Hub and Spoke network topology in Azure

6th of March, 2020 / / No Comments

Originally posted on Lucian.Blog. Follow Lucian on Twitter: @LucianFrango.

Back in late 2016 I was lucky enough to go Microsoft Ignite in Atlanta (USA), which was a bit of a big deal as it was my first major conference. One of the take aways from the various technical sessions on Azure networking I attended was that Microsoft wanted to put a great deal of emphasis on the usage of a Hub and Spoke network topology. … [Keep reading] “Hub and Spoke network topology in Azure”

Plugging the Gaps in Azure Policy – Part Two

18th of March, 2019 / / No Comments

Introduction

Welcome to the second and final part of my blogs on how to plug some gaps in Azure Policy. If you missed part one, this second part isn’t going to be a lot of use without the context from that, so maybe head on back and read part one before you continue.

In part one, I gave an overview of Azure Policy, a basic idea of how it works, what the gap in the product is in terms of resource evaluation, and a high-level view of how we plug that gap.… [Keep reading] “Plugging the Gaps in Azure Policy – Part Two”

How to make cool modern SharePoint Intranets Part 1 – Strategize (scope & plan)

28th of February, 2019 / / No Comments

Over the last year, we have seen many great advancements with SharePoint communications sites that have bought it more closer of being an ideal Intranet. In this blog series, I will be discussing about some of my experiences for the last years in implementing Modern Intranet and best practices for the same.

In this specific blog, we will look at the strategies about the first block of building a great Intranet – Strategize the Intranet approach.… [Keep reading] “How to make cool modern SharePoint Intranets Part 1 – Strategize (scope & plan)”

Office 365 Lessons Learned – Advice on how to approach your deployment

11th of February, 2019 / / No Comments

Hindsight sometimes gets the better of us. That poor storm trooper.  If only he had the advice before Obi-Wan Kenobi showed up.  Clearly the Galactic Empire don’t learn lessons.  Perhaps consultants use the Jedi mind trick to persuade their customers?

I’ve recently completed an 18 month project that rolled out Office 365 to an ASX Top 30 company. This project successfully rolled out Office 365 to each division & team across the company, migrating content from SharePoint 2007 and File Shares.… [Keep reading] “Office 365 Lessons Learned – Advice on how to approach your deployment”

Office365-AzureHybrid: Building an automated solution to pull Office 365 Audit logs

6th of February, 2019 / / No Comments

Custom reporting for Office 365 Audit logs is possible using data fetched from the Security and Compliance center. In the previous blogs here, we have seen how to use PowerShell and Office 365 Management API to fetch the data. In this blog, we will look at planning, prerequisites and rationale to help decide between the approaches.

The Office 365 Audit logs are available from the Security and Compliance center when enabled. At present, audit logging is not enabled by default and needs to be enabled from the Security and Compliance center.… [Keep reading] “Office365-AzureHybrid: Building an automated solution to pull Office 365 Audit logs”

Create Office365 business value through the power of limitation

22nd of January, 2019 / / No Comments

Recent consulting engagements have found me helping customers define what Office365 means to them & what value they see in its use. They are lucky to have licenses and are seeking help to understand how they drive value from the investment.

You’ve heard the sales pitches: Office365 – The platform to solve ALL your needs! From meetings, to document management, working with people outside your organisation, social networking, custom applications, business process automation, forms & workflow, analytics, security & compliance, device management…the list goes on and is only getting bigger!… [Keep reading] “Create Office365 business value through the power of limitation”

Build a better technical architecture with reusable components in React for SharePoint Framework webparts

8th of January, 2019 / / No Comments

If there is a complex web part to be implemented (for eg. with over 5000 lines of code), then the important question to ask is how to distribute the implementation logic, so it could be better maintained. From a technical architecture point of view, better readability and efficiency, the react components provide a suitable solution for it.

Another important consideration for this is to increase performance of the control during build and debugging. From experience, if a control’s logic goes beyond 5000 lines of code then the build performance decreases drastically, it takes about 30 secs or more to build and another 30 secs or more to ready the control for debugging.… [Keep reading] “Build a better technical architecture with reusable components in React for SharePoint Framework webparts”

The struggle for meaning – Is the Intranet dead?

17th of December, 2018 / / No Comments

People struggle to find meaning in life. Our place in the world. The value we provide. Our political persuasions allow us to either rethink definitions or preserve our traditions & institutions. Funnily enough, this philosophical divide plays out in technology all the time.

The morbid question – Is the intranet dead? – seems to be popping its head up recently. I get it, the world is evolving, our expectations of ‘digital’ has changed and technology is at a point where it’s no longer a barrier to seizing opportunity.… [Keep reading] “The struggle for meaning – Is the Intranet dead?”

AWS Organizations, How do I get Started?

27th of November, 2018 / / No Comments

Overview

In the previous blog post (see here) we took a look at AWS Organizations, what it is, what it’s comprised of and the benefits of a multi-account strategy. In this post we will take a look at how to get started with AWS Organizations by looking at a couple of ways we might want to design our Organization Unit’s hierarchy and go through the process of setting up our First OU’s and AWS Accounts. In a future blog post we will look at how we can implement an AWS Account Vending Machine to automate this process and ensure consistency across future accounts.… [Keep reading] “AWS Organizations, How do I get Started?”

PnP Provisioning PowerShell, Site Scripts or CSOM scripts – which one to use and when?

23rd of November, 2018 / / No Comments

There are various approaches to plan and automate the process for Site creation and management of SharePoint Online Sites. In this blog we will look at these options and how to use with a best possible approach.

Pnp Provisioning PowerShell is a great way to automate creation of SharePoint assets through an xml or pnp template file using PowerShell. Similarly, Site scripts and site design allows us to create Site using JSON templates and also allows call to any Provisioning automation scripts or use a Template for custom implementation.… [Keep reading] “PnP Provisioning PowerShell, Site Scripts or CSOM scripts – which one to use and when?”