Studying for DP-900
Recently released within the Microsoft Certification family was the DP-900: Azure Data Fundamentals exam. I sat the exam as a Beta exam, so I didn’t get the results instantly when I sat the exam, but I recently received the good news that I had passed the exam, I thought I’d share some of the material that I used to study with to help others. If you’ve never sat a Beta exam before or… Continue Reading ‘s...
Session Recordings
I’ve been doing a lot of presenting online recently, and as such a lot of the sessions have been recorded. Which means if you didn’t catch it live then you can catch the recording. It’s not quite the same as watching a session live but it does give you the chance to watch it or even share with your colleagues if you saw the session live and wanted to share with them. ? Continue Reading ‘s Article on their blog...
Weekly Update 52
Well this weekly update is the 52nd, which means I’ve managed to do this weekly vlog thing for a year now! Which is just mind blowing, I can’t believe I’ve managed to maintain that streak for a whole year. I’ve been on so many adventures and celebrating so many milestones during that time as well. Thank you to everyone that has ever tuned into an update, commented, liked or subscribed to my… Continue...
Cloud Computing and Elasticity vs Scalability
I was recently helping at a Azure Fundamentals exam training day and the concepts of elasticity and scalability came up. Both of which are benefits of the cloud and also things you need to understand for the AZ-900 exam. ? So I thought I’d throw my hat into the ring and try my best to explain those two terms and the differences between them. Elasticity Elasticity in the cloud allows you… Continue Reading ‘s Article...
Skylines Summer Sessions
I have had the pleasure of being invited to take part on the Skylines Summer Sessions series. ? If you haven’t heard of the Skylines Summer Sessions series, it is a series of interactive sessions that the team at Skylines have put together featuring a bunch of Azure experts on various different topics. They’ve had Thomas Maurer talking about Azure Arc, Joe Carlyle spoke about Azure… Continue Reading ‘s Article...
Weekly Update 51
This week marks 51 episodes of my weekly update! Which is just crazy. I cover off the Azure news that has happened this week and also talk about the events I am speaking at next week. I also touch on something that’s personally happened to me to recently. Unfortunately some people have decided to make me a target and abused the fact I had my Twitter DM’s open and available to everyone to… Continue Reading ‘s...
Remembering to disconnect
I’ve always been an advocate of making sure you take time away from your work to either spend time with your family or just not being at your work. ? And during current times with the pandemic is no different, in fact I think it might even be that much more important. Our homes are now not just our homes, they are also our work place. I’ve been working from home for the past few years,… Continue Reading ‘s...
Streaming
With in person events no longer being a thing and a lot of people have turned to creating content in video form, or streaming sessions, interviews etc. And I’m no different, I’ve been working on building up video content on my YouTube channel. I’ve tried streaming a few of my Weekly Update videos, with mixed success! 😉 I’ve tried various different methods of streaming, with a bit of mixed…...
Weekly Update 50
I’ve had a short working week this week, as I am enjoying Thursday and Friday off. Taking some time to disconnect and recharge the batteries. And thankfully it looks like I’ve forecasted it right as today is due to be a scorcher in Scotland. So suncream and sunglasses at the right! During my update I talked about a couple of things, if you want to check them out in more detail here are… Continue Reading ‘s...
D365 FO/LOGIC APPS: REST SERVICE FOR ACCEPTING JSON & INSERTING RECORDS INTO A TABLE
MANAGEMENT, LOGIC APPS, ODATA-OPEN DATA PROTOCOL, TIPS & TRICKS D365 FO/LOGIC APPS: REST SERVICE FOR ACCEPTING JSON & INSERTING RECORDS INTO A TABLE D365 FO/Logic Apps: REST Service For Accepting JSON & Inserting Records Into A Table – All About Microsoft Dynamics D365 Finance and Operations and LOGIC APPS, REST SERVICE FOR ACCEPTING JSON & INSERTING RECORDS INTO A TABLE, Logic Apps HTTP...
