Reading Notes #90

Suggestion of the week

• My New Pluralsight Course – Patterns of Cloud Integration – Is Now Live - Very promising training, looking forward to watch this.
  
• Visual Studio ‒ It Just Keeps Getting Better (Marc Gagné) - Wow! So many great features in one thing... The news that makes my day.
  
  

Cloud

• azure-scripty – Azure CLI scripting made even easier (Glenn Block) - Automating repetitive tasks is a must and Azure-scripty is surely a tool that should find a place in your toolbox.
  
• Windows Azure: Active Directory Release, New Backup Service + Web Site Monitoring and Log Improvements - Great new features in Windows Azure. This post details this new stuff with also updates on previous release.
  
• Affinity Groups are Important on Windows Azure - Good explanation of a very important feature. A post to share...
  
• How Cloud Computing Influences Digital Marketing (Xath Cruz) - Nice post that gives a real example of company using / moving to Windows Azure.
  
• But what can I do with Windows Azure? Create (Free) Websites and Applications - Nice tutorial that explains how you could easily install a free application on Azure by installing DotNetNuke.
  
• Large-scale Implementation on Azure Platform (Ajay Solanki) - One of the larger-scale implementation and surly very critical on Azure was the US election. This post explains how this application was design.
  
• Document oriented database with Azure Table Storage Service (Pascal Laurin) – Good tutorial that explains all the code needed for the exercises.
  
• Walkthrough #1: Adding Sign-On to Your Web Application Using Windows Azure AD (vibro) - Quick recap of an unavoidable tutorial about single sign-on.

• Episode 104: Building cross platform Android and Windows Store apps using Windows Azure Mobile Services (Channel 9) (Nick Harris Nathan Totten) - Don't miss this episode; it contains a very complete demo where you can see full connected application on Windows8 and Android. 

Integration

• BizTalk 2013 worldwide launch events by Impack - Learn more about this important event that you shouldn't miss. 

Programming

• Using jQuery to POST [FromBody] parameters to Web API » Encosia) (Dave Ward) - Useful tutorial that explains what to do and why.
  
• Créé une application Windows 8 pour votre site Wordpress - Offre limitée - Windows 8 achieved great things, and one of them is changing technology so it is accessible by everyone.
  
• EF6: Nested types and more for Code First (Arthur Vickers) - This post explains new features of the Entity Frameworks EF code first.
  
• SymbolSource support for NuGet Package Source Discovery (Maarten Balliauw) - How to be lazy in a professional manner...

• Confreaks - Really interesting video about the best practices of making library.
  
• Can You “Over Organize” JavaScript? - Interesting post questioning the re-factorization of JavaScript code.
  
• A Month of PowerShell – Day 12 (Logins, Users and Roles) (Wayne Sheffield) - This post gives useful tips to manipulate database users. A good example of practical scenario.

• The Art of Writing Functional Specs (Part 1) – What is a Functional Specification? - Promising series that propose to explains the art of being understood by technical people
  
• The Art of Writing Functional Specs (Part 2) – The Most Important Thing About A Spec - The key is simple, but easy to miss. This post highlight some traps to avoid.
  
• The Art of Writing Functional Specs (Part 3) – Spec Shapes (Saveen Reddy) - This post briefly categorizes specs and gives details for each type.
  
  

Miscellaneous

• Social Media: Not the Productivity Killer You Thought (Francesca Louise Fenzi) - Wow! I really surprised, and happy... ;)
  
• Why You Should Take the Blame - Good lesson that teaches us how to learn for our mistake.
  
• Five must-try cloud-based utilities (Jack Wallen) - Interesting tools, particularly Asana that I didn't know.
  
• The Importance of Scheduling Nothing – Interesting post that explains why scheduling nothing doesn't mean doing nothing.

~Frank

Reading Notes #89

Suggestion of the week

• Pinching pennies when scaling in The Cloud (Scott Hanselman) - Great example of code optimization, and all that in the cloud.
• Mobile Services and Windows Azure Storage (Chris) - Great tutorial that explains how to change the usual SQL database to Azure storage with Azure Mobile services. The client parts are also available for iOS and Android.

Cloud

• Optimized Windows Azure IaaS Disk Mobility with Save-AzureVhd (Michael Washam) - Another quick post that demonstrates how to upload a VHD in Azure storage using the new Azure cmdlet feature.
  
• What Does Your Cloud Disaster Recovery Plan Look Like? - Nice post that explains how you can use Azure Data Sync to backup your database.
  
• Running SSL with Windows Azure Web Sites Today - The perfect workaround to have a SSL Azure Website today is explained in this post. Using a web service to forward the traffic this is a good solution until SSL is supported.
  
• Put Your Windows Azure SQL Database on a Diet! - Nice post of a real case, real data and real prices.
  
• A Quick Guide to Getting Started with New Relic - Perfect starting point with a lot of information and reference on deeper tutorials.
  
• Three gotchas with the Azure Service Bus - Very interesting post that goes deeper than usual and explains clearly some details of the Azure service bus.
  
• Cloud Cover Show: Episode 103 - Windows Azure HDInsight (Nick Harris, Nathan Totten) - Don't miss this show, it explains what big data, why it is useful. What's the difference between it and HDInsight and in bonus, you got a demo.

 

Programming

• The Repository Pattern - Nice example of dependency injection. Really useful pattern.
  
• Problems with Copy Pasting Code - And Modifying Slightly... (Jason Singh) - Wow! I'm always impressed by tools that are available to get better code. That one is a must.
  
