Reading Notes #643

In this week Reading Notes, we explore a diverse range of updates and insights from the tech world. From the latest features in the Azure SDK and Developer CLI, to an introduction to .NET Aspire and its innovative approach to Infrastructure as Code, there's plenty to catch up on. 

Jump into discussions on AI productivity, free Azure SQL tiers, and even a refreshing podcast on stress-free living. 

Let's get started!

Cloud

• Azure SDK Release (March 2025) (Hector Norzagaray) - Many languages are supported and now Rust is part of it. There also some new bits for Node and Python.

• Azure Developer CLI (azd) - April 2025 (Kristen Womack) - New features in the CLI, bug fixing and new possibilities in the website to search templates!

Databases

• Are You Azure SQL Database Curious? (Karen Lopez) - What?! Didn't know about that free tier. I could definitely use that; great news!

AI

• Does AI really make you more productive? (Salma Alam-Naylor) - I trust AI as much as I trust any code found after googling.Meaning it might works but to I need to understand what it is doing. There is no trust, is always gambling.

• Microsoft partners with Anthropic to create official C# SDK for Model Context Protocol (Mike , Maria) - New SDK is already available and it works!

Programming

• .NET Aspire - Microsoft's Attempt at Infrastructure as Code (darren horrocks) - This is a quick intro to .NET Aspire, perfect to learn what it is without going deep into the details.

• Making Software Like LEGO: How Aspire Brings the Pieces Together (David Fowler) - I really liked that image with the construction blocs. And also it seems my hobbies didn't change much in the past fifty years.

Podcasts

• Forking around (with the Linux Desktop) and Finding Out with Justin Garrison (Hanselminutes with Scott Hanselman) - Interesting discussion about Linux desktop and everything they can do. More people should know about that

• 359. Rest More, Stress Less, and Live the Life You Actually Want with Courtney Carver (The Greg McKeown Podcast) - Episode with the author of the book Gentle: Rest More, Stress Less, and Live the Life You Actually Want. It seams simple but must be hard to apply in today's word.

Sharing my Reading Notes is a habit I started a long time ago, where I share a list of all the articles, blog posts, and books that catch my interest during the week. 

If you have interesting content, share it!

~Frank

Reading Notes #608

It's reading notes time! It is a habit I started a long time ago, where I share a list of all the articles, blog posts, and books that catch my interest during the week. 

You also read something you liked? Share it!

Cloud

• Running a Playwright scheduled job with Azure Container Apps (Anthony Chu) - A very nice post about recording test session using azure container app. Good idea!

Programming

• The .NET MAUI Extension for Visual Studio Code is now Generally Available - .NET Blog (Maddy Montaquila) - Wow,already GA! Looking forward to try it on my Linux PC. This post shares all the features packed in this release, and there videos too.

• Introducing collection expressions in C#12: Behind the scenes of collection expressions - Part 1 (Andrew Lock) - First post of a series that goes deeper into c# comparing expressions, initialization, and what the compiler does.

• Making C# Simple with Fluent Techniques (Niraj Ranasinghe) - Nice post. I didn't realise that Fluent path was used in so many places. It makes it so cleaner when we can use it.

AI

• Visual Studio Code AI Toolkit: Run LLMs locally (Shreyan Fernandes) - It goes so fast! It used to be complicated to get AI and now we can get one locally directly from vs code... Quick post to get us started.

• Announcing the official OpenAI library for .NET - .NET Blog (.NET Team) - Yay! New version of the SDK.

Podcast

• 84. Comparing Terraform, Pulumi and Bicep: Infrastructure as code - with Sam Cogan (Betatalks the podcast) - Create episode with Sam. Really interesting to listen about those three IaC.

• Dan Garfield: GitOps with Kubernetes - Episode 298 (Azure DevOps Podcast) - Interesting episode about containers and deploying platforms, tools and so much more.

• Episode 1900 with Scott Hanselman! (.NET Rocks!) - Three of my favorite people in the word in a single episode! It was such a pleasure to listen pleasure to listen talk about all those little stories. Long live to .NET Rocks (and HanselMinutes)

Miscellaneous

• What's new in the Windows Subsystem for Linux in May 2024 (Craig Loewen) - Tons of experimental features are being move to regular ones, and more are coming up to manage our distro, improve security and more.

• 8 Learning Paths for Beginners on GitHub (Cynthia Zanoni) - Wow! so many very cool learning Path to get started with anything you can think about it. I may do one or two just to refresh my knowledge.

~ Frank

Reading Notes #602

It's reading notes time! It is a habit I started a long time ago, where I share a list of all the articles, blog posts, and books that catch my interest during the week.