Create a meeting request but don't require a response
Have you ever had to send out a meeting request to a large group of people that is maybe optional or informational for them? I know I have and then my mailbox gets flooded with acceptance emails or decline emails or those tentative emails as well. Sometimes a response to your meeting request isn’t required. Did you know that within Microsoft Outlook you can actually set it to not require… Continue Reading ‘s Article...
An Hour with April and Sarah
Ever wanted the chance to ask two kick ass women questions around Azure? ? Well you will have the chance on the 29th July! April Edwards and myself will be doing “An Hour with April and Sarah” live stream on YouTube. April is a Senior Software Engineer at Microsoft where she specialises in datacentre modernization and application transformation. She’s helped many customers move away… Continue Reading ‘s...
Studying for AI-900
Recently released within the Microsoft Certification family was the AI-900: Azure AI Fundamentals exam. At time of writing this blog post, the exam is still in Beta format, meaning if you sit the exam you won’t get your results back instantly. If you’ve never sat a Beta exam before or looking for some advice around it there is a great post here that covers off more information. Now… Continue Reading ‘s Article...
Weekly Update 49
This week there has been a lot happening between MSInspire, Microsoft’s partner conference, and MSReady, the internal conference. We’ve also had some great news and update news. As we’re fast approaching the end of July I’ve started to look at what I want to complete and achieve before the end of the month, and try and prioritise the many things I have on the go. Which has been really good… Continue...
Setting up AWS Billing Alerts
I recently spun up an Amazon Web Services (AWS) subscription in order to create some demos of using Azure products outside of the Azure ecosystem. One of the first things I did when I got into the AWS subscription was set up a billing alert so I would be sure not to overspend, as I was paying for the resources myself. I wanted to take you through the process, and also document it for myself… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Speaking at DevOps Notts
Last month I put out a Tweet asking if any event organisers needed a speaker at their event and I got a really great response from all around the world from all different types of users groups. One of the groups to reach out to me were the DevOps Notts Meetup. And I’m pleased to say I will be speaking at their event later this month on the 27th July. The session I am delivering is a new… Continue Reading ‘s Article...
Weekly Update 48
This week I return to recording my weekly update video, and don’t have any technical issues (thankfully!). I talk about the latest Azure news, what I’ve been up to in terms of attending user groups and speaking at events. I show off a new tshirt I am ridiculously excited about and also talk a little about the Jabra Evolve2 85 headset. During my update I talked about a couple of things, if… Continue Reading ‘s...
Speaking at msHOWTO
Mert Yeter reached out to me recently and asked if I would be a guest on his msHOWTO show and I jumped at the chance as the show is something I’ve seen happening and wanted to be a part of. ? So on the 21st July Mert and I will be talking about Datacentre Migrations, which is one of my favourite topics. We will also be covering off Azure Migrate as well. My chat with Mert is going to be… Continue Reading ‘s Article...
Weekly Update 47
I’ve been promising for a while to do a live stream of my weekly update and for this 47th edition I went for it. ? Thank you to everyone that tuned in and participated, sorry for the technical issues at the start, thank you for baring with me! ? During my update I talked about a couple of things, if you want to check them out in more detail here are some links: Azure Load Balancer… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Speaking at Geeks on Screens with Coffee
Mark Pryce-Maher reached out to me recently and asked if I would be a guest on his and I jumped at the chance as the show is something I’ve seen happening and wanted to be a part of. ? So on the 16th July Mark and I will be having a chat. It’s a non technical chat, just a couple of geeks having a bit of a blether together, and hopefully interacting with all of you. The show is live on… Continue Reading ‘s...
Printing at Home – HP Instant Ink
Printers were always my arch nemesis when I was in IT Support, toners would always explode on the days when I wrote white shirts or I’d have to spend hours trying to find that tiny bit of paper that was still triggering the paper jam sensors. I loved to hate printers. As much as we all talk about going paperless, and keeping all our important notes in cloud storage such as OneDrive or… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Microsoft Surface Ergonomic Keyboard Review
In December (or maybe early January) I got a Microsoft Surface Ergonomic Keyboard for the home office. I was excited and apprehensive about it, if I’ll be honest. I am a massive fan of the keyboards the Microsoft Surface team have been creating on their devices and just love the feeling and response from them. So I was excited to try out this keyboard, but I had never owned or really used… Continue Reading ‘s Article...
