Kurt Shintaku's Blog

There is no time better to be a developer. With the cloud, you can compose solutions that were never possible before. You can release new features to millions of users within minutes. You can push the boundaries of current technological limitations in days. Developers can turn ideas from the ground up to successful businesses in only months. Companies need apps that allow them to maximize customer engagement and differentiate against competitors. Teams must have agility with app development for faster time to market. Developers need a flexible platform to scale up and down based on business demands, yet rock-solid resources that can withstand failure.

Microsoft Azure offers a cloud platform designed for developers to build the most innovative apps.

This guide breaks down the “why” and “how” for scenarios suited to the cloud with a focus on building apps using platform services available in Microsoft Azure. The second half of the guide showcases the breadth and depth of the Azure platform and services designed to help developers make truly competitive and differentiated applications. The intended audience for this guide includes:

• Developers wanting to understand why Azure is the best cloud platform for creating applications and how to get started quickly based on the app you want to build today.
• Technical leaders considering Azure to support new or existing application development.

Get the eBook here:

• DOWNLOAD: Understanding Azure – A Guide For Developers (7.54MB, 39pgs)
  http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/C/F/2CF7401A-B9D7-4828-917D-199E0896BFE5/Azure_Developer_Guide_eBook.pdf

A pretty important primer just released for folks looking at Windows Server 2016 – especially folks interested in Containers!

We’re happy to announce the availability of our newest free ebook, Introducing Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview (ISBN 9780735697737), by John McCabe and the Windows Server team. Enjoy!

• Download standard PDF (174pgs, 9.1MB)
• Download mobile PDF (174pgs, 7.94MB)

Get a head start evaluating Windows Server 2016—guided by the experts. Based on Technical Preview 4, John McCabe and the Windows Server team introduce the new features and capabilities, with practical insights on how Windows Server 2016 can meet the needs of your business. Get the early, high-level overview you need to begin preparing your deployment now!

Read more at the announcement here:

• MS PRESS BLOG: Free ebook: Introducing Windows Server 2016 Technical Preview
  https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/microsoft_press/2016/04/20/free-ebook-introducing-windows-server-2016-technical-preview/

Folks looking to migrate their SQL Server databases to Azure now have a great reference to review.

We’re happy to announce the availability of our newest free ebook, Microsoft Azure Essentials Migrating SQL Server “Databases to Azure (ISBN 9781509302925), by Carl Rabeler. Enjoy!

• Download standard PDF (174pgs, 11.7MB)
• Download mobile PDF (174pgs, 9.1MB)

Part of the “Microsoft Azure Essentials” series, this ebook helps SQL Server database users understand Microsoft’s offering for SQL Server in Azure. Learn how SQL Server in Azure is similar to SQL Server in an on-premises environment, and how they are different. The author, a content lead for Azure.com, walks you through the steps of getting started with SQL Server in an Azure virtual machine and with Azure SQL Database. Follow the numerous screenshots to create a trial subscription, create SQL Server in an Azure virtual machine, create an Azure SQL Database, migrate an on-premises database to each Azure environment, create users, back up and restore data, and archive data.

Read more on the MS Press blog announcement:

• MS PRESS BLOG: Free ebook: Microsoft Azure Essentials Migrating SQL Server Databases to Azure
  https://blogs.msdn.microsoft.com/microsoft_press/2016/05/11/free-ebook-microsoft-azure-essentials-migrating-sql-server-databases-to-azure/

I have clients that have historically used a 3rd party cloud file storage service but since the release of OneDrive for Business & its advanced sync client, most are reassessing that earlier decision & instead investigating why it makes sense to instead use OneDrive for Business – especially clients using Office 365 in production.

