to step up your automation game. or just interested in new technology, I encourage you to attend my session about Azure serverless.

The two-day conference is held on February 6 and 7, Oslo Norway. Are you coming?

Azure

Microsoft Ignite 2019 announcements and news

04/11/201913/11/2019
by Martin Ehrnst

It is Monday morning and Ignite announcements are coming in fast. The releases itself aren’t that groundbreaking as previous years, but looking at them from 10.000 feet they represent something very interesting in my opinion.

At Microsoft Ignite in 2015, we were pitched that everyone should run in the public cloud only.
Over the years, Microsoft has invested heavily in the hybrid scenario, introducing Azure stack and other services. With the announcements from Ignite 2019, I feel like we are completing the circle. Azure Arc lets us manage on-premises as we do with Azure, using ARM. Azure Functions are getting more hybrid/local benefits, and the same goes for many of the other services.

Below you can find what I find particularly interesting. Expect this list to evolve and change throughout the week.

For all announcements from Ignite 2019 read the Microsoft Ignite Book of news

Azure Arc

If you think Microsoft all over your infrastructure already. Azure Arc extends Azure management to any cloud and on-premises. I am really looking forward to testing this out! ARM templates on-premises?

Azure Monitor

Azure monitor itself doesn’t get any new features. But all other services get better integration with Azure Monitor. Prometheus support is GA, and hybrid monitoring for containers (kubernetes) is announced as a preview.

Azure Functions

As with the announcement of Azure Arc. Support for multi-cloud and hybrid cloud continues to evolve with Azure Functions. Premium support is now GA, as well as PowerShell. With Powershell support in functions, and Premium plan with hybrid support. I am keen to hear about the future of Azure Monitor.

Azure Cost Management for CSP

Finally. If you know the struggle you are probably as excited as I am, that Azure Cost Management now is available for CSP subscriptions. This means that we can provide cost management seamlessly across all subscription models, and leverage the same APIs

Tags for subscriptions

A long-awaited feature. The ability to add tags to subscriptions is finally available.

Azure

Ignite 2019 session tips

04/11/201904/11/2019
by Martin Ehrnst

Ignite 2019 is just around the corner, and we have a lot to look forward to. According to the session builder, there are almost 2000 sessions to choose from. Even Monday has 321!

In this post, I will share what I think you should look out for and what sessions to attend.

Keynotes

First things first. Monday is packed with keynotes. Satya Nadella’s vision keynote will tell us how Microsoft sees the future and sets the mood for the coming week. We can also expect a few announcements coming as well.

After the vision keynote, each product team has their own technology keynote. These are usually really good and packed with demos.
For Ignite 2019 I am not sure which I will attend. But it will be one of these two:

Breakout sessions

One hot tip that I have, is the ability to chose a learning path. This lets you add all breakout sessions within the learning path, and with that have consistency in your sessions. If you’re going à la carte, I think these sessions look interesting.

Hallway sessions

Ignite 2019 have a great option called Expert Connect. Here you can schedule to meet subject matter experts and discuss your real-world challenges.

Personally, I have cut down on the number of sessions that I attend each day. And instead, I am prioritizing side meetings and the occasional “hallway session”.
Most of the breakout sessions are available on-demand when you get home.
If you want to meet, let me know!

Speaking at Nordic Virtual Summit

Event-based automation for Operations

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IT Pro announcements from Microsoft Build

Azure Resource Manager templates

ARM language improvements

What-If analysis

PowerShell or CLI inline in the templates

Azure infrastructure

Azure Arc enabled kubernetes

Azure Security and Azure AD

Build 2020 book of news

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Speaking at NIC 2020 vision

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Microsoft Ignite 2019 announcements and news

Azure Arc

Azure Monitor

Azure Functions

Azure Cost Management for CSP

Tags for subscriptions

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Ignite 2019 session tips

Keynotes

Breakout sessions

Hallway sessions

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