Having interesting content? Share it!

Cloud

• Azure SDK Release (April 2024) (Hector Norzagaray) - Lots of SDKs updates for many different languages and services.

Programming

• .NET Aspire preview 6 - .NET Aspire - The more a play with Aspire the more I like it. .NET developers you must give it a try.

• How to upload a file with Blazor SSR in .NET 8? - (Jon Hilton) A nice quick tutorial with all the code snippets we need.

• What's new for the Microsoft Fluent UI Blazor library 4.7 - (Vincent Baaij) A lots o new features and improvements in this release.

• Why don’t we talk about minifying CSS anymore? - (Salma Alam-Naylor) An interesting post. I didn't think about it but it's true, we used to talk way more about minification...

• Minimal APIs Nuget Packages - (Shawn Wildermuth) Same great tools but new names to make it easier to remember and more of the same family.

AI

• #SemanticKernel: Local LLMs Unleashed on #RaspberryPi 5 - (Bruno Capuano) This is the perfect tutorial to get started with local AI. No powerful computer required.

~Frank

Reading Notes #531

Good Monday, 

Already time to share new reading notes. Here is a list of all the articles, and blog posts that catch my interest during the week. 

If you think you may have interesting content, share it!

Cloud

• Azure SDK Release (November 2022) - Azure SDK Blog (Azure SDK team) - New release with tons of updates.

Programming

• .NET 7 Web API CRUD Using Entity Framework Core (Naveen Bommidi) - This is a good tutorial to build our first simple API with EF...and it uses the brand new .NET 7.0

• 7 Reasons for Startups to Choose ASP.NET Over Node.js (Michael Shpilt) - I believe the most crucial point is to use a language that your team is comfortable with. If everyone already masters Node, then continue with that. If you are starting a new team or need specific performance or requirements that Node doesn't provide then, of course, .NET must be considered.

• 7 common mistakes new contributors make in Open Source Software - DEV Community 👩‍💻👨‍💻 (Jessica Wilkins) - Good health check of our practices when collaborating on an open-source project.

• Minimal API validation with ASP.NET 7.0 Endpoint Filters - Ben Foster (Ben Foster) - That minimalist API can really make us save some keystrokes

• Multi-repository Support Released! - Visual Studio Blog (Jessie Houghton) - That's very good news and so many developers will be happy about it.

• .NET Interactive Notebooks is now Polyglot Notebooks! - .NET Blog (Claudia Regio) - A new name, the same great tool with a bright future.

~frank

Reading Notes #490

Good Monday, time to share my reading notes. 

It's a habit I started a long time ago where I share a list of all the articles, blog posts, podcast episodes, and books that catch my interest during the week and that I found interesting. It's a mix of the actuality and what I consumed.

You think you may have interesting content, share it!

Cloud

• Azure SDK Release (January 2022) (Azure SDK team) - I'm always so impressed by all the changes happening each month... Are you?

• How to Create an Azure Function App Using C# (Claudio Bernasconi) - This is a nice tutorial paired with a video. In fact, there is an entire channel of tutorials about Azure, .NET, and Visual Studio.

• Secure messages to Teams with Azure Logic App (Tobias Almen ) - This is a good tutorial to secure communication done by Logic Apps.

Programming

• Postman Announces Support for gRPC in Beta (Wendell Santos) - Great news to see that the toolings follow the tech.

• Announcing .NET MAUI Preview 12 (David Ortinau) - Things are getting pretty... Nice update.

• Dependency Injection in .NET 6 - Adding and Injecting Dependencies (Matthew Jones) - We all agree that testing is important dependency injection is part of a great test strategy. This is the second post of a series.

• Model Binding in ASP.NET Core using Razor Pages (Elisenda Gascon) - A clear tutorial about the binding to simplify and improve our code.

• What Is Single Project in .NET MAUI? (Leomaris Reyes ) - I'm just getting started with MAUI and it's very impressive. I really like this post as it explains why and how the structure of the project is set.

Podcast

• 561: How to Reduce Burnout, with Jennifer Moss (Coaching for Leaders) - As I was listening that episode, I realized that the team I'm in we already did a lot of those things. The past months were hard for all of us but I think we did well. Very interesting episode, and it could be a good idea to share to your teammates.
• 288: Turning Hacks into Reality (Merge Conflict) - Super interesting to listen Frank and James as they share their progress about there App development and how a simple "wind speed" question became a thing!
• No More Lonely Friends with Marissa Meizz (A Bit of Optimism) - Wow! It's always very impressive what can happends when you mix social media and good intention.
• 562: How to Make Progress When Starting Something New, with Michael Bungay Stanier (Coaching for Leaders) - Very nice episode with Michael Bungay Stanier, author of the book also poart of this Reading Notes (but not the book they talk in the episode), about how to get started. Love it, very honest, and real.

