Reading Notes #695

A mix of thoughtful perspectives and practical updates this week. From evolving AI tools and model selection guidance to changes in developer workflows and tooling, there’s plenty to reflect on. Add in insights on streaming and a strong push toward more secure environments, and you get a well-rounded set of reads worth your time.

Suggestion of the week

• Why MicroVMs: The Architecture Behind Docker Sandboxes (Srini Sekaran, Craig Gumbley) - Yes! Officially launched, so we can finally include some security in our processes!

AI

• Introducing Claude Design by Anthropic Labs - Looking forward to try the new interface that that seams to allow a more artistic interaction.

• The importance of people who care – Rachel Andrew - Interesting post about people who care in the world, where doing a lot of stuff fast is seen as a goal

• Changes to GitHub Copilot Individual plans (Joe Binder) - Big changes for Copilot that will probably affect your workflow. This post shares the details and reasons of this disturbance; it's all for a good reason

• GPT-5 vs GPT-4.1 - choosing the right model for your use case - Microsoft Foundry - Yes, this post is about two specific models in Foundry, but it's still true that it can definitely help to understand when to pick one model over the other in general

Programming

• It's Time for a Visual Studio Upgrade - This post does a comparison between the old and the new versions of the Visual Studio IDE and shares details about the most impactful changes.
  
  

Miscellaneous

• Livestreaming Before It Was Cool (Golnaz) - Curious to learn more about the streaming options from the different platforms to the tools, and the pro and cons of each? This post is for you, and on top of that, you get the Microsoft story.

~frank

Reading Notes #638

Welcome to Reading Notes —a curated dive into the latest and greatest in programming, cloud, and AI. From mastering multithreading with Azure to exploring GitHub Copilot's productivity potential, this collection is brimming with knowledge. Let's unravel what's new, innovative, and worth your attention!

Cloud

• Azure Functions – Part 1 (Jesse Liberty) - Quick launch of a series about Azure Function.

• How to Multistream Using Azure, Azure VM, MonaServer 2, and FFmpeg with OBS Studio (Maho Pacheco) - That's a very cool idea! This post also made me understand better how those things work.

Programming

• Dapr v1.15 is now available (Dapr project maintainers ) - This new release is anticipated by the community with new features and many bug fixes

• Building a CRUD API with ASP.NET Core Web API and PostgreSQL (M. Oly Mahmud) - This is a nice step-by-step tutorial with all the code snippets required to get started.

• .NET Aspire 9.1 is here with six great new dashboard features, and more! - .NET Blog (Maddy Montaquila) - Learn more about many dashboard updates in this post like the grouping, theme, localization and logs management.

AI

• Let's Learn .NET: GitHub Copilot Event - .NET Blog (James Montemagno) - A new cool event is coming up to improve our productivity. Learn how to use copilot as a developer.

• Claude 3.7 Available for Visual Studio - Having options is interesting, I should try Claude to see the difference.

Sharing my Reading Notes is a habit I started a long time ago, where I share a list of all the articles, blog posts, and books that catch my interest during the week. 

If you have interesting content, share it! 

~frank

Reading Notes #474

Every Monday (or Tuesday when the previous was a holiday 😏), I share my "reading notes". Those are a curated list of all the articles, blog posts, podcast episodes, and books that catch my interest during the week and that I found interesting. It's a mix of the actuality and what I consumed.

You think you may have interesting content, share it!

Cloud

• Achieving observability in async workflows (Colby Callahan, Megha Manohara, and Mike Azar.) - Interesting real-life story.

• The fastest way to get started with Microsoft Azure (Abhijit Jana) - That a piece of very good advice, I need to remember that next time someone asks me.

• Updating Azure App Service on Linux for Docker via Webhooks from C# - Dangl.Blog(); (Georg Dangl) - Yep it's so simple to update in PaaS.

Programming

• Exploring the Visual Studio Code REST Book extension for native Notebooks (Scott Hanselman) - Quick post about an interesting extension, and if you are interested you can collaborate.

Podcasts

• 118: How to Get Into Teaching & Public Speaking (Plus My Entire Gear List) (CloudSkills.fm) - If you are thinking about starting to Podcast or event streaming... This is a nice podcast to help you to get started.