Here’s a few matters to consider when evaluating the use of OneDrive for Business for your end user’s personal file storage in the cloud:

• NO ADDITIONAL COST: 
  Office 365 E3 customers have OneDrive for Business as part of their subscription.  There is no additional subscription cost to leverage the solution as it’s already being paid for. (https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/onedrive-for-business-service-description.aspx)
• UNLIMITED STORAGE:
  Folks with Office 365 E3 licensing get *unlimited* file storage in OneDrive for Business for Office 365 licensed users.  Initial limits are set to 5TB however more storage may be allocated to a user’s OneDrive upon request to Office 365 support. (https://blogs.office.com/2015/12/16/onedrive-for-business-update-on-storage-plans-and-next-generation-sync-client/)
• SYNC CLIENT REQUIRED FOR SHAREPOINT: 
  Any customer with active SharePoint implementations will likely need to deploy OneDrive for Business sync client to end users anyway to provide file sync with centralized SharePoint Online/SharePoint Server document repositories in which to collaborate.  If the sync client is already going to be used for SharePoint, why not simply use the client to sync personal OneDrive for Business files as well? It makes no sense to deploy a SECOND sync client to accommodated a 3rd party service.(https://support.office.com/en-us/article/Sync-your-OneDrive-for-Business-files-23e1f12b-d896-4cb1-a238-f91d19827a16?ui=en-US&rs=en-US&ad=US)
• CO-AUTHORING/CO-EDITING FROM OFFICE APPLICATIONS 
  Users will be able to simultaneously edit the same Office documents (.docx, .xlsx, .pptx) at the same time without fear of collisions when they are stored in OneDrive for Business.  This productivity feature is only available if the files being collaborated on are stored OneDrive for Business or SharePoint Online.  (https://support.office.com/en-us/article/realtime-coauthoring-7dd3040c-3f30-4fdd-bab0-8586492a1f1d, https://blogs.office.com/2015/08/13/preview-real-time-co-authoring-on-onedrive/#wdZgiV4hKoHPEpG1.97) 
• NATIVE DOCUMENT SHARING FROM OFFICE APPLICATIONS 
  Office 365 users can, from the Office 2016 apps, automatically publish documents to OneDrive for Business or SharePoint Online and provision those files with the necessary security privileges, and send a message to the person being collaborated with.
  (https://support.office.com/en-us/article/sharing-documents-from-Office-apps-d39f3cd8-0aa0-412f-9a35-1abba926d354)
• PREMIER SUPPORT CONTRACT:
  Customers with existing Microsoft Premier Support agreements for have a single, flexible, technical support contract which covers OneDrive for Business without the need for a separate 3rd party support agreement.  The same people supporting the desktop, servers, Azure Active Directory & Office 365, can receive support for OneDrive for Business without any changes. (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoftservices/premier-support-for-enterprise.aspx)
• NATIVE OFFICE INTEGRATION:
  Natively integrated with Office applications for iOS, Android, Windows, Mac, OneDrive for Business allows users to open documents from the “Most Recent” list synchronized across OneDrive for Business enabled devices. (https://blogs.office.com/2016/04/12/onedrive-for-business-recognized-as-an-efss-leader-and-continues-momentum-with-spring-updates/#FE6gvASqIW01JjKZ.97)
• ENTERPRISE IT CONTROLS:
  OneDrive for Business will maintain IT controls to throttle bandwidth consumption of the client for synchronization activities nad keep them centrally manageable.  We also have the ability manage expiration dates for sharing to limit exposure on a tenant level.  (https://blogs.office.com/2016/04/12/onedrive-for-business-recognized-as-an-efss-leader-and-continues-momentum-with-spring-updates/#FE6gvASqIW01JjKZ.97, https://blogs.office.com/2016/02/17/auditing-reporting-and-storage-improvements-for-sharepoint-online-and-onedrive-for-business/)
• DELVE & PRODUCTIVITY ANALYTICS: 
  Office 365 E3 customers have access to Delve which provides cross-organizational collaboration & alignment/relationship mapping however it will only work with files stored in OneDrive for Business.  Delve does not see relationships using documents stored on 3^rd party cloud file storage.   (https://products.office.com/en-us/business/explore-office-delve?legRedir=true&CorrelationId=58efcdac-8b2f-4cf0-a9b8-f8413bc3fe38)
• UNIFIED SEARCH WITH SHAREPOINT:
  Search works across file shares, SharePoint document repositories, and OneDrive for Business, providing a singular & integrated search experience that is not possible with other cloud file storage providers.
  (https://blogs.office.com/2014/08/27/search-sensitive-content-sharepoint-onedrive-documents/)
• OFFICE 365 EDISCOVERY SEARCHABLE:
  eDiscovery through Office 365 produces reports that includes Exchange, SharePoint, and OneDrive for Business.  Office 365 eDiscovery will not index & report on content stored within 3rd party cloud file storage.
  (https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn765092.aspx)
• WEB, DESKTOP, MOBILE CLIENT SUPPORT:
  Provides the client support you expect from the web to the PC/Mac to mobile devices including iOS, Android, and Windows Phone through native clients.
• OFFICE 365/AZURE ACTIVE DIRECTORY
  Native authentication with Azure Active Directory means seamless & instant integration for Office 365 users including single-sign on.

