Tag: Cloud

Feb282019February 28, 2019February 28, 20190Commentby Thomas Maurer
Microsoft NetWork 9

Speaking at Microsoft NetWork 9 in Neum

Posted in Cloud, Cloud Advocate, Containers, Hyper-V, Microsoft, Microsoft Azure, Speaking, Virtualization, Windows Server, Windows Server 2019

Today, I am happy to announce that I will be speaking at the Microsoft NetWork 9 conference in Bosnia again. The Microsoft NetWork 9 conference will take place from March 27-29 in Neum, Bosnia. I will present two sessions focusing on the Microsoft Hybrid Cloud and Azure. This will be my second time at this conference, after speaking in 2016.

NetWork 9

Mastering Azure using Cloud Shell!

Azure can be managed in many different way. Learn your command line options like Azure PowerShell, Azure CLI and Cloud Shell to be more efficient in managing your Azure infrastructure. Become a hero on the shell to manage the cloud!

NetWork 9

Windows Server 2019 - Next level of Hybrid Cloud

Join this session for the best of Windows Server 2019, about the new innovation and improvements of Windows Server and Windows Admin Center. Learn how Microsoft enhances the SDDC feature like Hyper-V, Storage and Networking and get the most out of the new Azure Hybrid Cloud Integration and Container features. You’ll get an overview about the new, exciting improvements that are in Windows Server and how they’ll improve your day-to-day job.

I remember it is great event, with a great community and a lot of interesting sessions. I am looking forward to the event and hope to see you at Microsoft NetWork 9!

If you want to learn more about Windows Server 2019 and Azure CloudShell, check out my blog.


Feb142019February 14, 2019February 14, 20190Commentby Thomas Maurer
Microsoft Ignite The Tour

Speaking at Microsoft Ignite The Tour 2018-2019 in London and Amsterdam

Posted in Cloud, Cloud Advocate, Microsoft, Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Azure Stack, Speaking

After joining Microsoft a couple of days ago, I am happy to announce my first speaking engagements under Microsoft. As mentioned in my blog before, I will be joining Microsoft Ignite The Tour 2018-2019 in London and Amsterdam. As part of our Cloud Advocates team, I will be speaking in two sessions in the “Building and maintaining your Azure hybrid environment” learning path.

This learning path is designed for Microsoft Ignite The Tour and gives attendees an overview about the steps to build, connect, secure, protect and manage a Azure hybrid cloud environment.

Sessions at Microsoft Ignite The Tour

Microsoft Ignite The Tour

HYB10 - Planning and implementing hybrid network connectivity

Once your organization has decided to implement a hybrid model, you need to start figuring out how to ensure that communication between your on-premises environment and your hybrid workloads is both secure and reliable. You also need to ensure that those workloads are protected from internal and external network threats. In this module, you’ll learn how to assess your organization’s on-prem network infrastructure, how to plan and then implement an appropriate networking design for Azure. You’ll learn how to implement appropriate Azure virtual network technologies, including securing connectivity between on-premises and Azure using VPNs and ExpressRoute as well as how to strategically deploy firewalls, network security groups and marketplace appliances to protect those resources and workloads.

Microsoft Ignite The Tour

HYB20 - Securing your Azure environment

With Cloud resources now connected with our datacenter, secure administrative access to critical workloads needs to be configured appropriately. It’s also important from an organizational and compliance perspective to ensure that workloads have a security configuration aligned with industry best practice. In this module, you’ll learn how to improve the security of privileged accounts used to manage Azure resources, manage software updates for both on-premises and cloud hosted virtual machines, and how to get the most out of Azure Security Center for assessing and remediating security configuration issues in a hybrid environment.

I am also happy to talk with you in the expo hall about the latest and greatest features in Azure, Azure Stack and Windows Server. as well as learning from your experience. So join me and the team at Microsoft Ignite the Tour.

If you want to join, check out the Microsoft Ignite The Tour 2018-2019 website. London is already sold out, however you can join the waitlist. For Amsterdam, there are still seats available.

I hope to see you there!


