Wednesday AWS Wrap up – Wednesday 12 February 2020

13th of February, 2020 / matthew merriel / No Comments

Here we are halfway through February already (all be it a bit belated… again) for another AWS Weekly Wrap-up.

As always, This list is a summary of the recent releases and announcements made by AWS and is far from exhaustive. I simply try to summarise the dozens of weekly announcements to those most sought after by our customers. If your interested in taking a look at all of AWS’s recent announcements, you can follow the “What’s New” section of their website (available here).… [Keep reading] “Wednesday AWS Wrap up – Wednesday 12 February 2020”

Upgrade existing Lync/Skype QoE data to Skype for Business 2019

12th of February, 2020 / James "UcMadScientist" Arber / No Comments

Skype for Business 2019 is the latest and greatest on-premises UC product from Microsoft, and if you are deploying it in an existing environment as part of your journey to the cloud you may have some legacy call data in your Lync 2013 or Skype for Business 2015 servers. In this guide, we take a look at how to import that existing data into our new Skype for Business 2019 deployment.

Why should I do this?

… [Keep reading]

Quick Intro to Azure Backup Explorer

10th of February, 2020 / Jesse Loudon / No Comments

Here’s what you need to know about Azure Backup Explorer which has been released in public preview as of 5th Feb 2020.

What is Azure Backup Explorer?

It’s currently available for use with Azure Virtual Machines
A single pane of glass for monitoring backups of your Azure Virtual Machines
Removes complexity and manpower associated with monitoring backups using Azure Log Analytics Workspaces

How do I access it?

TLDR = Azure Portal > any RSV > Overview > Backup Explorer

… [Keep reading]

Azure VNets and 172.16.0.0/12

5th of February, 2020 / Lucian Franghiu / No Comments

I’ve recently been digging into the weeds of doing an Azure VNet Hub and Spoke design for a customer and it’s brought about revisiting a topic from a while back.

For some quick context- for any given VNet in Azure there is a System RouteTable that holds basic routing information for that VNets network traffic flows within that VNet as well as inbound and outbound of the VNet. The following table outlines what the default System RouteTable routes consist of (table information source):

So, whats the problem with that?

… [Keep reading]

Your 2020 Study Guide to Azure DevOps Solutions (AZ-400)

3rd of February, 2020 / Jesse Loudon / No Comments

With Microsoft announcing sweeping changes to a few Azure exams later in March 2020 the time is ripe to blog about an exam I’ve had my eye on for a while: Azure DevOps Solutions (AZ-400). This is an advanced exam that targets professionals familiar with Azure administration and Azure development. I can see this exam providing value to engineers, consultants, and architects who are driving for increased adoption of Agile practices and Infrastructure as Code.

After doing a few of these exams over the years you’ll find a rhythm that works for you.… [Keep reading] “Your 2020 Study Guide to Azure DevOps Solutions (AZ-400)”

Choosing and using a Hardware Security Token for Azure AD Passwordless Authentication

30th of January, 2020 / Darren Robinson / No Comments

Evaluation criteria for product selection can be a difficult process, especially for items that are rarely purchased. We’ve become accustomed to working out what we want from daily use items such as laptops, and mobile phones which does make that process easier when we refresh them every few years. However, choosing a hardware security token is maybe something you haven’t ever had to do.

So how do I choose a Hardware Security Token? This post outlines some selection criteria I’ve recently used to assist others with answering “Which Hardware Security Token do I need?”… [Keep reading] “Choosing and using a Hardware Security Token for Azure AD Passwordless Authentication”

ChatOps for Azure Active Directory

28th of January, 2020 / Darren Robinson / No Comments

Last year I wrote Lithnet Microsoft Identity Manager plug-ins for PoshBot. After publishing those I developed the majority of a PoshBot plugin to enable ChatOps for Azure Active Directory. Finally with a little more bandwidth at the start of 2020 I’ve been able to put the finishing touches on the module and release it. ChatOps for Azure Active Directory using PoshBot is available from the PowerShell Gallery here and the source in GitHub here.… [Keep reading] “ChatOps for Azure Active Directory”

Azure Bastion’s current annoying limitation

28th of January, 2020 / Lucian Franghiu / No Comments

Originally posted on here at https://lucian.blog. Follow Lucian on Twitter @lucianfrango.

Since this service stumbled on the open web by way of a leak in June 2019 and having used it for a while now in preview plus since its been GA- for me this seems to be the best way to conduct secure remote access to IaaS infrastructure in Azure.

The idea of not having to deploy any internet accessible infrastructure (not having to open up TCP22 or TCP3389) to the avalanche of 1337 h4x0rs trying to gain access to anything and everything on those ports is great news.

… [Keep reading]

Wednesday AWS Wrapup – Wednesday 22nd January 2020

24th of January, 2020 / matthew merriel / No Comments

Welcome to 2020 (all be it a bit belated) and the first AWS Weekly Wrap-up for 2020. For those of you who followed my weekly updates last year, welcome back. For those of are new to these weekly posts, I like to take time each week to review the recent announcements from Amazon Web Services and outline the ones that my customers appear interested in.

As always, This list is a summary of the recent releases and announcements made by AWS and is far from exhaustive.… [Keep reading] “Wednesday AWS Wrapup – Wednesday 22nd January 2020”

Sending and Querying Custom Log Data to Azure Monitor Logs

17th of January, 2020 / Darren Robinson / No Comments

Recently for a customer engagement we had the requirement to take log data from a 3rd party application and ingest it into Azure Log Analytics to make the data available in Azure Monitor. Sending Custom Log Data to Azure Monitor Logs is currently in Public Preview. This Microsoft article provides an overview of the capability.

In addition to the standard tiers of an application, you may need to monitor other resources that have telemetry that can’t be collected with the other data sources.… [Keep reading] “Sending and Querying Custom Log Data to Azure Monitor Logs”