Miscellaneous

• Windows 11 is getting a new Task Manager design (Tom Warren) - Oh yes! Things evolved, get better, faster, and takes fewer resources...

Books

The Advice Trap: Be Humble, Stay Curious & Change the Way You Lead Forever 

(Michael Bungay Stanier) 

- I really liked this book. Yes, I read The Coaching Habit, that's a nice one too, but in The Advice Trap has something that feels more adapted for when we get started. The book shares many gems and important points to get us started on a better path (or to change our habits). It's may not necessarily be easy, but it's clear what needs to be done, well in this case not done.

~frank

Reading Notes #485

It's Monday,

time to share my reading notes. Those are a curated list of all the articles, blog posts, podcast episodes, and books that catch my interest during the week and that I found interesting. It's a mix of the actuality and what I consumed. 

You think you may have interesting content, share it!

Cloud

• Announcing the Azure Identity 2.0 client library and plugin packages for JavaScript (Will) - Very nice update for the SDK that will be used with popular tools.

• General Availability of Azure Functions OpenAPI Extension (Justin Yoo) - What!? one year already and GA is on top of it. Wonderful.

• Is it time to start creating C# Azure Functions in isolated mode? (Mark Heath) - Nice post about the different options today and in the future.

• What is Cloud-Native? Is It Hype or The Future of Software Development? (Thorben Janssen) - My 2 cents, it's so much more than a heap. Excellent post that cover all the angles.

Programming

• Implicit Usings in .NET 6 (Scott Hanselman) - Ok yes, it's a cool feature to get started... BUT it's the first best practice you learn in VB (yes I remember Scott) do not use implicit... So fun, but that's it.

• 5 Reasons Why You Should use a DevTool (Michelle Pruit) - Yes, indeed and it is worth spending money on them to not be limited or blocked because you are using the free version or something.

• 7 unique software collaboration features in GitHub Discussions (Evi Liu) - I started using GitHub discussion while streaming and loved it. I was curious to learn different scenarios where there is also a benefit.

• Announcing ASP.NET Core in .NET 6 (Daniel Roth) - I've not been coding for a little while now, first thing on my to-do is to upgrade to.NET 6 my projects.

• [Cake v2.0.0 RC 1 released](Pascal Berger) (https://cakebuild.net/blog/2021/11/cake-v2.0.0-rc0001-released) - A great new version, and important notification of retirement. I should do a tour of my flows/ pipeline to avoid bad surprises.

• I made Squid Game with JavaScript (Shuvo) - I love it! Great post that shows us all the code used in this cool demo. There is also a short video to see the final game.

• Publishing Events from CRUD or Commands? (Derek Comartin) - Nice post/video about event-driven architecture.

• Should Controllers Reference Repositories or Services (Steve) - Very interesting dive into the layers of an application. There are reasons for different architectures.

• Shrink your WSL2 Virtual Disks and Docker Images and Reclaim Disk Space (Scott Hanselman) - Wonderful tips from Scott. To get back that pure performance of a clean dev environment.

Miscellaneous

• After Microsoft Ignite, keep the learning momentum going (Jeff Sandquist) - Very happy to see this news being public.

• How to get Windows 11 (John Cable) - It's out now and honestly, it is great! If you didn't get the automatic upgrade maybe it's because you don't meet the requirement. Following the steps, it could be a simple checkbox to check-in your current version.

• Introduction to GitHub Actions for .Net Developers (Dave Murray) - I'm not sure why but I always felt called by automation. Maybe because it's the ultimate proactivity of any task.GitHub Action is one of those extremely powerful tools that are worth your attention.

~frank

Reading Notes #460

Cloud

• Let’s compare the cloud shells offered by AWS, Microsoft Azure, and Google Cloud Platform (Richard Seroter) - It's always interesting to read those comparison posts...

• ARM Template deployment, the what-if option for your Azure Deployments (Olivier Miossec) - The what-if feature is awesome, this post explains why and shows how to use it.

• State of the Azure SDK 2021 (Azure SDK Team) - So much good news! A ton of updates already done (do you know all of them?) And a very promising roadmap.

• Use Postman with the Microsoft Graph API - Microsoft Graph - Very complete docs about how to do your rest query using a dev tool.

Programming

• How to Add a Serverless Database to your React Projects (Michael Bagley) - This is a nice tutorial with all the code snippets to get started and try this type of project.

