Kurt Shintaku's Blog

Microsoft Fabric is an all-in-one analytics solution for enterprises that covers everything from data movement to data science, Real-Time Analytics, and business intelligence. It offers a comprehensive suite of services, including data lake, data engineering, and data integration, all in one place.  With Fabric, you don’t need to piece together different services from multiple vendors. Instead, you can enjoy a highly integrated, end-to-end, and easy-to-use product that is designed to simplify your analytics needs.

The platform is built on a foundation of Software as a Service (SaaS), which takes simplicity and integration to a whole new level.  And it’s powered by Artificial Intelligence.  Azure OpenAI Service is integrated into every level of Microsoft Fabric to provide dataflows, data pipelines & full function development to remove the drudgery of building code to data management.  A CoPilot AI will be available for Microsoft Fabric soon as well.

And while it’s in public preview, it’s fully production ready:  We have a variety of customers deployed already like Ferguson, T-Mobile & Aon.

What happens to current Microsoft analytics solutions? 

Existing Microsoft products such as Azure Synapse Analytics, Azure Data Factory, and Azure Data Explorer will continue to provide a robust, enterprise-grade platform as a service (PaaS) solution for data analytics. Fabric represents an evolution of those offerings in the form of a simplified SaaS solution that can connect to existing PaaS offerings. Customers will be able to upgrade from their current products into Fabric at their own pace. 

Our announcement is posted here & explains the solution well:

• Introducing Microsoft Fabric: The data platform for the era of AI
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/introducing-microsoft-fabric-data-analytics-for-the-era-of-ai/

For a deeper dive into the solution, visit:

• What is Microsoft Fabric – Microsoft Fabric
  https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/fabric/get-started/microsoft-fabric-overview
• eBook: “Unlocking Transformative Data Value with Microsoft Fabric” (49pg, .PDF)
  https://info.microsoft.com/ww-landing-unlocking-transformative-data-value-with-microsoft-fabric.html
• Free Trial: “Microsoft Fabric”
  https://aka.ms/try-fabric

Are you a developer? Interested in viewing Microsoft Build 2023 highlights…
…& also screening “Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse”?

Better hurry up… limited seating!

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Microsoft Events: "Microsoft Build Spotlight: Los Angeles"

Tuesday June 20, 2023, 5:15PM-9:30PM

Join local developers and experts at Microsoft Build Los Angeles, AMC The Grove 14, an event for developers by developers. Explore the latest in developer tools and solutions in your region, gain skills to build the future, and uncover ways to adapt easily with a trusted, integrated data platform.

Come together with peers on June 20^th, to discover new opportunities with AI, advance your knowledge and skills, and connect with engineer experts and cutting-edge partners. The event will be a triple feature night of Spider-Man: Across the Spider-Verse Movie Screening, Microsoft Build Los Angeles keynote and highlights, and an Ask the Expert panel session.

Key topics

• What’s new for developers in Microsoft Windows and .NET
• How AI accelerates your projects
• Cloud platform innovations
• Building collaborative apps
• Transforming your data & analytics
• Advancements in developer tools
• DevSecOps & SRE news
• Low-code solutions

—————-

• Date/Time:
  Tuesday June 20, 2023
  5:15PM-9:30PM
• Location:
  AMC The Grove 14
  189 The Grove Dr, Los Angeles, CA 90036
• Registration:
  Microsoft Events – Microsoft Build Spotlight: Los Angeles
  https://msevents.microsoft.com/event?id=92329548&wt.mc_id=AID3058918_QSG_EML_643905&ocid_source=AID3058918_QSG_EML_643905

Azure OpenAI Services (access to ChatGPT & GPT-4, DALL-E 2, etc.) is not enabled for people by default.  In order for an Azure Commercial cloud instance to get it enabled, simply follow the instructions below.

Please submit this form to register for approval to access and use Azure OpenAI’s Limited Access text and code and/or DALL·E 2 text to image models (as indicated in the form). All use cases must be registered. 

Azure OpenAI Service requires registration and is currently only available to approved enterprise customers and partners. Learn more about limited access to Azure OpenAI Service here.

…

To begin the process of getting it enabled:

• Request Access to Azure OpenAI Service from your Azure subscription
  https://customervoice.microsoft.com/Pages/ResponsePage.aspx?id=v4j5cvGGr0GRqy180BHbR7en2Ais5pxKtso_Pz4b1_xUOFA5Qk1UWDRBMjg0WFhPMkIzTzhKQ1dWNyQlQCN0PWcu
  (For background on “Limited Access to OpenAI Service”, see https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/legal/cognitive-services/openai/limited-access?context=%2Fazure%2Fcognitive-services%2Fopenai%2Fcontext%2Fcontext)
• Request to be placed on the OpenAI GPT-4 waitlist
  https://aka.ms/oai/get-gpt4
  (For background on this, see https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cognitive-services/openai/how-to/chatgpt?pivots=programming-language-chat-completions)

Are you a public sector data analytics or data reporting contact using Microsoft Power BI or are you planning on it? 

