Reading Notes #109

 

Suggestion of the week

• 10 Easy Steps to Azure Web Site Custom Domains (Bret Stateham) - The best tutorial a saw on this topic, very clear, with screenshots and tips.

Cloud

• Delivering push notifications to millions of devices with Windows Azure Notification Hubs - Create post that explains push notification and notification hubs in Windows Azure.
  
• Windows Azure: New Virtual Machine, Active Directory, Multi-Factor Auth, Storage, Web Site and Spending Limit Improvements - Okay! That a big release a new VM type, some new feature in the billing section (I known a lot of people that will be very happy) and new more convenient maintenance features.
  
• Important: Update to Default PHP Runtime on Windows Azure Web Sites - Nice post that explained how to keep control of the PHP version running on our website in Azure.

Programming

• Generically Implementing the Unit of Work & Repository Pattern with Entity Framework in MVC & Simplifying Entity Graphs - Nice tutorial about some really useful pattern.
  
• Power Tools and other Extensions for VS/TFS 2013 RC - Nice update!
  
• Visual Studio Tips: Starting to code your class project in TFS (Susan Ibach) - Great post whit a lot of tips, the perfect get started post to use TFS as source control.

Database

• Auto-delete Azure SQL Database Servers with no databases - Nice catch! Be aware that this can append to you.

Miscellaneous

• Developer – Best Practices for Daily Stand-Up or Daily Scrum – Rules and Regulations (Pinal Dave) - Quick recap of what should be a SCRUM meeting. Team...
  
• Sometimes You Have to Slow Down - Interesting post that talks about how to improve the comprehension of the students into a class room. But it's true for all kinds of audience.
  
• Sit, Stand, Walk, Type - Using a Treadmill Desk (Scott Hanselman) - At the beginning, I found this concept funny, but while reading the post the idea makes is way in my head, and finally, I think it's a great idea! Good job!

~Frank

Reading Notes #98

Suggestion of the week

• Windows Azure: Announcing New Dev/Test Offering, BizTalk Services, SSL Support with Web Sites, AD Improvements, Per Minute Billing (Scott Guthrie)- This post is a mandatory reading. Know from the source what's new! So many good things, that I don't know where to start...
• Announcing "Get Involved" from Tekpub - Enhance your career by engaging with your peers (Scott Hanselman & Rob Conery) - Really great video that explains how to be involve in the community, the good way. Really nice work.

 

Cloud

• How To: Setup Windows Azure PowerShell  - Quick post that explains how to get ready to play with Azure with PowerShell.
• Cloud Cover Show, Episode 109 - Using Windows Azure Active Directory from Windows Store apps - Nice episode with V. Bertocci that get us up to date on all the news Windows Azure Active Directory (AD) features.
• Running WordPress with SQL Azure - That a great workaround! It could be super if we had this option when creating the application.
• Is Amazon becoming the Microsoft of cloud? Hold that thought | ZDNet (Service Oriented Joe McKendrick) - Interesting post about the future of the major players who wants to rules the cloud.
• Microsoft’s “Understanding the Microsoft Cloud” White Paper Misses the Windows Azure IaaS Boat (Roger Jennings) - Hard critic of a Microsoft White Paper. However, it's true that this paper does reflect Azure IaaS reality.
• Cloudy Thoughts by SyntaxC4 - Quick post that introduces some cool new feature for PHP in Azure...
• Windows Azure PowerShell June 2013 Update for IaaS and PaaS (Michael Washam) - With new Azure capabilities comes great PowerShell functionality... this post is all about that. Also Michal Washam is announcing that he is quitting Microsoft.
• Cloud Cover Show, Episode 110 - Windows Azure BizTalk Services - Great show with a demo done by no other one then Guru Venkataraman.
• Checking Azure Cloud Service SDK Version with PowerShell (Tyler Doerksen) - Nice and useful script.
• Azure VM Access Control with PowerShell (Tyler Doerksen) - Great with this post we now know all the new features that came up last week: powershell cmommand.

 

Programming

• ELMAH: Error Logging Modules and Handlers for ASP.NET (and MVC too!) (Scott Hanselman) - This post is not really recent, but really interesting. If you still don't ELMAH this post is for you.
• Making Computer Science Cool (Jonathan Rozenblit) - Really good resources post that gives place to get started based on our level of confort. It could also be use at home for our kids... I wonder if this kind of information is also available in other languages...
• TypeScript: Scaling Up JavaScript - Great video from TechEd, it was hard to wait until the end to start doing TypeScript...