• If You Code on Windows, You Deserve a Better Windows Terminal (Matthew MacDonald) - Lovely. A nice post about why the new Windows Terminal is awesome.

• The New .NET Multi-platform App UI (David Ortinau) - I'm more and more excited by Maoi. The simple experience that it promises is very appealing.

Podcast

• #188 – Fame, Focus, and Billions of Pageviews with Evan Britton of Famous Birthdays (Indie Hackers) - A nice story where people focus on the users, worked super hard (and continue to do it), and had amazing success.

• How to Stop Being Complacent (Influencer Entrepreneurs with Jenny Melrose) - A nice episode to "kick our butt" and get back on track. Yes, 2020 indeed brought tons of new challenges at all and every level. However. we must try to make this year better.

• Who Owns Open-Source Software? (Coding Blocks) - Great discussion. Most of us, at some point, have to ask ourselves those questions (at least I know I did). It was very interesting listening to this episode and follow their thoughts.

• 631 - How to Explain a Gap in Your Résumé (Modern Mentor) - I have gaps in my resumé and I always been very comfortable about it. When I saw the title of this episode I thought maybe I should be concerned... Happy to know I was right!

Miscellaneous

• Coaching sessions: here’s what I talk about with junior developers (Dominique St-Amand) - An interesting post for all more junior will found answers and more experienced will have ideas about how to help others.

Books

Beyond the Trees: A Journey Alone Across Canada's Arctic

Author: Adam Shoalts

Nice adventure. I wish I could see all those images, animals, and horizon. I had a good time reading this odyssey. And for the record, as a canoeist/ kayaker I was impressed by the upriver challenge.

~Frank

Reading Notes #451

Cloud

• Migrating to the new C# Azure KeyVault SDK Libraries (Dominique St-Amand) - Learning a new SDK can be challenging and this post can help you lowering the learning curve. So much great feature.

• Tip 295 - What database should you use in your next Azure Functions app | Azure Tips and Tricks - A nice little post that shows different options to connect our azFunctions to a data store.

Programming

• 6 ways to narrow types in TypeScript (Carl Rippon) - This is a nice post that teaches how to avoid a few good exceptions.

• What's new in .NET Productivity (Mika Dumont) - In post offers a nice summary of the new feature available in the latest version of Roslyn.

• Your dotnet outdated is outdated! Update and help keep your .NET projects up to date (Scott Hanselman) - Wonderful! Easy to update and to use. Sold!

Miscellaneous

• Azure DevOps Boards and Excel! (Sarah Lean) - Pretty sweet tips for everyone.

Podcast

• 622 - Why Vulnerability Is a Misunderstood Professional Superpower (Modern Mentor) - First time on this podcast, but definitely not the last. Great show great topic.
• The Shorts -- Backyard Adventures (The Dirtbag Diaries) - One thing keep coming back to my head again and again as I was listening... Yeah, so true! I love it. Let's do small adventure.
• 227: Databases! (Merge Conflict) - So many great questions, a tons of answers, hypotheses, and laughs. Great show guys!
• Growing the next generation of technologists with CodeCrew's Meka Egwuekwe (Hanselminutes with Scott Hanselman) - Very interesting questions. I really like discussion from a different point of view; for me.

Books

A Game Plan for Life: The Power of Mentoring

Author: John Wooden, John C. Maxwell

What a great book. I didn't know John Wooden before, but I am very impressed and inspired by both coach Wooden and the author. There is so much in this book and worth reading it again... But first, let's get prepare :)

Reading Notes #446

Every Monday, I share my "reading notes". Those are a curated list of all the articles, blog posts, podcast episodes, and books that catch my interest during the week and that I found interesting. It's a mix of the actuality and what I consumed.

You think you may have interesting content, share it!

Cloud

• Introducing the new Azure SDK for C++ Beta (Jeffrey Richter) - Oh wow! Now I just want to take from my dusty memory shelf my c++ knowledge and mixt it with Azure...
• Migrating this blog to Azure. It's done. Now the work begins. (Scott Hanselman) - A very exciting and promising series of posts related to migration. So many of us have websites that are old and clunky. I'm looking forward to reading more.
• Update Azure CLI from the command-line (az upgrade) (Dan Patrick) - Tools are great! And If you never try Chocolatey... What are you waiting for, it's awesome.
• Zone Redundancy for Azure Cache for Redis now in preview | Azure blog and updates | Microsoft Azure (Kyle Teegarden) - Great news for the Redis Cache users.