Here are some resources to look at to pursue to develop your Power BI instance and your expertise of the service.

• Power BI Government Users Group
  (Biweekly meetings)
  https://powergi.blog/ 
• Power BI Community Forums
  https://community.fabric.microsoft.com/t5/Forums/ct-p/PBI_Comm_Forums
• Power BI Center of Excellence “toolkit”
  https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/guidance/center-of-excellence-establish
• Power BI End User Training
  http://aka.ms/adoptiontraining
• Power BI IT Professional Training
  https://esi.microsoft.com 
  (Only available for ESI-enrolled Microsoft managed customers)
• Power BI Whitepaper Library https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/power-bi/guidance/whitepapers
  • Planning a Power BI Enterprise Deployment
  • Security
  • Power BI Premium Planning and Deployment
  • Power BI and Dataflows
  • Advanced Analytics with Power BI
  • Distribute Power BI content to external guest users using Azure Active Directory B2B
  • Power BI migration overview
  • Bidirectional filtering
• Unified Support Workshops & Engagements
  (Download datasheets for engagements at: Unified Offerings – Power BI.zip.  Only available for Microsoft Unified Support customers)

• Activate – Power Platform: Governance with COE
• Activate Business Analytics with Power BI
• Power BI Assessment
• Power BI Clinic
• Security: Microsoft Defender – Advanced Dashboards with Power BI
• WorkshopPLUS – Data AI: Advanced Data Analytics with Power BI
• WorkshopPLUS – Data AI: Business Analytics with Power BI
• WorkshopPLUS – Office 365: Usage Reporting –
• WorkshopPLUS – Power BI in Microsoft Teams for End Users

Let GitHub do the hard work of ensuring that tokens, private keys, and other code secrets are not exposed in your repository through GitHub Secret Scanning.

Secret scanning alerts for users are available for free on all public repositories. Organizations using GitHub Enterprise Cloud with a license for GitHub Advanced Security can also enable secret scanning alerts for users on their private and internal repositories. For more information, see "About secret scanning" and "About GitHub Advanced Security."

• Proactively prevent secret leaks with GitHub Advanced Security secret scanning
  https://github.blog/2022-04-04-push-protection-github-advanced-security/

In the meantime…

HOW TO REMOVE CREDENTIALS FROM YOUR AZURE APPLICATION CODE
Here’s instruction on how to removing credentials (where possible) when dealing with Azure application development:

• Getting rid of credentials in Azure – Part 1 (microsoft.com)
• Getting rid of credentials in Azure – Part 2 (EasyAuth) (microsoft.com)
• Getting rid of credentials in Azure – Part 3 (EasyAuth & Managed Identity) (microsoft.com)

Having a strategy on ensuring proper cost management of your Azure cloud instance should be top priority for cloud-enabled organizations.

This is a blog post & a FREE eBook that we’ve made available that goes over Azure Cost Governance top to bottom, including how billing works, cost optimization, setting guardrails and thresholds for your usage, etc.

Make sure you’re spending your budget on Azure wisely & optimally by driving toward “cloud efficiency” with Cost Governance.

What is cloud efficiency?

It is the capacity to utilize cloud resources in the best possible way, and at the lowest possible cost while, at the same time, minimizing the waste of resources, and thus of energy and carbon emissions. It’s a combination of cost—how you handle and govern your cloud infrastructure, carbon—how you can keep carbon emissions at a minimum, and energy—how the application uses electricity, and how you can optimize these three areas to make the cheapest, more modern, efficient, and sustainable application. In this post, we will explore why you should immediately start your cloud cost management and governance process.

Cloud cost optimization is essential for companies as it directly impacts their bottom line and OPEX expenses. The cost of cloud computing can quickly add up, especially for businesses with a high volume of data or high traffic, and mission-critical applications.

Cloud cost optimization is what makes workloads more efficient, but what are its benefits?

• Understanding, measuring, optimizing, and tracking your cloud costs. Having full control of your monthly bill should be your primary goal.
• Reduce carbon emissions. Cloud computing consumes a significant amount of energy, and the increased usage of cloud resources has resulted in a substantial increase in carbon emissions. Cloud providers are taking steps to reduce their carbon footprint, but businesses can also play a significant role in reducing carbon emissions by optimizing their cloud resources.
• Improve the performance of applications. This can significantly impact user experience, as slow or unresponsive applications can lead to frustrated customers and lost revenue. By optimizing cloud resources, companies can ensure that their applications run smoothly, improving customer satisfaction, and decreasing cloud spend.
• Saving on your application’s cost in a systematic way can give you a budget for additional features, refactoring, and innovation.

