A Developer's Life » Software Development, 42, and everything in between

04 May 2020

Microsoft Build 2020 – Virtual AND Free!

Conferences

Microsoft Build, Microsoft's premier developer conference, is scheduled for May 19 - 20, 2020. This year, the conference has gone virtual and, for the icing on the cake, it is also completely free! This is going to be 48 hours of continuous content! Everything is being recorded so you can always catch up if you're not up for staying up for 48 hours straight ;-) Starting at 08:00am Pacific time, there will be a total of three sessions presented each day with each session being spread out over eight hours. You should be able to watch live from pretty much…

27 Apr 2020

The Power of Azure DevOps

Azure DevOps, Conferences

This past week, I gave a talk on The Power of Azure DevOps as part of the Virtual Global Azure Day 2020. This talk was recorded and is now available on YouTube if you would like to check it out. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wpIts5c_47E&feature=youtu.be If you can't see the video above, you can click here to go directly to the video on YouTube. Also, the PowerPoint slides for the presentation are located here.

24 Apr 2020

Global Azure Day 2020 – Omaha

Azure DevOps, Conferences

UPDATE You can view/download my presentation slides here. This year will mark the seventh annual Global Azure event! In light of the on-going (COVID-19) situation, this year's Global Azure Day in Omaha has been moved online. This virtual event will take place on Saturday, April 25th starting at 08:00 (Central Time). Here is the full schedule for this year's event: I am pleased to be speaking at this year's Global Azure Day on The Power of Azure DevOps. If you are new to Azure and/or Azure DevOps, or you've been around it for a while but are looking to learn…

27 Jan 2020

First Contact!

Cloud Certification

The only constant is... change! So... yesterday, I published My Cloud Certification Journey detailing my (ambitious) plan for obtaining the AWS and Azure Solutions Architect certifications. In a rare, but prescient moment, I included the following quote: No plan survives first contact (with the enemy) Well, less than 24 hours later, plans have changed! I happened to come across this blog post today: Updates to Several Azure and Data & AI Certifications are Coming Soon In the post, the author discusses how Microsoft is reviewing some of the certification exams to ensure the skills being tested are more closely aligned…

26 Jan 2020

My Cloud Certification Journey

Cloud Certification

Clouds on the Horizon While I have been using various aspects of Microsoft Azure for years now, I have not taken the time to go deep into some (many) of the services that Azure offers. For many years now, I have spent most of my time focusing on the Microsoft technology stack. Given that, spending time in Azure has made a lot of sense. We have made some decisions recently within the organization that I work for to start making use of Salesforce. If you are not familiar with Salesforce, just know that it provides a lot of capabilities using…

12 Jun 2019

Introducing the Azure DevOps CLI

Azure DevOps, Azure DevOps Extensions

This is the first in a multi-part series on the Azure DevOps CLI. There are currently four posts planned, including: An Introduction to the Azure DevOps CLIRevoking PATs with the Azure DevOps CLIUsing the Azure DevOps CLI Behind a ProxyMake Every Day a Banner Day with Azure DevOps CLI Why Have a CLI? If you've been using Azure DevOps for a while then you know there is a ton of functionality available within the product. With that functionality comes a decent amount of administration overhead that must be dealt with. For example, you need to manage users and licensing. You…

31 Mar 2019

Global DevOps Bootcamp – Omaha

Azure, Bootcamp, DevOps

If you would like to learn more about DevOps on the Microsoft stack, then plan to join us in Omaha on June 15th, 2019. While we are still working out some of the details, Jeff Bramwell (that's me! :-)) and Mike Douglas will be hosting the Global DevOps Bootcamp in Omaha at Farm Credit Services of America. Event Details Global DevOps Bootcamp is a global event that will be held on Saturday June 15th and is all about DevOps on the Microsoft Stack. Centrally organized by Xpirit and Solidify and offered to you by local partners and sponsors. During this…

20 Mar 2019

Work Items and Queries in Azure Wikis

Azure DevOps, Tips

Did you know that you can embed individual work items and/or work item queries within your wiki pages? If not, then read on... There is a lot to like about the wiki feature within Azure DevOps. You can create a provisioned wiki or one or more Git-based published wikis. The content is based on markdown, though Microsoft provides several extended features on top of the markdown syntax. In this post, we will cover a couple features that allow you to embed individual work items and work item queries within your wiki pages. Embedding Work Items Embedding a single work item…

18 Mar 2019

5 Things You Should Know About Azure DevOps

Azure DevOps

Maybe you've heard of Azure DevOps but haven't tried it out because you create non-Microsoft solutions (e.g. Java on Mac or Linux, etc.). Maybe you haven't tried it out because it has Azure in it's name so you've assumed it wouldn't work with AWS or GCP? If you've had your doubts about trying out Azure DevOps, then take a look at the following 5 things you should know about Azure DevOps and see if you still feel the same way. You'll likely discover that Azure DevOps can work for your specific needs as well! 1. Does Azure DevOps Require an…

25 Jan 2019

Azure DevOps Keyboard Shortcuts

Azure DevOps, Tips

File this one under tips-n-tricks. As you likely already know, Azure DevOps has a ton of features and capabilities that are generally encapsulated into Azure DevOps' primary offerings: Azure Boards, Azure Repos, Azure Pipelines, Azure Test Plans and Azure Artifacts. However, did you know that Azure DevOps, just like Visual Studio and many other tools out there, has a lot of keyboard shortcuts at your disposal that can improve how you navigate and use Azure DevOps? If you already knew this, then you can skip to the end where I talk about the Azure DevOps Keyboard Shortcuts Cheat Sheet. Otherwise,…