Programming

• Moq vs NSubstitute vs FakeItEasy - Which one to choose? ( Thomas Ardal) - A very interesting post that compares three mocking solutions. No bad choices here it depends on your taste.
• Async Await JavaScript Tutorial – How to Wait for a Function to Finish in JS (Fredrik Strand Oseberg) - Really interesting post. I learn better by trying... And now I have all the snippets I need.
• Creating a .NET Core Global Tool (John Smith) - Cool project. It gave me ideas of little things I would like to have available...
• How to Docker with .NET: Getting Started (Dave Brock) - A truly beginner tutorial. If you know about Docker but never did really play with it, here is your chance. First post of a trilogy that definitely worth our time.
• Keeping your WSL Linux instances up to date automatically within Windows 10 (Scott Hanselman) - This is sooo simple! Wonderful.
• Let's use NUKE to Quickly Deploy an App to Azure via Zip Deployment - Dangl.Blog(); (Georg Dangl) - Interesting build/ automation framework. Definitely worth giving it a try.

Suggestion of the week

• Learn Node.js with this series of short videos for beginners (Microsoft) - An amazing series of tiny videos. I started myself and already learned so much! Perfect bite-size to watch in a break, or to find THE topic/ answer you are looking for.

Books

Take Control of Your Life

Author: Mel Robbins

Great book. I wasn't sure first but someone recommended it and since, I like her first book and thought why not! I was not disappointed. I like this journey through interviews. Each person (yes real person, not characters), is great; full of emotions, victory, fails... like us, well me at least. 

~

Reading Notes #442

Cloud

• ASP.NET Core Configuration – Azure Key Vault (Vladimir Pecanac) - A nice tutorial that shows how to setup our keyvaul. All the commands and code snippets are there to help.

• Azure SDK Release (September 2020) | Azure SDK Blog (Jon Gallant) - Super SDK update...

• Introducing the new Azure Tables Client Libraries | Azure SDK Blog (Christopher Scott) - Storage is everywhere, this post is an excellent starting point to benefits of how the new SDKs can help us.

• Project Bicep Sneak Peek (Justin Yoo) - Very interesting new project from the ARM team. I really need to try it.

Programming

• Dependency Injection with Azure Functions (Joseph Guadagno) - Interesting code perspective on the AzFunctions.

• Azure Container Instances - Docker integration now in Docker Desktop stable release (MacKenzie Olson) - Learn more about this really useful integration in this post.

• Creating a Progressive Web App with Blazor WebAssembly -- Visual Studio Magazine (Peter Vogel) - A really cool idea, not perfect but pretty fun.

• Introduction à Bicep (Lucas de Carli) - A nice FRENCH post that gives us an introduction of Bicep and where it comes from.

• Making Scott Hanselman's Powerpoint Greenscreen trick work with RevealJS via Blazor Server (Jon Hilton) - Really cool post that shows the magic of another presentation tool.

• Starting to Use Git Hooks With a Team - Redgate Software (Grant Fritchey) - Interesting uses of the hook.nice.

• The First Blazor Dock Manager (Brian Lagunas) - Nice demo/ tutorial of the new dock manager with Blazor.The pretty cool component in this suite.

• VSCode Tips for Power Users (Boris Yordanov) - Because there is always something new that we can learn about this amazing tool.

Reading Notes #439

Cloud

• How to Redirect with Azure Static Web Apps - Kevin W. Griffin | Developer, Training, Entrepreneur (Kevin W. Griffin) - A nice tutorial that explains a key feature.

• Free eBook: Developer’s Guide to Azure: 2020 Edition (Chris Pietschmann) - Awesome Free book. It looks very nice.

Programming

• Azure SDK: Packaging, tools, and repository structure | Azure SDKs (Mitch Denny) - A very interesting post, it's important to find the best way and for that, we need to start by asking the good questions.

• Integration Testing ASP.NET Core Applications: Best Practices (Steve Gordon) - This summary chapter gives us a really good preview of this very interesting Pluralsight course.

• Introducing C# 9: Extending Partial Methods (Anthony Giretti) - It's been a while since a used them, but it nice to see it will be much easier...because I remember how it was.

• The DevOps Journey (Chris Ayers) - Interesting post about DevOps in our reality.