• Understanding Javascript Prototypes - Very clear post that explains what is a javascript prototype, what is not and how to use it.
  
• Why 30% of App Deployments Fail (Victor Cruz) - Interesting post that share result of a survey on deployment strategies.
  
• App Building Made Easier–Step 3 (Jonathan Rozenblit) - Great post. Start coding, you are not alone. Note that even if Jonathan didn't say it help is also available in French...
  
• Getting started with AngularJS - With all those JavaScript framework available it's difficult to know with one to pick or where to start looking. This post is a good place to start.

 

Integration

• BizTalk Anti Pattern – Don’t over complicate your maps (Michael Stephenson) - It is sometime difficult to find the limit of functoids to use in map to get the job done. But we shouldn't be afraid to .Net code.

I wrote a blog post a few years ago around the options for where you could put configuration settings in BizTalk (Click here).

• BizTalk 2013 worldwide launch events by Impack - Learn more about this important event that you shouldn't miss.

System Management

• BizTalk Monitoring Solutions (SCOM vs BizTalk360) white paper by Kent Weare (Saravana Kumar) - Nice intro to the white paper about monitoring BizTalk solutions. And of course, the reference to the white paper.

Miscellaneous

• The 3 Biggest Resume Mistakes - Few tips to get your social "you" more appealing. Because to have new contracts you need to demark yourself.
  
• How to: Add a ‘Copy Code’ Link to Your Blog Post and Colored Code Blocks (Jeff Sanders) - Simple tips to improve the code visibility and accessibility in your post.
  
• Surviving legacy code - Very complete article about legacy code and why the trash for person is the treasure of another.

• Move your Hotmail.com account to an Outlook.com account (Greg Shultz) - I use outlook.com for few months now, and I love it. This post explains how to migrate, what era your options and what will happen if you do nothing.

~Frank

Reading Notes #88

Cloud

• Avoid these five cloud storage pitfalls (Rick Vanover) - Good advices that will help thinking through a cloud migration.
• Tips for a successful submission to Windows Azure App Gallery (mksunitha) - Great tutorial that explains every step to create and submit a Windows Azure application, so it can be part of the Azure app Gallery.
• Windows Azure Mobile Services - for Organizations and the Enterprise (Channel 9)(Clemens V) - Nice video that focuses on the business capability of the services.
• 10 reasons to outsource your cloud (Jack Wallen) - Nice post. These are really the top reasons.
• New blob storage cmdlets in Azure PowerShell 0.6.12 (Abhishek Anand) - This post lists the great new features included in the new version of Azure PowerShell.
• 12 reasons why public clouds are better than private clouds | ZDNet (Joe McKendrick) - Aaah Musphy's law; I was talking about that just yesterday with a client. Nice post.
• Windows Azure PowerShell Cmdlets Now Supports Storage! (Michael Washam) - Yeah! they finally been integrated (and more polish) in the Azure PowerShell cmdlets! (before only available in azure command line, and less friendly)
• Optimized Windows Azure IaaS Disk Mobility with Save-AzureVhd (Michael Washam) - Another quick post that demonstrates how to upload a VHD in Azure storage using the new Azure cmdlets feature.

Programming

• Taking It to the Next Level(Jonathan Rozenblit) - Nice post that explains how to can use the Ads from Microsoft to get more from your developer's skill training.
• TFS as perfect tool for Scrum (Part 1) - Introduction in Scrum and TFS - A promising series about Scrum methodologies and how it could be used with TFS.
• A Month of PowerShell – Day 6 (Exporting and Importing) (Wayne Sheffield) - Ah. What if I want to full text in one variable?
• A Month of PowerShell – Day 7 (Script Input/Output) (Wayne Sheffield) - Very useful cmdlets in this one to improve trace and user experience: interacting, getting feedback, etc....
• Changing ASP.NET web.config inheritance when mixing versions of child applications (Scott Hanselman) - Nice catch! A good trick to know.
• Nice Tool for Presenters who use Visual Studio 2012 - Great! I'm already using the productivity tool, but I didn't know about this feature.
• A Month of PowerShell – Day 8 (Working with Snippets in the ISE) (Wayne Sheffield) - Presenting snipetsType and their utilities.
• Understanding method lookup in Ruby 2.0 – Interesting post that goes under the hood of Ruby Language.
• A Month of PowerShell – Day 9 (Getting Started with SMO) (Wayne Sheffield) - This post focuses on MsSql tools (SMO).
• Building Single Page Apps on the Microsoft Stack (Stephen Walther) - Nice post and presentation to get started.

Database

• Diagnosing differences between production and development - Get a better ideas of what are your options to compare database schemas.
• The ODataLib Dependency Issues in the Storage Client Library for .NET are Now Resolved - Learn why you should be happy about this new version.

System Management

• But what can I do with Windows Azure? Backups (Buck Woody) - Know better your options when it comes to backup using the cloud (Azure).

Miscellaneous

• The 30 Minute Meeting (Janine Popick) - Interesting thoughts about long meeting.
• Introducing: The New Readability for Chrome and Tags in iOS (blog.readability.com) - Wow the speed improvement of the new chrome extension is amazing.
• //BUILD 2013 Announced (David Jung MSFT) - Time to plan... ;)
• How to Use Temptation to Strengthen Your Willpower - Interesting post. Try to rest eating while reading it...
• The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business (Charles Duhigg) – I was very impressed by this book. I learned a lot about the brain and how it’s possible to re-program the brain.

~Frank