Monthly news roundup as delivered to the Brisbane Azure User Group by Damien Berry

1. @BrisbaneAzureUG
meetup.com/Brisbane-Azure-User-Group

2. Microsoft Azure News
October 2020

3. Sponsorship Update

5. Upcoming Presentations
Month Presenter(s) Topic
January 2020 Gayatri Guru Sneak Peek into Azure Billing API
February 2020 Alex Apergis / Josh Hurn Life in CloudOps
March 2020 Valeriia Savenko Azure IoT 101
April 2020 COVID19 Isolation
May 2020 Jernej Kavka From Paper to Power using Azure Form Recognition
June 2020 Todd Whitehead Best of Build 2020
July 2020 Bill Chesnut Azure Application Insights for Developers
August 2020 Wagner Silveira A Lap Around API Management VS Code Extension
September 2020 Johannes Strydom Blazor’ing’ly simple secure app development with immutable infrastructure
October 2020 Ashish Trivedi SIEM-lessly SOAR with Azure Sentinel: Watch Your Cloud
November 2020 TBA TBA
December 2020 Various UNCONVENTION NIGHT!
Got Topic?
Send message on Meetup or email baug@outlook.com.au

7. Azure AI (IGNITE)
Azure Cognitive Services
- Search – private endpoints and Managed Identities
- Anomaly Detector – providing Metrics Advisor (Preview)
- Vision category - Spatial Analysis – Understanding physical spaces
Azure Machine Learning
- visual tools - developing custom models easier
- RBAC security support
- ML lifecycle management
Bot Framework
- Bot Framework Composer — an open source tool for visual bot development
- Power Virtual Agent bot also supports Bot Framework Composer
https://news.microsoft.com/ignite-2020-book-of-news/#111-azure-cognitive-search-updates-private-endpoints-and-managed-identities

8. Azure Data (IGNITE)
Azure Cache for Redis now has two new product tiers in public preview: Enterprise and Enterprise Flash.
Azure Cosmos DB now offers a serverless option for database operations - consumption-based model
Flexible Server, a new deployment option now in preview for Azure Database for PostgreSQL and Azure
Database for MySQL - control and flexibility for database maintenance, configuration and tuning
Azure SQL zone redundancy to general-purpose databases and provide cost-effective backup storage options
Azure SQL Edge – SQL Server for Internet of Things (IoT) gateways and edge devices
Azure SQL Edge is a small-footprint container — less than 500 megabytes — running in ARM- and x64-based
devices in connected, disconnected or semi-connected environments.
Analyzed usage patterns in Power BI and viewed via Azure Synapse providing insights
Last access for Azure Blob Storage – allowing grater visibility in when storage was last used.
https://news.microsoft.com/ignite-2020-book-of-news/#121-azure-cache-for-redis-offers-developers-two-new-product-tiers-to-unlock-new-use-cases-improve-caches-

9. Azure Datacentres (IGNITE)
Microsoft continues to expand deployment of Availability Zones in datacentre regions worldwide, with a
roadmap to provide Availability Zone options in each country it operates datacentres in over the next 24
months.
Azure Resource Mover provides a single plane of glass to manage migration between regions
Zone to Zone disaster recovery allows customers to replicate, failover and failback their business-critical virtual
machines within the same region with zones.
https://news.microsoft.com/ignite-2020-book-of-news/#131-availability-zones-deployed-to-more-azure-regions

10. Azure Dev ecosystem (IGNITE)
Updates to the Azure App Service
- Reserved Instance (RI) commitment discounts are now available for App Service for the first time.
- App Service Premium (V3) Plan leverages the latest Azure VM hardware to deliver improved performance
and better scalability.
- Windows Containers general availability is included in the App Service Premium (V3) plan.
- Isolated v2 Plan, available in public preview in October,
- GitHub Actions integration with App Service
- Java Tomcat support in the Azure App Service
Azure Communication Services makes it easy to add voice and video calling, chat, and SMS text message
capabilities to mobile apps, desktop applications and websites with just a few lines of code.
integrated Datadog SaaS solution expected to launch in October.
Azure Kubernetes Service
- The AKS Stop/Start cluster feature
- Azure Policy add on for AKS (GA)
https://news.microsoft.com/ignite-2020-book-of-news/#141-net-5-release-candidate-is-now-available-

11. Azure Dev ecosystem (IGNITE)
Azure Logic Apps has been updated with new capabilities such as enabling multiple workflows into a single
Logic App
This update also enables developers to build workflows into modern apps through a new Visual Studio
extension enabling local development and GitHub Actions, providing better integration with the developer
toolchain.
https://news.microsoft.com/ignite-2020-book-of-news/#141-net-5-release-candidate-is-now-available-