Earlier this month, we made some big announcements around SQL Server’s future.

SQL Server 2016 is the foundation of Microsoft’s data strategy, encompassing innovations that transform data into intelligent action. With this new release, Microsoft is delivering an end-to-end data management and business analytics solution with mission critical intelligence for your most demanding applications as well as insights on your data on any device. Recently, we had the opportunity to showcase the exciting capabilities and what customers are doing with SQL Server 2016 at our Data Driven event. Building on this momentum, today we are excited to announce the following:

• SQL Server 2016 will be generally available on June 1, 2016. This will allow you to build mission-critical, and business critical intelligent applications with the most secure database¹, the highest performance data warehouse², end-to-end mobile BI on any device, in-database advanced analytics, in-memory capabilities optimized for all workloads, and a consistent experience from on-premises to cloud. These capabilities are built-in to SQL Server for industry-leading low cost of ownership.
• New SQL Server 2016 performance benchmarks. Today, Lenovo published a new #1 TPC-H 30 TB world record³ using SQL Server 2016 and Windows Server 2016 on Lenovo System x3950 X6. This result, in addition to recent benchmarks by software and hardware partners, as well as key applications across variety of workloads, proves that SQL Server 2016 is the fastest in-memory database on the planet for your applications.
• The SQL Server 2016 editions include Enterprise, Standard, Express, and Developer. In March, we announced that the SQL Server 2016 Developer edition will be a free download to enable broad access to and development on the full capabilities of the latest SQL Server release.

…

Read the rest of the blog here:

• SQL BLOG: Get ready, SQL Server 2016 coming on June 1st
  https://blogs.technet.microsoft.com/dataplatforminsider/2016/05/02/get-ready-sql-server-2016-coming-on-june-1st/

Containers are officially live & in-production in Microsoft Azure.

I’m excited to announce the general availability of the Azure Container Service; the simplest, most open and flexible way to run your container applications in the cloud.

But why a container service? Lately it seems like you can’t have a discussion about cloud computing without also talking about the benefit of container ecosystems for development agility and portability. Organizations are already experimenting with container technology in an effort to understand what they mean for applications in the cloud and on-premises, and how to best use them for their specific development and IT operations scenarios.

However, as organizations adopt containers and look to scale them in production, they discover that deploying and operating containerized application workloads is a non-trivial exercise. The complexity of tracking and managing high-density containers at scale grows at an exponential rate, making traditional, hands-on management approaches ineffective.

Azure Container Service addresses these challenges by providing simplified configurations of proven open source container orchestration technology, optimized to run in the cloud. With just a few clicks you can deploy your container-based applications on a framework designed to help manage the complexity of containers deployed at scale, in production.

We built Azure Container Service to be the fastest way to get the benefits of running containerized applications, using your choice of open source technology, tools and skills and with the support of a thriving community and ecosystem.

With Docker image support and our commitment to open source software in the orchestration layer, your application is fully portable across any cloud and on-premises. Unlike other container services, the Azure Container Service is built on 100% open source software to maximize portability of workloads and offers a choice among popular orchestration engines: DC/OS or Docker Swarm.

…

Read more below:

• AZURE BLOG: Azure Container Service is now generally available
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-container-service-is-now-generally-available/

To visit the Azure Container Service page, visit:

• SITE: Azure Container Service
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/container-service

Starting May 1, 2016 (ending June 30th, 2017), any customers – either new or existing – that pre-purchase Azure credit on their Enterprise Agreements will get an Azure Support plan upgrade for 12 months at no cost.