• Automating all the Things with Home Assistant's Paulus Schoutsen (Hanselminutes) - I enjoy that episode... How did you start? And all those reflections about how to do it so everyone enjoys it even when not everybody is "pro-tech" at home.

• Having a Laugh with Michael McIntyre (A Bit of Optimism) - Definitely a fun episode to listen to.

• How to Show More Grit at Work (Modern Mentor) - New to remote work (aka pandemic forced to work remotely) you still need to make your work visible and this episode could help you to get started.

• The Art of Podcasting, the Future of Angel Investing, and Startup Ideas for Indie Hacker with Rob Walling of Tinyseed (Indie Hackers) - Interesting discussion about the podcast and the remote interaction with an audience.

• #93: Cristian Florea - Coach For Aspiring Developers (The Solo Coder Podcast) - Nice episode perfect for the new developers to help them to find that first job. I really like the live question part of it.

• SPI 486: One of the Most Important Things You Can Do for Entrepreneurial (and Life) Success (SPI podcast) - That was a nice episode talking about helping each other and doing so to grow. Tons of ideas.

• 0255 - Tidjani Belmansour - Azure Communication Services (Visual Studio Talk Show) - It's in French. Once more great episode, interesting talk about one of the "recent" addition to the Azure services and what you can do with it.

Miscellaneous

• How to achieve a pixellated secrets scene in OBS for Windows (LUCE CARTER) - So simple and very efficient.I will give it a try.

~frank

Reading Notes #442

Cloud

• ASP.NET Core Configuration – Azure Key Vault (Vladimir Pecanac) - A nice tutorial that shows how to setup our keyvaul. All the commands and code snippets are there to help.

• Azure SDK Release (September 2020) | Azure SDK Blog (Jon Gallant) - Super SDK update...

• Introducing the new Azure Tables Client Libraries | Azure SDK Blog (Christopher Scott) - Storage is everywhere, this post is an excellent starting point to benefits of how the new SDKs can help us.

• Project Bicep Sneak Peek (Justin Yoo) - Very interesting new project from the ARM team. I really need to try it.

Programming

• Dependency Injection with Azure Functions (Joseph Guadagno) - Interesting code perspective on the AzFunctions.

• Azure Container Instances - Docker integration now in Docker Desktop stable release (MacKenzie Olson) - Learn more about this really useful integration in this post.

• Creating a Progressive Web App with Blazor WebAssembly -- Visual Studio Magazine (Peter Vogel) - A really cool idea, not perfect but pretty fun.

• Introduction à Bicep (Lucas de Carli) - A nice FRENCH post that gives us an introduction of Bicep and where it comes from.

• Making Scott Hanselman's Powerpoint Greenscreen trick work with RevealJS via Blazor Server (Jon Hilton) - Really cool post that shows the magic of another presentation tool.

• Starting to Use Git Hooks With a Team - Redgate Software (Grant Fritchey) - Interesting uses of the hook.nice.

• The First Blazor Dock Manager (Brian Lagunas) - Nice demo/ tutorial of the new dock manager with Blazor.The pretty cool component in this suite.

• VSCode Tips for Power Users (Boris Yordanov) - Because there is always something new that we can learn about this amazing tool.

Reading Notes #437

Cloud

• Introducing Azure Tools, a new blog community for Azure command line tools - Open Source Blog (PUI CHEE CHAN, MARK GRAY) - Nice! Anew smart source of information, that et you filter the post you see.

• Tip 272 - Azure Security Best Practices | Azure Tips and Tricks (Michael Crump) - Seven great methods to keep our solution secure in Azure.

Programming

• 5 Ways Artifactory NuGet Repositories Boost .NET Development (Rami Honig) - This post introduces an end to end DevOps solution to manage packages dependencies. It looks very interesting.

• Exploring the .NET open source hybrid ORM library RepoDB (Scott Hanselman) - A great open-source solution... I need to give it a try, maybe with my Use-R-vote project...

• Highlights from Git 2.28 (Taylor Blau) - Nice update. I'm personally very please with the default name of our choice.

• Introducing GitHub's OpenAPI Description (Marc-Andre Giroux) - An interesting project.

