Microsoft Cloud Solution Architect, Marc Böhnke, gives us the low-down on the partnership between SAP and Azure and the technical details that that has resulted in the ERP software to be easily accessible in Microsoft's cloud platform.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode316.mp3

Transcript: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/40cb937dc4/?location=EUS2

Resources:

Embrace:
https://www.sap.com/documents/2020/01/1a87f51d-7d7d-0010-87a3-c30de2ffd8ff.html

SAP Reference architectures on Azure:
https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/reference-architectures/sap/sap-s4hana

Some examples for Integrationscenarios on GitHub from my colleague Roman Broich he uses in Partner Bootcamps:
https://github.com/ROBROICH

Other updates:

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/introducing-the-new-azure-logs-table-pane-schema/

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/site-recovery/migrate-tutorial-windows-server-2008
Extended Security Updates in Azure: Customers who migrate workloads to Azure Virtual Machines (IaaS) will have access to Extended Security Updates for both SQL Server and Windows Server 2008 and 2008 R2 for three years after the End of Support dates for no additional charges above the cost of running the virtual machine. For many customers, this is an easy first step before upgrading or modernizing with newer versions or services in Azure. Those that decide to move to Azure SQL Database Managed Instance (PaaS) will also have access to continuous security updates, as this is a fully managed solution. Customers do not need Software Assurance to receive Extended Security Updates in Azure.

From <https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/cloud-platform/extended-security-updates>

Azure Virtual Network—Network address translation is now in preview
Updated: February 18, 2020
Azure Virtual Network now offers network address translation (NAT) (in preview) to simplify outbound-only internet connectivity for virtual networks. All outbound connectivity uses the public IP address and/or public IP prefix resources connected to the virtual network NAT. Outbound connectivity is possible without a load balancer or public IP addresses directly attached to virtual machines. Virtual Network NAT Preview is fully managed, highly resilient.

New Azure Firewall certification and features in Q1 CY2020
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/new-azure-firewall-certification-and-features-in-q1-cy2020/
SQL Server runs best on Azure. Here’s why.
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/sql-server-runs-best-on-azure-heres-why/

Azure Offline Backup with Azure Data Box now in preview

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-offline-backup-with-azure-data-box-now-in-preview/>

Private Link:
Azure Private Link is a secure and scalable way for Azure customers to consume Azure Services (such as Storage, SQL, and Cosmos DB) or Customer Own services (for example, Partner Service and BYOS) privately from within their virtual network. Private Link brings in true private connectivity experience between services and virtual networks. The technology is based on a provider and consumer model where the provider and the consumer are both hosted in Azure. A connection is established using a consent-based call flow and, once established, all data that flows between the service provider and the service consumer is isolated from the internet and stays on the Microsoft network. There’s no need for gateways, NAT devices, or public IP addresses to communicate with this service.

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/azure-private-link-is-now-available/>

Azure Backup offline-backup with Azure Data Box
Updated: February 19, 2020
Now Azure Backup customers can take advantage of Azure Data Box to move large backups of critical enterprise data through offline mechanisms. With this preview, customers will be able to use Azure Data Box (100 TB appliance) and Azure Data Box disks (up to 8 TB each) with the Microsoft Azure Recovery Services Agent to seed large initial backups (up to 80 TB per server) offline to an Azure Recovery Services Vault. Subsequent backups will take place over the network.

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/azure-backup-offlinebackup-with-azure-data-box/>

Senior Azure PM Varun Shandilya talks to the team about Spot VMs and gives us some great tips on tricks on when and how to leverage these low-cost VM SKUs.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode315.mp3

Transcript:

Other updates:

Azure Key Vault—Private endpoints now available in preview
Updated: February 07, 2020
Establish a private connection between Azure Key Vault and other Azure services by using Azure Private Link, now available in preview for all public regions.

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/key-vault-private-endpoint/>

Azure Cognitive Services Text Analytics sentiment analysis v3 now supports Korean
Updated: February 07, 2020
The sentiment analysis v3 feature of Cognitive Services Text Analytics now supports Korean in addition to English, Japanese, Simplified and Traditional Chinese, Spanish, Italian, French, Portuguese, German, and Dutch. 

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/sentiment-v3-preview-updates3/>

Backup Explorer is now in preview
Updated: February 07, 2020
Azure Backup now offers a new solution called Backup Explorer (in preview). Backup Explorer is a built-in Azure Monitor Workbook enabling you to have a single pane of glass to perform real-time monitoring across your entire backup estate on Azure.