Podcasts

• TikTok, Reels, and Shorts (UGH! Not another algorithm to learn?!) (Your Thriving Side Hustle) - When I saw the title I was TikTok? Not for me... I'm still not convinced, but now it's definitely not that clear. Could some serious things work in that format?
• SPI 435: 7 Terrible Traps Entrepreneurs Fall Into (And How to Get Out of Them) (The Smart Passive Income Online Business and Blogging Podcast) - Interesting real-life stories. We ear more often about success, but things don't go always well.
• Cybersecurity for Executives in the Age of Cloud with Teri Radichel (Hanselminutes with Scott Hanselman) - A interesting conversation about security. Who's accountable? What does it mean?
• #385: Rediscovering the Joy of Work with Bruce Daisley (The EntreLeadership Podcast) - I'm lucky because I really like what I do for a living. You could too. An interesting episode about emotion, joy, and work.
• Linus Tech Tips Returns for Episode 100! (That Creative Life) - I was really happy when I saw that Linus was back on the show. I really like to dynamic between those two, it feels honest and true.

Books

How to Talk to Anyone: 92 Little Tricks for Big Success in Relationships 

Author: Leil Lowndes

I was interested to read this book to get some inspiration when it's time to talk to people in an event. But this book brought me way more then that. I really appreciated the clear example and the variety. After reading this book you won't be a master, but you now have options to start a conversation.

☁️

Reading Notes #426

Every Monday, I share my "reading notes". Those are a curated list of all the articles, blog posts, podcast episodes, and books that catch my interest during the week and that I found interesting.

It's a mix of the actuality and what I consumed. You think you may have interesting content, share it!

Cloud

• Free Certs for Azure App Services (Mark Downie, Ray Fan) - Marvelous! Perfect timing. All documented, a nice step by step.

• May 2020 Azure SDK Release (@Adrian Hall) - Nice new update coming on the Azure SDK.

• Migrate to Azure: Save now, be future ready (Julia White) - Nice little post that explains some reasons to migrate to the cloud and gives a few links to get started.

Programming

• Different ways to host Blazor WebAssembly (Wasm) (Tim Heuer) - A really interesting post with a lot of little gems.

• Announcing Blazm (Grid component) (Jimmy Engström) - Nice I think I just found the grid I was looking for...

• Git Branching Strategies (Chris Ayers) - Nice post that describes 3 popular solutions base on your teams' skills and experience.

Podcasts

• Making Docker lovely for Developers with Simon Ferquel (Hanselminutes with Scott Hanselman) - Incredibly interesting podcast episode where they discuss about Docker on Windows. How it was working before and how it works with WSL2. A must.

• SPI 422: Email Marketing Audit: Which of These Email Marketing Strategies Are You Actually Doing? (The Smart Passive Income Online Business and Blogging Podcast) - I don't have an email list, I don't have anything to sell. However, sometimes I wish I had one to share some event coming, or new videos/post/live... I really like the respectful approach.

• 5 Reasons It's Better to Be A Small Streamer - Twitch Tips (Stream Coach: Twitch Stream Tips | Partner Interviews | Pro Advice) - A nice episode that list some advantages of being a smaller streamer. I've been streaming for one year now, I'm pretty happy with my journey, learned a lot, and still learn so much. I don't feel disadvantaged, but that's maybe just because I don't really focus on growth.

• 469: See What Really Matters, with Greg McKeown (Coaching for Leaders) - Nice episode that talks about the essential, how to find it, how to not pass over it. Very interesting. The book, Essentialism, from seems interesting too... And hop! On the to-read list.

Miscellaneous

• Whiteboarding for Developers: Yes, You Have To ( Chris Gustafson) - An excellent post that will help you to remember why whiteboarding is important. It will also provide nice guidance to restart doing it efficiently.

• Why to OneNote instead of Whiteboard? (Vesa Nopanen) - I love OneNote ...but strangely never draw inside of it... I'll definitely give it a try.

~

Reading Notes #285

Cloud

• 10 tips for enterprise integration with Logic Apps (Toon Vanhoutte) - Nice list of integration / LogicApps best practices.
• Azure Automation Graphical Editor from a Coder’s Perspective (Brian Christopher Harrison) - Pretty cool post that explains how someone with PowerShell base could use the designer interface in automation.
• Azure CLI Samples for Azure Cosmos DB - Just a quick reference to see what's available today.
• Azure Logic Apps - Retry Policy (Sriram Hariharan) - This post explains how to customize a key feature to build successful integration solution in cloud programming.
• Microsoft Cognitive Custom Vision Service .Net Core Angular 4 Application (Part One) - With all those code snippets and screen captures, this tutorial is extremely well detailed.
• How to Serve Serverless with Examples in Azure (Jeremy Likness) - Nice post that decorticates the serverless using Azure Functions as an example.
• Microsoft Cognitive Toolkit version 2.0 - Super, new version of the toolkit.
• Top 5 mistakes when people talk about Azure (Saverio Guardato) - Yep, same here.All true.

