Balaji Sankaran, General Manager of Azure HDInsight, joins us to share the latest announcement from HDInsight - an updated, managed HDInsight service that runs on AKS, giving a better experience for hosting opensource analytics workloads in the cloud.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode476.mp3

YouTube: https://youtu.be/RiQzpkZeT9c

Resources:

HD Insight on AKS:

• Manage your big data needs with HDInsight on AKS
• Enterprise scale open-source analytics on containers (Video)
• Get started with HDInsights on AKS
• Get in touch - Ask HDInsight

Other news:

• Announcing Microsoft Playwright Testing: Scalable end-to-end testing for modern web apps
• The Microsoft Azure Incubations Team launches Radius, a new open application platform for the cloud

Harold Wong, a Principal Software Engineer in the Commercial Software Engineering team, gives us the scoop on the popular Azure Redhat OpenShift service (ARO) which gives customers a fully managed OpenShift cluster in Azure. He gives us use-cases for this service as well as tips and advice on moving to ARO.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode299.mp3

Transcript: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/9aeef77764/?location=EUS2

Resources: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/openshift/

Other updates:

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-azure-storage-explorer-1-10-0/

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/microsoft-and-swift-extend-partnership-to-make-native-payments-a-reality/

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/12-tb-vms-expanded-sap-partnership-on-blockchain-azure-monitor-for-sap-solutions/

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/introducing-the-preview-of-direct-upload-to-azure-managed-disks/

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-cosmos-db-recommendations-keep-you-on-the-right-track/

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/analyze-and-visualize-your-data-with-azure-cosmos-db-notebooks/

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/windows-virtual-desktop-is-now-generally-available-worldwide/

The dynamic Sean McKenna, Lead PM for AKS, gives us all the details about the service and why and when you should use it for your cloud compute needs. Russell and Kendall get together with him @ Microsoft Ready for a great show.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode266.mp3

 Transcript: https://www.videoindexer.ai/accounts/aca83d23-620b-46d6-beec-e920bff88847/videos/44d9b32072/

Other updates:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/common/storage-disaster-recovery-guidance

Disaster recovery and storage account failover (preview) in Azure Storage

From <https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/common/storage-disaster-recovery-guidance>

Azure Cost Management for pay-as-you-go customers is now available in preview. Azure Cost Management brings the functionality of Cloudyn right into the Azure Portal so you can get visibility into your Azure spend through easy to use dashboards, create budgets, and optimize your spend so you get more value out of Azure.

Migrate from on-premises or cloud implementations of MongoDB to Azure Cosmos DB with minimal downtime by using the Azure Database Migration Service. Perform resilient migrations of MongoDB data at scale and with high reliability using Azure Database Migration Service. Provision an instance of Azure Database Migration Service from the Azure portal or via Azure CLI and create a migration project to perform the migration. 

SQL Server Migration Assistant support for Azure SQL Database Managed Instance is now generally available
Take advantage of generally available functionality in SQL Server Migration Assistant version 8.0 to migrate from Oracle, MySQL, DB2, and SAP ASE (Sybase) to the Azure SQL Database Managed Instance platform. The latest version of SQL Server Migration Assistant enables users to perform an assessment, convert the schema, and move data to the fully managed database service in the cloud

Update 19.02 for Azure Sphere public preview now available

New features around support for more broader enablement of device capabilities; more connectivity options, more space for applications, and some samples in the github repo on how to use bluetooth, IoT, private networking, etc.

Actuating mobility in the enterprise with new Azure Maps services and SDKs

Some services moving to GA from Public preview - Improved map canvas, and some enhanced spatial operations services for helping with analytics solutions.  New Android and Web SDK launched for developers.  Due to partnership with TomTom updates to maps will become quicker as well, as they move their map-making compute workloads to Azure as well.

Individually great, collectively unmatched: Announcing updates to 3 great Azure Data Services

Justin Luk, a PM on the Azure Compute team, breaks down ACI for us, giving advice on why and when you should consider this new service for your container workloads.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode244.mp3

Product page = https://aka.ms/aci 
Docs = https://aka.ms/aci/docs 
Samples = https://aka.ms/aci/samples 
Pricing = https://aka.ms/aci/price 
Virtual-kubelet project = https://github.com/virtual-kubelet/virtual-kubelet

Other updates:

NPR's Ask Me Another - https://www.npr.org/player/embed/640342676/640343477

https://www.experts-exchange.com/articles/32747/Microsoft-Azure-IAAS-platform-SMTP-Restrictions-and-Alternatives.html

Cross-subscription disaster recovery for Azure virtual machines
Monday, August 27, 2018
Azure Site Recovery now supports cross-subscription disaster recovery (DR) for Azure virtual machines. You can configure DR for Azure IaaS applications to another region in a different subscription within the same Azure Active Directory tenant. For more information, see the detailed blog post.