Jan152019January 15, 2019February 13, 201929Commentsby Thomas Maurer
Joining Microsoft

Joining Microsoft

Posted in Award, Cloud, Cloud Advocate, Microsoft, Microsoft Azure, Microsoft Azure Stack, Microsoft MVP, Speaking, Work

Today is a great day! I’m excited and proud to announce that as of February 1st, 2019, I’m joining Microsoft. I will join the Microsoft Azure Engineering team as a Senior Cloud Advocate. After being a Microsoft MVP for 7 years and working very closely with Microsoft the last couple of years, this is a great new opportunity and an exciting time ahead.

Microsoft Cloud Advocate

Microsoft Azure Cloud Advocate

The Microsoft Cloud Advocate Mascot by Ashley McNamara

My role is part of the Microsoft Developer Relations group and more specific the Cloud Advocates. I’m joining the team of Rick Claus, which many of you know from Channel9, Microsoft conferences and his overall work at Microsoft. Our team is focused in the IT Ops and IT Pro community. This allows me to do what I love most, which is being an advocate for customers in the Azure product group, sharing knowledge and engaging with the community.

We are advocates for the IT community within Microsoft. Using the products, listen to customers and help the product teams to prioritize their work. We develop tools to help use the products, we write documentation and tutorials, and we build connections between the community and the engineering teams.

Our team’s charter is to help every technologist on the planet succeed, be they students or those working in enterprises or startups. We engage in outreach to developers and others in the software ecosystem, all designed to further technical education and proficiency with the Microsoft Cloud + AI platform.

A large part of our mission is to make Microsoft Azure the best platform to run your applications and services, as well as making migration to the Microsoft Azure ecosystem simple. Our team looks for common pain points and works with the product teams to address them. In other cases, we build the missing pieces like tools and documentation.

My focus is going to be on the Azure and Microsoft hybrid cloud strategy. Besides the Azure services, this will include products and services like Windows Server and Azure Stack. Which will help bringing that consistent cloud experience to life, so our customers can make the best out of the Intelligent Cloud and the Intelligent Edge.

If there’s anything you would like us to improve reach out to me or to our team. We listen to your needs and take your feedback into consideration in our future developments.

Read More

Jan102019January 10, 2019January 15, 20193Commentsby Thomas Maurer
Azure Solutions Architect Expert

Passed Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert

Posted in Certification, Cloud, Microsoft, Microsoft Azure, Work

Today I am on my way to Geneva for a customer meeting. Before I left I quickly check my email and had some exciting news in my inbox. I got the confirmation that I passed the Microsoft Exam AZ-302 Microsoft Azure Solutions Architect Certification Transition, which together with my previous exam, 70-535 Architecting Microsoft Azure Solutions, gives me the certification as Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert.

Earning the Azure Solutions Architect Expert certification demonstrates skills and knowledge to advise stakeholders and translate business requirements into secure, scalable, and reliable solutions. Candidates have advanced experience and knowledge across various aspects of IT operations, including networking, virtualization, identity, security, business continuity, disaster recovery, data management, budgeting, and governance – managing how decisions in each area affects an overall solution.

I took this exam as a beat exam back in September at Microsoft Ignite 2018. For people who do not have already done 70-535, you will need to take AZ-300 and AZ-301 to get the Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect certification. The AZ-Series are basically the new edition of the Microsoft Azure Certification path. These exams were announced at Microsofts Partner conference, Microsoft Inspire in 2018.

There is a great blog post by Chris Pietschmann, about the state of the current Microsoft Experts exams.

I am happy about getting the confirmation about my second successful Microsoft Azure exam this year, after passing AZ-900 Microsoft Azure Fundamentals last week.

If you want to know more about the exam and the skills measured in this exam, check out the official Microsoft Exam page for AZ-302. If you have any questions, please let me know in the comments.

Congrats to all the others which got the Microsoft Certified: Azure Solutions Architect Expert certification today. Otherwise I wish you good luck taking the exam, let me know how it was in the comments.


Jan082019January 8, 2019February 19, 20196Commentsby Thomas Maurer
Mastering Azure with Cloud Shell

Mastering Azure with Cloud Shell

Posted in Cloud, Microsoft, Microsoft Azure, PowerShell, Visual Studio, Visual Studio Code, Work

There are multiple ways to interact and manage resources in Microsoft Azure. You can use the Azure Portal or command line tools like the Azure PowerShell module or the Azure CLI, which you can install on your local machine. However, to set up a cloud management workstation for administrators and developers can be quite a lot of work. Especially if you have multiple machines, keeping consistency between these machines can be challenging. Another challenge is keeping the environment secure and all the tools up to date. This any many more things are addressed by the Cloud Shell.