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/backup-explorer-public-preview-2/>

Azure Stream Analytics—Machine learning–based anomaly detection functions
Updated: February 06, 2020
Easily add anomaly detection capabilities to your Stream Analytics jobs without the requirement to develop and train your own machine learning models. Ready-to-use unsupervised learning ML models are provided within the SQL language

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/machine-learningbased-anomaly-detection-functions-in-azure-stream-analytics-general-availability/>

Advancing safe deployment practices
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/advancing-safe-deployment-practices/

Check out Azure for Education.
 
Build, deploy, and manage applications with comprehensive Azure cloud services. Whether you’re a student getting started, an educator teaching advanced workloads, or just interested in building cloud-based skills in your community, we’ve got the cloud development resources you need.
 
Azure for Students
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/free/students/
 
Azure for Students FAQ
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/free/free-account-students-faq/
 
Azure for Students Starter FAQ
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/free/students-starter-faq/

Senior Microsoft App-Dev Consultant, Avon Gonzales, fresh from the internal Microsoft Ready conference, shares his passion and learnings about Azure Sphere and IoT in general.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode314.mp3

Transcription: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/76066d068b/?location=EUS2

Other updates:

Azure Site Recovery now supports customer-managed keys

From https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/azure-site-recovery-now-supports-customer-managed-keys/

Azure Backup now supports selective disk backup and restore using Azure Virtual machine backup solution

From https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/excludediskpreview/

Principal Architect Bob Ward makes another appearance to give us the latest technical details on the advances in SQL 2019 Big Data Clusters on Azure.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode313.mp3

Transcript: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/7984c7be05/?location=EUS2

Dr. Ranveer Chandra, the Chief Scientist of Azure Global, talks about his ground-breaking work to democratize AI in the agricultural industry.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode312.mp3

Transcript: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/21b00130fc/?location=EUS2

Resources:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/research/project/farmbeats-iot-agriculture/

https://azuremarketplace.microsoft.com/en-us/marketplace/apps/microsoftfarmbeats.microsoft_farmbeats?tab=Overview

Other updates:

Microsoft Sustainability Calculator provides insights into IT carbon emissions

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/microsoft-sustainability-calculator-provides-insights-into-it-carbon-emissions/

Cross Team Dashboard
https://devblogs.microsoft.com/devops/create-dashboards-without-a-team/

Azure Active Directory support in Azure Database for MySQL
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/azure-active-directory-support-in-azure-database-for-mysql/

Jason Stevens, a Software Engineer in the Commercial Software Engineering group at Microsoft, explains how Pivotal software can be deployed on Azure and gives us fascinating insights into some of the magic behind the scenes that makes it happen.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode311.mp3

Transcript: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/c1d626922f/?location=EUS2

Resources:

https://www.cloudfoundry.org/
https://pivotal.io/partners/microsoft-azure
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/campaigns/pivotal/

Other updates:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/security/solving-tls1-problem

Azure Lab Services—Virtual machine shutdown for Windows users

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/azure-lab-services-virtual-machine-shutdown-for-windows-users/>

Azure Lab Services—Multiple owners for lab and lab management

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/azure-lab-services-multiple-owners-for-lab-and-lab-management/>

Azure DevTest Labs—Browser connect now generally available

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/azure-devtest-labs-browser-connect-now-generally-available/>

Learning from cryptocurrency mining attack scripts on Linux
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/learning-from-cryptocurrency-mining-attack-scripts-on-linux/

In this round-table discussion, Cynthia, Kendall, Cale, Evan and Sujit weigh-in on what Azure features they are most excited about for 2020.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode310.mp3

Transcript: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/8c5dfae1ef/

Resources:

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/guide/technology-choices/load-balancing-overview

Other Updates:

Azure SQL Database Gen 4 hardware approaching end of life in 2020

To address customer security and manageability requirements, managed instance, a deployment capability of Azure SQL Database, is transitioning from a manual to service-aided subnet configuration.

Advancing no-impact and low-impact maintenance technologies
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/advancing-noimpact-and-lowimpact-maintenance-technologies/
Azure Lighthouse: The managed service provider perspective
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-lighthouse-the-managed-service-provider-perspective/
Tips for learning Azure in the new year
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/tips-for-learning-azure-in-the-new-year/

Paulo Renato, a Principal Cloud Solution Architect at Microsoft works with large GISVs and he tells us about the massive scale to which these customers have to consume Azure and how best to manage this consumption.