Programming

• How to reference a .NET Core library in WinForms - Or, .NET Standard Explained (Scott Hanselman) - Nice explanation, very clear.

Suggestion of the week

• Solve Node.js issues faster with Application Insights for Node.js (Josh Gavant) - Awesome post that shares a lots of very useful tips and guidance.

Miscellaneous

• 10 strategies for beating “programmer’s block” (Madison Moore) - Interesting top ten.

Reading Notes #276

Suggestion of the week

• Contributing to Open-Source - My first roslyn pull request - Fixing the bug (Maxime Rouiller) - Awesome post where Maxime shares with us that journey with us and helps us to understand what it is really about.

Cloud

• Announcing Azure SDK for Node.js 2.0 preview (Matt Hernandez) - This post details all the new features of this update.
  
• How to easily deploy Azure Hybrid Use Benefit (BYOL) virtual machines from marketplace images and Azure Resource Manager Template (Stephane Lapointe) - Nice post that explains how to save money using the BYOL VMs.
  
• Tips & Tricks: Cost savings using Logic Apps (Rene Brauwers) - Very interesting post where the author did the exercise of comparing different scenario's performances and prices.

Programming

• What is Kubernetes? An Intro for Beginners (Paul Burt) - This post is the perfect starting point to know what is Kubernetes are and understands what it can do for you, without getting deep technical.
  
• Setting up a Shiny Development Environment within Linux on Windows 10 (Scott Hanselman) - Nice post that describes how to setup your text-mode dev environment the Hanselman's way. Take what you like, adapted what you don't.

Miscellaneous

• How to control PowerPoint on Windows with a Bluetooth Nintendo Switch JoyCon controller! (or a Surface Pen) (Scott Hanselman) - Really cool trick.

Reading Notes #268

Cloud

• Azure Application Insights JavaScript SDK: reliability and performance improvements (Beckylin Orooji) - That's a good news! Time to update our packages.
  
• Access on-premise SQL Server data from Azure Logic Apps via On-Premises Data Gateway (Eldert Grootenboer) - Nice tutorial that explains step by step how to connect securely our on-premises resources to Azure.
  
• Cognitive Services APIs: Speech - Wow! So many ideas to play with those services... But that would be in another post.
  
• Serverless Integration with Logic Apps, Functions and Cognitive Service API (Steef-Jan Wiggers) - Another good integration example leveraging services in Azure.
  
• Microsoft Integration (Azure and much more) Stencils Pack v2.4 for Visio 2016/2013 is now available (Steef-Jan Wiggers) - We are always searching for images do use in our diagram. Here is your chance to update your tool with a nice pack.

Programming

• Running Cross Browser Automated Testings in Visual Studio Team Services - Fantastic tutorial that explains how to have a real impact on our deployment's speed by automating our UI testing on VSTS.

Miscellaneous

• Considerations on using Microsoft Flow or Logic Apps to sync documents (Steef-Jan Wiggers) - This post answers a question that many people I meet asked. Very clear, and yet simple to understand.

Reading Notes #258

Suggestion of the week

• Announcing the public preview of Azure Advisor (Shankar Sivadasan) - This is definitely the most asked question from clients: how can I optimize my solutions. I was very positively surprised by the quality and precision of the suggestions of the advisor service. It's a must.

Cloud

• Announcing auto-shutdown for VMs using Azure Resource Manager (Xiaoying Guo) - Really awesome feature that is finally available.
• Connect your things with the Azure IoT Gateway SDK (Sam George) - Interesting post that introduces us to the SDK and tells us a bit about how it could help us.

Programming

• Creating a New View Engine in ASP.NET Core (David Paquette) - Interesting post , where the Asp Monsters are sharing their experience building a view engine. Pretty cool.
• Getting to Know Containers (Alexandre Brisebois) - This post answers questions like: why? How? and why now?

Reading Notes #256

Cloud

• What’s this all about? (Alexandre Brisebois) - The cloud broth with him new patterns in the technology world, but knows that the business should also adapt.
• Azure Container Registry preview (Steve Lasker) - Containers, containers, containers, containers.... sound familiar? They are everywhere, learn more about this new service that will be available in preview in mid-November.
• Fluent API Libraries for Azure .NET SDK - These new azure commands definitely look good.
• Simpler Azure Management Libraries for .NET (Asir Selvasingh) - It looks very friendly, looking forward to trying it.
• Ten ways to minimize Azure costs (Iris Classon) - Nice few tips to save money... Time to do your checklist.