Cloud Shell is not brand new, Microsoft announced Cloud Shell at Build 2017. This blog post is about how you can master Azure with Cloud Shell and to give you an overview about the possibilities of Cloud Shell.

What is Cloud Shell

Cloud Shell Azure Portal

Cloud Shell offers a browser-accessible, pre-configured shell experience for managing Azure resources without the overhead of installing, versioning, and maintaining a machine yourself. Azure Cloud Shell is assigned per unique user account and automatically authenticated with each session. This makes it a private and secure environment.

You get a modern web-based command line experience which can be accessed from several end points like the Azure Portal, shell.azure.com and the Azure mobile app, Visual Studio Code or directly in the Azure docs.

In the backend Azure uses containers and automatically attaches an Azure File Share to the container. You can store the data on it, so your data is persistent. This persist your data across different Cloud Shell sessions.

Cloud Shell Bash and PowerShell

You can choose your preferred shell experience. Cloud Shell supports Bash and PowerShell and included your favorite third party tools and common tools and languages. If something like a module is missing, you can simply add it.

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Jan022019January 2, 2019February 19, 201911Commentsby Thomas Maurer
AZ-900 Microsoft Azure Fundamentals

Passed Exam AZ-900 Microsoft Azure Fundamentals

Posted in Certification, Cloud, Microsoft, Microsoft Azure, Work

I just took a little bit of my time to do one of the latest Azure exams. The Azure exam AZ-900 Microsoft Azure Fundamentals is, as the name suggests, a basic fundamental exam covering some general knowledge about Microsoft Azure. The exam covers a basic understanding of cloud concepts, core Azure services, security, privacy, compliance and trust, as well as Azure Pricing and support.

AZ-900 is a good exam if you are just starting with Azure and the cloud. It is not just a marketing and sales exam, even do it is a very light exam. you will need to have some technical know-how. If you are planning to take this exam I have some recommendations for you. Understand the benefits of cloud computing and the different cloud models. Go trough the list of Azure services, make sure you know what services are available and for what you would use them. Also make sure that you understand the concepts of Azure in general and in Azure governance, like Subscriptions, Management Groups, Azure Policies, Azure Resource Groups, Role-Based Access Control and many more.

You can find more detailed information on the Microsoft exam website. There you will find all the skills measured in this exam.

Microsoft Learn

I also highly recommend that you make an Azure free (or paid) account and try out different Azure services. But if you really wanna get ready for the cloud and especially for Microsoft Azure, and exam AZ-900, check out Microsoft Learn. Microsoft Learn is a great free learning platform, where you have free guides, walkthroughs and a hands-on experience. Microsoft Learn also provides you some more advanced trainings and guides, to get some deeper understandings of Microsoft services.

With that I wish you happy learning and good luck with the AZ-900 Microsoft Azure Fundamentals exam!


Jan022019January 2, 2019January 15, 20190Commentby Thomas Maurer
Top 20 Microsoft Azure Blogs

Listed in the Feedspot Top 20 Microsoft Azure Blogs To Follow in 2019

Posted in Blog, Cloud, Microsoft, Microsoft Azure, Microsoft MVP, Work

Another great thing I found out about today. My blog, ThomasMaurer.ch is listed in the Feedspot Top 20 Microsoft Azure Blogs and Websites To Follow in 2019. I am super excited to be on this list, next to other top blogs and websites. As you can imagine you will find even more about Microsoft Azure on my blog in 2019. You can follow my blog on Feedspot or just check out my Subscribe page, to get my latest blogs.

The Best Microsoft Azure Blogs from thousands of Microsoft Azure blogs in our index using search and social metrics. We’ve carefully selected these websites because they are actively working to educate, inspire, and empower their readers with frequent updates and high-quality information.

Thanks for reading, commenting and sharing my blog! If you have some topics or ideas I should cover in 2019, please let me know!



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    Thomas Maurer

    My name is Thomas Maurer. I am a Senior Cloud Advocate at Microsoft. I am part of the Azure engineering team and engage with the community and customers around the world. I am located in Switzerland. I am focusing on Microsoft technologies, especially cloud and datacenter solutions based on Microsoft Azure, Azure Stack and Windows Server.
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