12. Azure AZURE ARC-ENABLED (IGNITE)
Azure Arc to enable innovation on any infrastructure and unlock cloud innovation.
Azure Arc extends Azure management to infrastructure resources
Azure Arc-enabled servers is generally available for Windows and Linux Servers for production workloads.
Azure Arc-enabled data services is now in public preview with open access to Azure SQL Managed Instance and
Azure PostgreSQL Hyperscale that can run on any infrastructure
Backup Center, in public preview, provides a single, unified experience designed for backup management at
scale
Azure Backup will now extend Cross Region Restore of Azure VMs to support SQL and SAP HANA backups.
https://news.microsoft.com/ignite-2020-book-of-news/#151-run-azure-services-on-any-infrastructure-with-azure-arc-enabled-servers-and-azure-
arc-enabled-data-services-

13. Azure Infrastructure features(IGNITE)
New Azure Virtual Machines (VMs) - (20% greater CPU performance)
Azure Dedicated Host now gives customers more control.
New Azure Disk Storage updates
Azure Kubernetes Services (AKS) on Azure Stack HCI, now in preview
New Azure Spot VM features
- review the price history of Spot VMs and eviction rate for the past 28 trailing days.
Azure Advisor Score is now in preview
- help customers optimize cost, security, reliability, performance and operational excellence
Two new Azure Stack Edge appliances are now generally available
https://news.microsoft.com/ignite-2020-book-of-news/#151-run-azure-services-on-any-infrastructure-with-azure-arc-enabled-servers-and-azure-
arc-enabled-data-services-

14. HoloLens 2 expands (GA)
HoloLens 2 is now available in Italy, Netherlands, Switzerland, Spain, Austria,
Sweden, Finland, Norway, Denmark, Belgium, Portugal, Poland, Singapore, Hong
Kong, and Taiwan.
Mixed reality services, which leverage the scalability, reliability, and security of
Azure
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/mixed-reality-momentum-hololens-2-expands-globally-and-new-azure-service-launches/

15. Azure Orbital: Satellite data at cloud-scale (GA)
Data collected from space to observe Earth is
instrumental in helping address global challenges
such as climate change and furthering of scientific
discovery and innovation.
The new ground station service enables satellite
operators to communicate to and control their
satellites, process data, and scale operations
directly with Microsoft Azure.
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/introducing-azure-orbital-process-satellite-data-at-cloudscale/

16. NFS 4.1 support for Azure Files is now in preview
Azure Files is a distributed cloud file system serving file system SMB and REST protocols generally available
since 2015.
NFS 4.1 support for Azure Files will provide our users with a fully managed NFS file system as a service.
Azure Files NFS v4.1 has a broad
range of use cases.
Most applications written
for Linux file systems can run on
NFS.
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/nfs-41-support-for-azure-files-is-now-in-preview/

18. Coming Soon: Ignite Update Sessions!
Adam Stephensen & Todd Whitehead
to lead four sessions on:
• What's new in Azure DevOps and
GitHub
• What's new in Integration
• What's new in Web Apps
• What's new in Containers
Tuesdays from 12pm – 1pm!
(dates to be advised)

20. Azure Australia Slack Team!
http://bit.ly/az-aus-slack

21. BAUG You-Tube Channel
PLEASE SUBSCRIBE!!
http://bit.ly/BAUGYouTubeChannel

22. On Demand Training - Updates
https://aka.ms/learn/
•Azure Fundamentals
•Introduction to Azure
•Create Serverless Logic with Azure Functions
www.pluralsight.com
•Designing a Hybrid Cloud in Azure
•Docker for Web Developers
•Azure AD for Developers
www.opsgility.com
•Azure For AWS Experts
•Deploying Hybrid Identitity Solutions Using Azure AD
•Monitoring Apps with Application Insights

23. http://www.hanselman.com/
https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/itops-talk-blog/bg-p/ITOpsTalkBlog

25. SIEM-lessly SOAR with Azure Sentinel: Watch
Your Cloud
Speaker: Ashish Trivedi
Ashish works as a Technical Manager focusing on the Microsoft 365 stack
in Australia. He has lived in the cloud since the dawn of Office 365.
Ashish focusses on how to get best ROI of M365 with enterprise
customers, assisting them in achieving the digital transformation dream.
Currently, Ashish has been assisting customers in rolling out required
workloads to enable remote working.