Programming

• 10 Tips for Using GitKraken (Sara) - I really like this kind of format for tips. You learn so much in a snap.
• Extensibility in Visual Studio '15': Increasing Reliability and Performance - This post lists few key elements for extension author, don't miss it.
• Mobile DevOps - The Source of Truth: The Role of Repositories in DevOps (Kraig Brockschmidt) - Very interesting article about devops real word.
• Stateless 3.0 - A State Machine library for .NET Core (Scott Hanselman) - Interesting tutorial that shows how that new lib could be useful.
• Using MongoDB with Web API and ASP.NET Core (Mahesh Sabnis ) - Dotnet core is now considerably more stable and so much more preferment. It worth try it.

Miscellaneous

• How to Make Time for Blogging During Your Lunch Break - Not a idea. However, I think it's more realistic to lower the number of posts produced... at least in my case.
• Introducing Markdown Monster - a new Markdown Editor (Rick Strahl) - Yet a markdown editor.... Will it be your new favorite? This post lists most of the feature and also contains a video if you prefer.
• Microsoft Flow is Now Available - Thurrott.com (Paul Thurrott) - Build on top of the excellent LogicApp platform Flow is free and doesn't require an Azure subscription but benefits from a lot of connectors.

Reading Notes #250

 

Suggestion of the week

• Is that Really Good Quality Code You’re Writing? - Always good to have our memory refreshed.

Cloud

• Announcing the release of Azure Mobile Apps Node SDK v3.0.0 (Adrian Hall) - Nice upgrade that includes a low of features. Be aware of the breaking changes.
  
• Data Factory supports multiple web service inputs for Azure ML Batch Execution (Harish Kumar Agarwal) - Cool! Simple AND powerful.
  
• Refreshing user logins in App Service Mobile Apps (Mimi Xu) - Great news, no more painful and complicated process, in the code App

Programming

• Build cloud apps at warp speed (James Staten) - Awesome tools, I'm very curious to see what people will create with those.
  
• NGINX for ASP.NET Core In-Depth - Interesting post that explains this very popular web server. It also very easy to use with docker.
  
• Self-contained .NET Core Applications - Great post that clarifies little things, but yeah... The devil is in the details!

Reading Notes #237

Cloud

• Azure Redis Cache May 2016 update (Pranav Rastogi) - Quick overview o this update.
  
• Release of Service Fabric SDK 2.1.150 and Runtime 5.1.150 - Have you played with Azure Fabric yet? Here is your chance with new SDK that provides more features and fixes some bugs.
  
• Application Insights is a Business Tool (Alexandre Brisebois) - Indeed, Application Insights is a business tool and a good one. Even more since it's available Azure services.
  
• Azure Media Services is now available in the new Azure portal (Mingfei Yan) - Fantastic another big piece that joined all the other services in the new portal.
  
• Power BI - Microsoft Azure Media Services and Power BI - Great tutorial that explains how to setup a cool dashboard and help you to get more about your media consumers.

Programming

• How to Debug and Run .NET CORE RC2 direct from within Visual Studio Code (Luís Henrique Demetrio) - Wow. I try on Windows, and it takes least than 5 minutes to get setup. Really cool.

Miscellaneous

• Microsoft to acquire LinkedIn - This is a really big move ... even more at the and of the fiscal year.

Reading Notes #224

Cloud

• An application revolution powered by the cloud (Mark Russinovich) - This post is a great introduction to the air of micro-services. It explains the evolution from the monolithic architecture and introduces some container system.
  
• Azure Active Directory Application (Vincent-Philippe Lauzon) - This post is a good intro to Azure Active Directory and how it could help us in our cloud applications.
  
• Why Microsoft Azure? - Interesting post that explains major reasons why Microsoft is a lead in cloud computing.
• Load Balancing VMs in Azure Resource Manager (Vincent-Philippe Lauzon) - Another great tutorial from Vincent.
  
• Creating a Node.js Azure Mobile App from OS X or Linux - Excellent tutorial that shows step by step how to build a unique backend easily using Azure mobile services.
  

Programming

• Save money with Application Insights’ web SDK 2.0 (Beckylin Orooji) - Nice new version that gives us more flexibility, but be aware it also included important breaking changes.
  
• Visual Studio Code Jumpstart for Node.js Developers (Dave Johnson) - This post is a nice tutorial that explains about to get started in Node.js by setting up our dev environment from scratch.
  
• Introducing LINQPad.QueryPlanVisualizer (Giorgi) - Great tool.
  

Miscellaneous

• Save money with Application Insights’ web SDK 2.0 (Beckylin Orooji) - Nice new version that gives us more flexibility, but be aware it also included important breaking changes.