Resources:

Azure Architecture Center: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/architecture/;
Azure Security Fundamentals: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/security/fundamentals/;
Microsoft Cloud Adoption Framework: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/cloud-adoption-framework/

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode309.mp3

Transcript: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/c9c5ebea80/?location=EUS2

Other updates:

Proximity placement groups—an Azure Virtual Machine logical grouping capability to decrease inter-VM network latency—is now available.

From <https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/proximity-placement-groups-are-now-available/>

Azure Private Link support in AKS now in preview

https://aka.ms/aks/docs/private-cluster

Microsoft recently announced plans to establish a new cloud datacenter region in Qatar to deliver its intelligent, trusted cloud services and expand the Microsoft global cloud infrastructure to 55 cloud regions in 20 countries. The new region is anticipated to be available starting with Microsoft Azure in 2021, and Office 365, Dynamics 365 and Power Platform to follow.

New enhancements for Azure IoT Edge automatic deployments
"https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/new-enhancements-for-azure-iot-edge-automatic-deployments/"https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/new-enhancements-for-azure-iot-edge-automatic-deployments/
Better performance with bursting enhancement on Azure Disks
"https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/better-performance-with-bursting-enhancement-on-azure-disks/"https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/better-performance-with-bursting-enhancement-on-azure-disks/

Announcing the preview of Azure Spot Virtual Machines
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-the-preview-of-azure-spot-virtual-machines/"https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/announcing-the-preview-of-azure-spot-virtual-machines/

https://www.marketplace.org/2019/11/25/what-is-a-cryptocurrency-anyway/

Jie Feng, a Senior PM in the Azure Data team, gives us the low-down on the new Data Share service that went GA at Ignite. She provides use-cases for the service, tells us how it works and how to access it.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode308.mp3

Transcript: https://eus2.videoindexer.ai/accounts/e0eee289-7730-4999-978b-eb7f63be8cb5/videos/2442844626/?location=EUS2

Resources:

Demo videos: https://channel9.msdn.com/Tags/azure-data-share
Product website: https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/services/data-share/
Documentations: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/data-share/

Other updates:

Azure Sphere guardian module simplifies & secures brownfield IoT
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/azure-sphere-guardian-module-simplifies-secures-brownfield-iot/
Introducing maintenance control for platform updates
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/maintenance-control-for-platform-updates/
Networking enables the new world of Edge and 5G Computing
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/networking-enables-the-new-world-of-edge-and-5g-computing/
Building Xbox game streaming with Site Reliability best practices
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/building-xbox-game-streaming-with-site-reliability-best-practices/

Evan talks about a recent support case he worked on and how it's easy to blame Azure for everything that goes wrong when moving to the Cloud.

Media file: https://azpodcast.blob.core.windows.net/episodes/Episode307.mp3

Transcript:

Other updates:

Support to assess physical servers is now available in Azure preview, in addition to existing support for VMware and Hyper-V servers. The appliance for physical servers can be installed on an existing Windows server. This feature can be used to assess virtual machines where there is no access to the hypervisor, as well as virtual machines on any cloud. For more details, refer to the documentation

Azure HDInsight now supports the use of service tags to simplify inbound network security group (NSG) rule management. Azure service tags group multiple IP addresses under a single user friendly tag. Administrators need to only create rules by referring to the tags while Microsoft takes the responsibility of keeping the IP addresses up to date. Administrators maintaining Azure HDInsight clusters can now benefit from this manageability improvement.

Now in preview for the East US and UK South regions only, Azure Database for MariaDB, PostgreSQL, MySQL provides support for service health notifications for planned maintenance.

Web Application Firewall—New bot protection rule now in preview
Updated: December 09, 2019
A new bot protection ruleset (Microsoft_BotManagerRuleSet_1.0) is now in preview for Azure Web Application Firewall with Azure Front Door service. Adding to this updated ruleset are three bot categories—good, bad, and unknown. There are multiple bot groups within each category. Bot signatures are managed and dynamically updated by Web Application Firewall service. The default action for bad bot groups is set to Block, for the verified search engine crawlers group it’s set to Allow, and for the unknown bot category it’s set to Log. Customers may overwrite the default action with Allow, Block, Log, or Redirect for any type of bot groups. 
For more details, see bot protection overview. 

https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/new-bot-protection-rule-set-in-public-preview-for-web-application-firewall-waf-with-azure-front-door-service/