Databases

• Azure does Powershell too (Grant Fritchey) - Nice quick introduction to Azure Sql PowerShell cmdlets.

 

Integration

• Walkthrough of New Windows Azure BizTalk Services - Again a great post/ tutorial from Seroter. This is THE place to start to know more about the Biztalk services (WABS)

 

Miscellaneous

• Are you secure? WiFi Honeypots, Pineapples and SSL with Troy Hunt - And I though a knew the danger of the WiFi. You must spend 30 minutes and listen this post... and re-share!
• Live Demonstration: Hacker Tools You Should Know and Worry About (Hasain Alshakarti, Marcus Murray) - Wow! Very "perturbing" video that shows a lot of different tools to help you... or not.

~Frank

Reading Notes #73

Cloud

• A Refresh of the Windows Azure Authentication Library Developer Preview (Vittorio Bertocci) - Really nice a complete post. Explain the new change and improvement of the Azure Authentication Library (AAL).
• Adding Auth and Logging out of an iOS Windows Azure Mobile Services App (Chris Risner) - Nice explanation of a real life situation. This post is done using the iOS but it's true for all other platform also.
• Windows Azure SQL Database Management (Shay Yannay) - This post explain how you could do a PowerShell script to speed up your deployment by automating the database creation and some other tasks.
• Adding multiple endpoints to your Windows Azure Virtual Machines by using a CSV file - Really useful script to automatize endpoint creation on Azure VM. I really need to see how this script works.
• Visual Studio Identity Support Works with .Net 4.5 Only - Good! That confirmed some assumption that I made.
• Connecting Windows Azure Web Sites to On-Premises Databases Using Windows Azure Service Bus - Very nice article that combine multiple elements on-premise and in the cloud. It clearly reflect the reality of many companies. Also available in video on Channel9.
• Windows Azure Training Kit - November 2012 - What?! Already! Wow that what I call staying up to date.
• PHP 5.4 available in Windows Azure Web Sites - Great news for the PHP developers. It will be a lot easier now for them.
• Windows Azure Virtual Machines - Make Sure You Follow the Documentation (Buck Woody) - Good advice. It will save us a lot of time.
• Windows Azure Active Directory Processes 200 Billion Authentications - Connecting People, Data and Devices Around The Globe (Bill Hilf) - Very interesting post that explain Active directory in numbers and also gives different possible scenarios.

  […]respond to 9,000 requests per second and in the U.S. the average authentication takes less than 0.7 seconds. […]

• easyJet transforms business model with cloud and Azure (HowieT) - Interesting real life story about a company who leverage is legacy application and then use this to build something completely new.
• Configuring Online Backup for Windows Server 2012 - Good tutorial about how to configure the great feature of Windows Server 2012 such as online backup (with Windows Azure).
• Amazon Web Services Blog: Enable Single Sign On to the AWS Management Console - Great news using Active Directory in business context is so convenient!
• Cloud is begging for governance, analyst argues | ZDNet (Joe McKendrick) - Interesting article; the cloud is still young and people still need to learn.
• Google’s approach to Big Data is BigQuery (Scott Matteson) - Very interesting post learn more about BigQuery and Google Sql Database.

  […]the first 100GB of data you process each month is free[…]

• Windows Azure Mobile Services: A Robust Back End for Your Device Applications - Great article that explain how Windows Azure Mobile services works truth a nice tutorial. You must read that.

Integration

• October Images of Windows Server 2008 R2 and Windows Server 2012 Available for Windows Azure Virtual Machines (Stephen W. Thomas) – Aah… That great I will also to that then. Looking forward to try the new BizTalk 2013.

Programming

• Use Big Data to gain insight about small business customers (David Gitonga) - Interesting post that explains how BigData could be you in your business... even if you are in a small company.
• Combining Files in PowerShell (Robert Bernstein) - Nice PowerShell tips.
• SqlDependency with Entity Framework 5.0 - Very nice tutorial that explain how to get change notification with EF and beyond... Good job.

Miscellaneous

• 10 Simple Things you should do to Protect your Privacy - Good tips... and I think I should do more of them.
• Why Great Teams Build Great Products - Does (n x developer) = output? Really? This post explains why.
• 6 Concrete Ways to Improve Business Communication - Nice way to improve
• What are the best and worst things about working at Microsoft? - Learn the truth about was it is to work at one of the biggest tech company.
• How to Publish Your Blog on Amazon Kindle (Guest Blogger) - Since I’m a Kindle user I confirm that I would love to see more 0blog available on this platform.

~Frank