Weekly Update 46
I’ve recorded my 46th weekly update video! Where I talk about some Azure news and also the community engagements that I’ve been involved in this week. You can tune in either in video format or audio format, the links are below, enjoy! ? During my update this week I talked about a couple of pieces of news: Azure Firewall Manager is now generally available Azure Security Centre… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Azure Fundamental Exams
Certifications, exams are something that I’ve done at school and also throughout my professional career. I sat my first Microsoft exam back in 2011. That exam was the now expired Windows 7 Enterprise Desktop Administrator, ever since them I’ve gone to to sit exams on Windows Server, Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft Azure, Microsoft 365 and Microsoft Power Platform. Exams and certifications… Continue Reading ‘s...
Speaking at Azure, Office and Data Community (Singapore)
One benefit of the current pandemic lock down that we all find ourselves in is that the amount of user group, conferences and meetups going online is allowing people the change to either attend or speak at events that they normally wouldn’t be able to due to travel/budget constraints. I will be speaking at the Azure, Office and Data Community (Singapore) community on the 1st July. The… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Weekly Update 45
I’ve recorded another weekly update video/podcast, I am off work today (again), so I’ve went with a recorded video rather than a live stream. Hopefully get back to the live stream event when I am back working a Friday again. ? You can tune into my update either in video format or in audio format, the links are below, enjoy! ? During my update this week I talked about a couple of… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
GitHub for the IT Pro
GitHub is one of those tools that I always considered to be a developer tool and never thought about learning, until about three years ago. I then realised that I was so wrong to class it as developer only tool! I’ve come to use GitHub on a regularly basis and in this video I talk about how I use and how you can make use of it and why you should learn to use it. ? If you are just… Continue Reading ‘s Article on their...
Speaking at East Sweden Microsoft User Group
Earlier this month I put out a tweet saying I was available to speak at user groups, if anyone was in need of a speaker. My good friend Simon Binder reached out and asked if I’d like to speak at the very first East Sweden Microsoft User Group that he and Alexander Arvidsson are launching. And I jumped at the chance, the first meetup will be online and will be held of the 30th June. The… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Business Continuity With Azure
Regardless of what size your business is or what industry your business works within business continuity planning is important. Whether that just be what you do if the electricity goes out in your office building, who do you call, who can help, etc right up to the biggie, where your IT equipment completely fails. I’ve worked with customers in the past to work through what they would do in… Continue Reading ‘s Article...
Weekly Update 44
I’ve recorded another weekly update video/podcast, I am off work today but I am hoping that next week I can do another live stream of this and everyone can join in so look out for details on that. You can tune into my update either in video format or in audio format, the links are below, enjoy! ? During my update this week I talked about a couple of pieces of news: Import server… Continue Reading ‘s Article on their...
What is Azure Bastion?
We have probably all remoted into a desktop or a server at some point in our careers, it’s something I’ve done a million times in order to carry out a task or check on something. The remote desktop (RDP) port, 3389, was something that was always available within on prem networks, you could connect into a server through RDP without an issue (most of the time) on an internal network. That… Continue Reading ‘s...
Speaking at Virtual Microsoft Azure Night
I have been invited to speak at a user group, which is normally hosted in person in Wales, but will be running virtually due to the current pandemic situation. I am looking forward to speaking to the attendees and interacting with them. The event is being held on the 2nd July 2020, at around 6pm which is British Summer Time, or 1pm Eastern Daylight Time or 10am Pacific Daylight Time. The… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Weekly Update 43
I did something a little different for my weekly update. I had my office all set up to present as I delivered a session this morning at the Azure Day Rome, I decided to a live stream my weekly update on YouTube. ? Thank you to everyone that tuned in live and said hello to me during the live stream, I might do more live streams when my work schedule allows. It would be good to interact… Continue Reading ‘s Article on their...