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/cross-subscription-disaster-recovery-for-azure-virtual-machines/>

Microsoft Azure Data welcomes attendees to VLDB 2018
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/microsoft-azure-data-welcomes-attendees-to-vldb-2018/

Helping Go developers build better cloud apps faster
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/helping-go-developers-build-better-cloud-apps-faster/

Turn your whiteboard sketches to working code in seconds with Sketch2Code
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/turn-your-whiteboard-sketches-to-working-code-in-seconds-with-sketch2code/

Azure.Source - Volume 46
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-source-volume-46/

OMS portal moving to Azure portal
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/oms-portal-moving-to-azure-portal/

Cale, Evan and Sujit get into an interesting discussion around containers in Docker, ACS and Service Fabric, their use-cases and container registries. Cale shares some of his experiences using them for his work.

Media file: http://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode172.mp3

Other updates:

Azure DevTest Labs is now available in Korea South and Korea Central, in addition to the other regions it has supported. The support includes the full Azure DevTest Labs capabilities, as well as the auto-shutdown option for all Azure Resource Manager–based VMs in these regions. To see the other supported regions, check out the Azure products available by region matrix.
Since the launch, DevTest Labs has been helping customers to quickly get “ready to test” with a worry-free self-service environment. The reusable templates can be used everywhere after they're created. The public APIs, PowerShell cmdlets, and Visual Studio Team Services extensions make it easy to integrate your dev/test environments from labs to your release pipeline. In addition to the dev/test scenario, DevTest Labs can be used in scenarios like training and hackathon.

Effective April 5, 2017, Azure API Management will be available only in the Azure portal. Access from the classic portal will no longer be supported.

Azure DevTest Labs supports Managed Disks in newly created labs, including VM OS disks, data disks, and custom images. Managed Disks helps you manage storage accounts for large-scale VM deployments.

Web Application Firewall (WAF) is now generally available in all public cloud regions as part of the Azure Application Gateway WAF SKU. WAF helps protect web applications from common web-based attacks like SQL injection, cross-site scripting attacks, and protocol anomalies. It comes preconfigured with Core Rule Sets to provide protection from many of the threats identified by the Open Web Application Security Project (OWASP) as the top 10 common vulnerabilities.

Now, instantly restore files from Azure Linux VM backups with no additional cost or new infrastructure by using Azure Backup. You can quickly mount an iSCSI-based recovery volume and browse and copy the files to the destination of your choice. With this feature, users can:
Instantly recover files. Whether it’s accidental file deletion or simply validating the backup, instant restore drastically reduces the time to recover your data.
Mount application files without restoring them. You can use our iSCSI-based approach to open/mount application files directly from cloud recovery points to application instances, without having to restore them. For example, in case of backup of an Azure Linux VM running MongoDB, you can mount BSON data dumps from the cloud recovery point. You can then quickly validate the backup or retrieve individual items such as tables without having to download the entire data dump.

Up your SaaS application game
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/up-your-saas-application-game/

Large-Scale Analysis of DNS Query Logs Reveals Botnets in the Cloud
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/large-scale-analysis-of-dns-query-logs-reveals-botnets-in-the-cloud/

Cale and Sujit talk about the newly released to GA, Azure Container Service (ACS).

Media file: http://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode124.mp3

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/container-service-intro/

Create an SSH public/private key - https://ranjanajain.wordpress.com/2016/02/28/using-azure-container-service-acs-on-azure/

Other updates:

IoT Hub throttling and you
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/iot-hub-throttling-and-you/

Azure Media Services announces collaboration with THEOplayer
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-media-services-announces-new-collaboration-with-theoplayer/

Customize developer portal pages using Azure API Management templates
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/customize-your-developer-portal-pages-with-azure-api-management-templates/

Announcing face and emotion detection for Azure Media Analytics
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/face-and-emotion-detection/

JSON functionalities in Azure SQL Database (public preview)
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/json-functionalities-in-azure-sql-database-public-preview/

Optimizing document search using Machine Learning and Text Analytics
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/optimizing-document-search-using-machine-learning-text-analytics/

Evan, Cale and Sujit discuss these hot topics and how they relate to Azure and cloud computing in general.

Media file: http://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode82.mp3

SDK for Service Fabric: http://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/campaigns/service-fabric/

Updates:

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/documentation/articles/application-gateway-introduction/