The upgrade works as follows:

• For customers NOT purchasing an Azure Support plan: They will automatically receive a “Azure Standard” support for 12 months.
• For customers already purchasing an “Azure Standard” support plan: They will receive an automatic upgrade to the next tier of support ,”Azure Professional Direct” Support for the term of their plan.
• For customers purchasing $100k in Azure credit OR consume $10k in Azure/month: They will automatically receive “Azure Professional Direct” support for 12 months.
• For customers already purchasing an “Azure Professional Direct” support plan: They will receive a credit for 6 Application Consulting sessions at no cost.

WHAT ARE THESE TIERS?
Azure Standard support offers unlimited technical assistance for subscription management and break-fix issues.

Azure Professional Direct support offers faster initial response and escalation management for high priority issues, proactive monitoring of business critical support issues and account management.

Here’s a chart describing the Support plans available today for Azure:

For more detail around the offer & the tiers of service available visit the following blog sites:

• AZURE BLOG: Announcing Azure support upgrade for enterprises
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-azure-support-upgrade-for-enterprises/
• INFO: Terms & Conditions of Enterprise Agreement Support Offer
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/offers/enterprise-agreement-support-upgrade/
• PLANS: Azure Support for Customers
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/support/plans/
• DATASHEET: Azure Support Plans
  http://download.microsoft.com/download/2/B/7/2B777524-3A90-450E-BA1E-51803524053C/AzurePaidSupportDatasheet_072215.pdf

We’ve published a series of posters specifically for cloud architects.

These architecture posters give you information about Microsoft cloud services and platforms, including Office 365, Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Intune, Microsoft Dynamics CRM Online, private cloud datacenter, and hybrid on-premises and cloud solutions.

IT decision makers and architects can use these resources to determine the ideal solutions for their workloads and to make decisions about core infrastructure components such as identity and security.

• Azure
• Microsoft Cloud Services and Platform Options
• Microsoft Cloud Identity for Enterprise Architects
• Microsoft Cloud Security for Enterprise Architects
• Microsoft Cloud Storage for Enterprise Architects
• Microsoft Cloud Networking for Enterprise Architects
• Microsoft Hybrid Cloud for Enterprise Architects
• Office 365
• Information Protection for Office 365
• Change Management for Office 365 Clients
• …

This is list is growing constantly.  There will be 4 additional posters published for Office 365, for example. 

For the current index of all architecture resources for Microsoft Azure cloud & Office 365 – go here:

• Microsoft cloud IT architecture resources
  https://technet.microsoft.com/library/dn919927.aspx

If you’re thinking of attending DockerCon (Seattle, WA – June 19­-21, 2016), you’re in luck! 

We at Microsoft love Docker and containers and have implemented container support in BOTH our on-premises solutions beginning with Windows Server 2016 as well as in Microsoft Azure via the Azure Container Service.

Even better, we’re the top-tier Diamond sponsor of DockerCon 2016 and will be presenting during the following timeslots:

• Monday, June 20 • 11:45am – 12:30pm
  Windows Server and Docker – The Internals Behind Bringing Docker and Containers to Windows
• Monday, June 20 • 2:55pm – 3:40pm
  Workflows for Developing, Debugging and Deploying Containerized Applications

And as a sponsor, we’re entitled to provide our customers with 10% off using the code: “DockerConDiscount”

Register for DockerCon 2106 here:
http://2016.dockercon.com/

Are you interested in understanding how you can save on costs by using Microsoft Azure?

Cost savings are a frequently cited benefit of cloud adoption; however, many customers lack a holistic model for evaluating the economic benefits and costs that public cloud solutions afford. In order to better anticipate the economic benefits of Microsoft Azure, you can use Forrester’s Total Economic Impact (“TEI”) model.

Download “The Total Economic Impact of Microsoft Azure,” a commissioned study conducted by Forrester Consulting, for free to learn about the key benefits, costs, and risks associated with implementing Microsoft Azure and deepen your understanding.

• WHITEPAPER: Forrester Consulting – “The Total Economic Impact of Microsoft Azure”
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/resources/co-azure-cntnt-fy15-07jul-totaleconomicimpactofazure/