Speaking at Azure Day Rome 2020
I recently received the confirmation email that I will be speaking at the Azure Day Rome 2020, which was supposed to be an in person event but has changed to a virtual event. The session is one I have presented before, although with all the changes to Azure Migrate lately there is definitely something new in it if you’ve seen me deliver the talk before. The session I am delivering is: Start… Continue Reading ‘s...
Starting and Running a User Group
On the 29th May 2020, the Glasgow Azure User Group celebrated it’s third year of running. I have to say when I first had the idea about setting up a user group, I never thought it would take me on the personal and professional journey that it has. I can’t thank certain people and organisations enough for backing my idea and growing the community the way it has evolved. When I started the… Continue Reading ‘s...
Weekly Update 42
I’ve released another weekly update video and hope you can all join me and tune in. This week in terms of news I want talk about Proximity Placement Group support within Azure Site Recovery and media optimisation for Microsoft Teams within Windows Virtual Desktop. It’s been tough with the COVID19 situation and the racism happening in America, and trying to educate myself on both has been a… Continue Reading ‘s...
Cloud 5X20
I had the pleasure of chatting with Prabhath Mannapperuma on his Cloud 5X20 podcast show. Prabhath is a fellow Microsoftie based in Sri Lanka. We had a great chat about the Cloud Adoption Framework. The Cloud Adoption Framework, or CAF as you’ll hear it referred to is a great resource for those that are looking for information on how to move or run their workloads within the Cloud. The… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Sync files from on prem to Azure Storage
For those that have been following me of late you’ll know I am in the process of changing my PC. As part of that project I need to make sure all my files, the important stuff is stored somewhere safe. And let’s be honest it’s also an exercise in tidying things up and making sure I know where everything is. For me, and I’m sure everyone reading this the most important files they have is… Continue Reading...
Weekly Update 41
I’ve released another weekly update video and hope you can all join me and tune in. This week in terms of news I want to focus on monitoring in Azure, as I’ve been digging into that in order to prepare a presentation for a customer. ? This week we’ve saw the team release over 250 example queries within Log Analytics. We also saw the team launch functionality within Azure Monitor that… Continue Reading ‘s...
Day Two Cloud Podcast Appearance
I had the pleasure of chatting with Ethan Banks and Ned Bellavance who are hosts on the podcast Day Two Cloud Podcast. The show has been running for quite a while and there is over 40 episodes to tune into. In Episode 48 I make an appearance. ? I chat with the guys around migrating to the Cloud, how engineers who are used to working with on prem servers can make that transition to… Continue Reading ‘s Article on their blog...
Camtasia vs Adobe Premiere Pro
I’ve been tinking with video creation and editing of those videos since January 2018, but really got into it back in August 2019 when I started a weekly vlog on YouTube. When I started my weekly vlog I was using Camtasia to edit my video footage. Looking back at that first few episodes I didn’t do much with the footage at all, I might have added a logo (or tried to) and maybe cut off the… Continue Reading ‘s...
Weekly Update 40
I’ve released another weekly update video and hope you can all join me and tune in. This week saw a ton of announcements thanks to Microsoft Build, I’ve picked out three that I wanted to just mention. We now have a preview service were Azure Backup supports backing up virtual machines that have 32 disks attached. Also in preview is support for Azure Kubernetes Service(AKS) within Azure… Continue Reading ‘s...
Datacentre Migration Discovery Checklist
For organisations looking to migrate workloads or their datacentres from on prem into Azure the first phase of the project is to do a discovery of the environment. And regardless of the size of the organisation or the amount of workloads being moved the discovery phase is really important. I advocate that every organisation looking to do a workload or datacentre migration should invest real… Continue Reading ‘s Article on...
Lisa at the Edge Podcast Interview
I’ve had the pleasure of knowing Lisa for a while now. We’ve never worked together but we’ve connected through various different tech communities and mutual friends. She’s been talking about blogging and starting a podcast for a while now and earlier this year we did have a chat where I encouraged her to give it a go and thankfully she’s found time during this current COVID 19 lockdown to… Continue...