• New Developer Landing Page and Issues Repo - Windows Developer Blog (Rich Turner) - Nice now we have a customized entry door to the knowledge word.

• Official Support for Remote Debugging a .NET Core Linux app in WSL2 from Visual Studio on Windows (Scott Hanselman) - Wsl2 is an incredible tool. There only one of my machines that don't have it yet because it running on public Windows release... But I should have it soon everywhere and it will be so great!

• Pimp up your Blazor EditForms with Tailwind CSS! (Tarik Alkathiri) - Nice tutorial.

• When does it make sense to use containers in a development workflow? (Sean Killeen) - Nice post that shares a very good answer.

Podcasts

• 211: Failure To Launch (Merge Conflict) - Interesting conversation about when it's time to stop adding features and deploy. Finding a comfortable point could be difficult sometime.

• 482: How to Sell Your Vision, with Michael Hyatt (Coaching for Leaders) - nice episode that shares a few points to guide us when it's time to build/ present our vision.

• #167 – The Most Sensible Debate on Hustle Culture and Work-Life Balance with Natalie Nagele and DHH (The Indie Hackers Podcast) - A very interesting discussion about the "entrepreneur" mentality. Are there too many differences between the guess (cultural)? It's definitely good to ear all their points... But be aware that's mostly a two-hour long episode.

• The Open Source Ecosystem, .NET Foundation, and Microsoft with Sebastien Lambla (.NET Rocks!) - A fantastic episode. A hot topic very strong opinion but done in with class!

• Managing remotely with Asana Engineering Manager Kate Reading (Hanselminutes with Scott Hanselman) - Interesting conversation. It's not a not topic, but they're a lot of unprepared managers that were forced into this situation.

Miscellaneous

• New Windows Virtual Desktop capabilities now generally available | Azure blog and updates | Microsoft Azure (Kam VedBrat) - Wow, that very nice news.

• Simplified YouTube live streaming with Azure and OBS Studio. ( Ihor Leontiev) - With more and more people doing conferences or streaming online this alternative could simplify a lot of technical issues.

Reading Notes #436

The suggestion of the week

• Learn Durable Functions with .NET Core and C#, stateful Serverless (Chris Noring) - A fascinating tutorial that teaches us how to get started with Azure Durable Functions and also explains how they work.

Cloud

• Azure Functions and App Service Authentication with Auth0 and other OpenID Connect providers (Anthony Chu) - A nice post that explains how to configure our function with the CLI.

• Using Key Vault and Managed Identities with Azure Functions (Damien Bod) - A very resourceful and tutorial post. The perfect place to get started.

Programming

• Bootstrap 5 alpha1 is here..! What is NEW? (Charuka herath) - Nice update.

• Securing Blazor WebAssembly Apps (Andrea Chiarelli) - A nice post with all the code.

• Windows Terminal Preview 1.2 Release (Kayla) - Very nice update of an open-source project...It's nice to see that.

Podcasts

• Stop Pushing Down Your Emotions (Developer Tea) - I think a lot of people are doing that, me included. Very interesting podcast about a real situation.

• How the OBS Project changed video forever with lead Hugh Bailey (Hanselminutes with Scott Hanselman) - I was trilled to listen to this podcast. I'm a regular user of OBS and it was wonderful to learn more about this project. I will definitely be lurking on the GitHub side...

• 480: Get Noticed Without Selling Out, with Laura Huang (Coaching for Leaders) - Interesting discussion. I never realize how “Be yourself” wasn't really useful...

• Episode 219: Remote crickets and Manager Careering (Soft Skills Engineering) - A really nice episode. Great topics answering diverse questions. One that kept my attention was about the magic manager and the time management...

• How to Improve Time Management with Angela Proffitt (Influencer Entrepreneurs with Jenny Melrose) - A few great tips to improve our efficiency at managing time. It's always good to have new ideas and ear how others are doing.

• #49: Erin Doyle - Beautiful Code and Accessibility (The Solo Coder Podcast) - A beautiful, very inspiring episode about how to make the world a better place for all.

Miscellaneous

• Azure DevOps Roadmap update for 2020 Q3 | Azure DevOps Blog (Sidi) - That looks pretty neat

• How to make separate Work and Personal Profiles with the New Microsoft Edge on Beyonce's Internet (Scott Hanselman) - The profiles are really awesome and very useful. I'd say it's a must.

