Recently I have been exploring Azure Bicep and the benefits it provides. Azure Bicep is a Domain Specific Language that allows the rapid creation of ARM Templates, in an easier manner. I’ve previously found ARM templates challenging, especially with the complexity that can arrive with deployment at scale. Bicep aims to improve this, providing a simpler way of authoring templates, […]
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This week I presented at the UK Windows Virtual Desktop User Group February Meeting. My presentation focused on Landing Zones (and their importance) and considerations around Scale for Windows Virtual Desktop. Thanks to Neil and Kirk for organising the meetup!
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One area that always need focus is around security and managing credentials. Using Terraform, and the method in this blog post, you can help build Azure Key Vault and create a secure secret to use when creating VMs, automatically. To keep things secure, my method uses a combination of randomised password values, and Azure Key Vault. This post explains how […]
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For some time, I have been using Terraform to create environments – and it’s something I rely on heavily for my own Azure lab environment. My lab is an ever changing picture – and thus I regularly create and destroy resources and environments, to test new things. I usually just run Terraform locally and have it spin up specific lab […]
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In my previous post I talked about Landing Zones and why they are an essential part of the Cloud Adoption Framework. Following on from that post, I wanted to elaborate on some of the considerations around Windows Virtual Desktop (WVD) in particular. WVD brings with it several unique elements that benefit from additional consideration and planning – particularly when designing […]
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A defined and structured Landing Zone is key component of the Microsoft Cloud Adoption Framework. But what exactly is a Landing Zone, and why is using one important? I’ll try and provide an overview and give some specific examples of the Design Areas, as well an overview of options around enterprise scale in this post. What is a Landing Zone? A […]
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Hello! In this post I’ll be covering an overview of the Azure Automanage Preview – and giving an overview of how it can be used to simplify management, achieve best practice, and provide automation of Virtual Machines in a few quick steps. What is Azure Automanage? Azure Automanage is a service that removes the need to “discover, know how to […]
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Recently, I have been playing around more and more with Microsoft Flow – which is a tool designed to Automate processes and tasks. In a previous post I used a tool called Stringify to automate a number of Smart Home actions. Microsoft Flow provides a similar environment and allows integration between processes and tasks. I was impressed from the first […]
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Azure Storage Sync provides the means to synchronise files from various locations into an Azure Storage account and to endpoints running the Azure Storage Sync agent. In this post I will give a quick overview of how it can be setup to service branch office requirements whereby VPN connectivity does not exist. For further information see here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/storage/files/storage-sync-files-planning. Here’s my environment which I […]
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It’s probably no secret that half of the IT blogs out there are running on WordPress or a similar Platform. WordPress is easy to use, simple, and requires little maintenance to run – what’s not to love?! As with any Website – it doesn’t matter how good the back-end code or server hosting the site is, if your user is […]
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Azure Firewall was released for preview this week, so I thought I would give it a quick try and look at some of the features available. The firewall provides the following features at the current time: Built-in high availability – built into the Azure Platform, so no requirement to create load balanced configurations Unrestricted cloud scalability – the firewall can […]
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When using any environment that provides virtual desktops at scale, it makes sense to have only the required number of resources running at the right time – rather than all of the resources all of the time. The usual approach to this is to use power management – so unused virtual machines are shut down when not in use. With […]
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