…

This article below goes over the different ways Azure users can optimize their costs.  The eBook reviews how billing works specifically for customers with EAs as well as other contacting scenarios.  For example:

Read about the 4 main cloud cost optimization strategies here:

• BLOG: “4 cloud cost optimization strategies with Microsoft Azure”
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/4-cloud-cost-optimization-strategies-with-microsoft-azure/

Download the FREE eBook on Azure Cost Governance here:

• eBook: Azure Cost Governance E-book by Packt (315pgs, .PDF)
  https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/resources/the-road-to-azure-cost-governance/

Wanna keep management appraised of how much money you’re saving the organization through proper cost optimization techniques?

This Power BI .PBIT dashboard for customers to import into Power BI that shows how much money they’re saving on Azure optimization techniques like Azure Reservations, Azure Savings Plan, or Azure Consumption Commitment discount.

For more information, visit:

• Azure Savings Dashboard – Microsoft Community Hub
  https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/core-infrastructure-and-security/azure-savings-dashboard/ba-p/3816131

One of my favorite Microsoft Security Global Black Belts, Andrea Fisher, wrote a great post explaining what should be ingested into Microsoft Sentinel & why.

She’s got a table and some advice on the post below. Andrea has done 70+ Microsoft Sentinel engagements & you should probably heed her advice.  

• What should I log in my SIEM? – by Andrea Fisher (substack.com)

What is Microsoft Defender for Endpoint?

• Microsoft Defender for Endpoint is an enterprise endpoint security platform designed to help enterprise networks prevent, detect, investigate, and respond to advanced threats.
• Defender for Endpoint uses the following combination of technology built into Windows 10 and Microsoft’s robust cloud service:
  • Endpoint behavioral sensors
  • Cloud security analytics
  • Threat intelligence
  • Core Defender Vulnerability Management
  • Attack surface reduction
  • Next-generation protection
  • Endpoint detection and response
  • Automated investigation and remediation
  • Microsoft Secure Score for Devices
  • Microsoft Threat Experts
  • Centralized configuration and administration, APIs

More details: 
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/defender-endpoint/microsoft-defender-endpoint?view=o365-worldwide

Is there a solution for non-Microsoft platforms?

• Microsoft Defender for Endpoint on macOS
• Microsoft Defender for Endpoint on Linux
• Microsoft Defender for Endpoint on Android
• Microsoft Defender for Endpoint on iOS

More details: Microsoft Defender for Endpoint on other platforms: 
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/defender-endpoint/non-windows?view=o365-worldwide
Microsoft 365 Defender

With Microsoft 365 Defender, Defender for Endpoint, and various Microsoft security solutions, form a unified pre- and post-breach enterprise defense suite that natively integrates across endpoint, identity, email, and applications to detect, prevent, investigate, and automatically respond to sophisticated attacks.

• Want to become a Microsoft Defender for Endpoint Ninja? 
  https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-defender-for-endpoint/become-a-microsoft-defender-for-endpoint-ninja/ba-p/1515647

• Want to know how to deploy Microsoft Defender for Endpoint? 
  https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/defender-endpoint/deployment-phases?view=o365-worldwide
• Want to know how to Migrate to Microsoft Defender for Endpoint from non-Microsoft endpoint protection?
  https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/defender-endpoint/switch-to-mde-overview?view=o365-worldwide
• Still not ready for the migration? Microsoft Defender for Endpoint evaluation lab
  https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/security/defender-endpoint/evaluation-lab?view=o365-worldwide

Did you know? Azure AD Identity Protection has risk detections for both premium licensed users and non-premium licensed users?

Azure AD Identity Protection identifies and reports suspicious actions related to user accounts in the directory, which contribute to the overall user risk score in the Risky Users report. The feature enables organizations to quickly see and respond to these suspicious actions.

The detection of risk can be classified into two levels, User and Sign-in, and can be calculated in Real-time or Offline mode. While certain risk types are exclusive to Azure AD Premium P2 customers, others are accessible to Free and Azure AD Premium P1 customers.

Sign-in risk refers to the likelihood that an authentication request is unauthorized by the identity owner. Suspicious activity may be identified for a user that is not associated with a specific malicious sign-in, but rather the user as a whole.

You can review which risk detections are for the Free, Azure AD Premium P1 and Azure AD Premium P2 licensed users here:

• What is risk? Azure AD Identity Protection
  https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/identity-protection/concept-identity-protection-risks#sign-in-risk