• Microsoft is working on an Azure-powered Cloud PC service ( Mary Jo Foley) - Interesting..

• Sort Data With ASP.NET Core and Query Strings (Khalid Abuhakmeh) - A very cool tutorial with all thee e required code. Pretty cool.

• Top 7 OBS Studio Tricks for 2020 – and you won’t believe #4 (Jeff Fritz) - A wonderful list of accessible tips to improve our stream.

Reading Notes #418

Every Monday, I share my "reading notes". Those are the articles, blog posts, podcast episodes, and books that catch my interest during the week and that I found interesting.
It's a mix of the actuality and what I consumed. Enjoy!

Cloud

• How to live-stream meetups on Twitch without any special equipment (Alex Casalboni) - Really cool experimentation and ideas using AWS cloud.

• Run Azure PowerShell in a Docker Container (Thomas Maurer) - Really useful tips to use different versions of PowerShell without having to install them.

Programming

• How to migrate an ASP.NET MVC app from .NET Core 2.2 to .NET Core 3.1 (Claudio Bernasconi) - This is a good step by step tutorial for a migration.

• EF Core 5.0: Using ToQueryString() method to translate LINQ query to SQL (Gunnar Peipman) - Nice little and cool feature coming up in the next version.

• How to create better code using Domain-Driven Design - Software House Altkom Software & Consulting (null) - A really interesting and complete article that explains it all.

• Introducing the New Pull Request Experience for Azure Repos | Azure DevOps Blog (Apeksha Awasthi) - Wonderful PR used to be a GitHub only feature... Really happy to see that it is now also present on Azure DevOps Repos.

• WSL2 will be generally available in Windows 10, version 2004 | Windows Command Line (Craig Loewen) - WSL2 is the next best thing I install on my PC since Win10 and used with the new Docker for Windows... It's fantastic

Shameless plug

• How to know how much your application is consuming on Azure (Frank Boucher) - Great post and video in both French and English that explains how to plan, visualize and monitor the cost of your applications in the cloud. And there is also a great MS Learn Azure Cost Management module.

Podcasts

• Des fonctions courtes, qui font une chose (Les Semi-Colons) - First time for me listening to this podcast, third time for them. A very interesting podcast in "Canadian French". They are passing through the book Clean Code of Robert C. Martin. This episode was about chapter 3.

• vygl - Le balado Ep.17 (vygl) - Great podcast in French. It was my first try and I really liked it. We can ear the experience of the speaker in their voice but also by the quality of this audio.

• Episode 14: What developers should know about security with Troy Hunt (Software Engineering Unlocked) - Okay, I know I've been a big fan of Troy for years, but this podcast is an incredibly interesting interview.

Miscellaneous

• An Update on the MSDN and TechNet Migration to docs.microsoft.com (Jeff Sandquist) - It was looking mostly like an impossible mission, but with a lot of work, it is really incredible the things that can be achieved. This post shares the status of the migration of each section.

~

Reading Notes #342

Cloud

• Logic Apps, Flow connectors will make Automating Video Indexer simpler than ever (Uri Greenberg) - This post explains how to extract a lot of insights from a video in a codeless solution. I did something similar with the v1 here.
• .NET Rocks! vNext (Carl and Richard, John Papa) - How could you not try to do some node on Azure after listening to that episode?

Programming

• Writing a Blazor App (David Pine) - This tutorial shows how to build a simple blazor app...and it's NOT the hello-word or todo.

Miscellaneous

• Introducing Ghost 2.0 (John O'Nolan) - Woo that a big change! If you don't know Ghost already, it worth a try.
• Azure Block Blob Storage Backup (Hemant Kathuria) - A very cool tutorial that explains all steps to build a full incremental back-up between azure blob storages (in two different subscription)]
• How do you even know this crap? (Scott Hanselman) - An interesting post that successfully connects developers, dungeon & dragon, and poop~?
• OBS for Twitch (John Papa) - A quick post about the OBS that everybody is talking about.
• TPZ160: Bikepacking Iceland and Sri Lanka with George Maurer (Paul Schmid, George Maurer) - An incredible trip story.