Recent Discussions
Azure Enterprise-Scale Landing Zone Building a Future-Ready Cloud Foundation
In today’s fast-paced digital landscape, enterprises are under constant pressure to innovate, scale efficiently, and maintain governance and security across their cloud environments. Microsoft Azure’s Enterprise-Scale Landing Zone (ESLZ) provides the blueprint organizations need to accelerate their cloud adoption journey while maintaining control, compliance, and agility. https://dellenny.com/azure-enterprise-scale-landing-zone-building-a-future-ready-cloud-foundation/When Words Matter Noise-Free, Domain-Specific Voice Recognition with Azure Custom Speech
As voice-driven technologies continue to transform how users interact with applications, delivering accurate, natural, and noise-resilient speech recognition has become essential. From virtual assistants and customer service bots to voice-controlled industrial systems, users expect speech interfaces that just work — even in noisy environments or when complex technical terms are spoken. That’s where Azure Custom Speech comes in. It allows you to tailor Azure’s Speech-to-Text service for your specific domain by training it to handle background noise, unique terminology, and diverse accents — enabling seamless and reliable voice experiences across industries. https://dellenny.com/when-words-matter-noise-free-domain-specific-voice-recognition-with-azure-custom-speech/Unlocking the Power of Conversational AI with Azure Bot Service
In today’s digital landscape, chatbots and conversational AI have become an integral part of modern business strategies. From automating customer support to enabling seamless self-service experiences, chatbots are transforming how organizations engage with users. One of the most powerful platforms to build, deploy, and manage such intelligent bots is Microsoft’s Azure Bot Service. In this blog, we’ll explore what Azure Bot Service is, why it’s a game-changer, and how you can get started with it. https://dellenny.com/unlocking-the-power-of-conversational-ai-with-azure-bot-service/Enhancing Copilot Bots with Azure OpenAI Services
In an era where conversational AI is rapidly moving from novelty to necessity, enterprises are turning to powerful tools that allow them to build bots and copilots that are not just reactive, but smart, context-aware, and deeply integrated with business data. Microsoft’s Copilot ecosystem combined with Azure’s OpenAI Services offers a compelling pathway to supercharge bots with advanced capabilities. This post explores how to enhance Copilot bots using Azure OpenAI Services: what features are available, what benefits they bring, how to implement them, and challenges to watch out for. https://dellenny.com/enhancing-copilot-bots-with-azure-openai-services/5 Azure Mistakes That Are Costing Businesses Thousands
Microsoft Azure has become the cloud backbone for thousands of organizations, offering flexibility, scalability, and powerful services. But with great power comes great complexity—and that complexity often translates into hidden costs. If your cloud bill keeps creeping up or your ROI doesn’t match expectations, you’re not alone. Many businesses unknowingly make configuration or management mistakes in Azure that quietly drain their budgets every month. Here are the five most common Azure mistakes that could be costing your business thousands—and how to fix them. https://dellenny.com/5-azure-mistakes-that-are-costing-businesses-thousands/
Locked out of Azure account for 5 months! Spent hours on phone, still no resolution! PLEASE HELP!!!
As per the title, back in April I somehow managed to lock myself out of my Azure portal. Typically to sign in my browser would auto-fill in the password field - for some reason that fateful day the auto-fill function didn't work. So I typed in what I believed to be the password, it wasn't. Annoyed, I typed in a few more passwords (even checked browser password manager to ensure I was typing the correct password) and finally locked myself out. Worse still, the email address that Microsoft wanted to send its verification code as a back-up contingency is no longer active (domain wasn't renewed and has since been bought). So Microsoft is sending a verification email to a dead email address... When I try to reset the password via Microsoft's questionnaire, once submitted I then get an automated email response back stating I haven't provided enough correct/relevant information, so the password can't be reset. I have long since lost any hope or faith in Microsoft rectifying this issue. Being courteous on the phone and apologising constantly is all well and good, but is only meaningful if there is a resolution. All that's happened is I've been passed around from one department to another and back again, before eventually being ghosted back in the summer. I have since opened another support ticket which is already winding its way around to ultimately leading me down another dead end. At this stage, all I want is for Microsoft to release my SQL database (my intellectual property) back to me. I am able to provide old invoices relating to my Azure account (when I was able to log in and download invoices!), as well as proof of ID to prove I am who I say I am - enough is enough! Please advise.Implementing Zero Trust Architecture in an Azure Environment
In today’s cloud-driven world, the traditional “trust but verify” security model no longer works. The rise of remote work, hybrid networks, and increasingly sophisticated cyber threats means that organizations can’t rely solely on firewalls or network perimeters to protect their assets. Instead, Zero Trust Architecture (ZTA) has become the gold standard for securing modern cloud environments — especially on platforms like Microsoft Azure. This article explores the principles of Zero Trust, why it matters, and how to implement it effectively in an Azure environment. https://dellenny.com/implementing-zero-trust-architecture-in-an-azure-environment/How Agentic AI Works and How to Build It in Azure
Agentic AI refers to systems that go beyond simple question-answering or rule-based automation. These systems are autonomous, goal-oriented, and adaptive — meaning they can plan, act, and learn with minimal human oversight. https://dellenny.com/how-agentic-ai-works-and-how-to-build-it-in-azure/Azure Functions vs. Azure Container Apps Choosing Your Serverless Compute
As organizations continue to embrace cloud-native architectures, the demand for serverless computing has skyrocketed. Microsoft Azure offers multiple options for deploying applications without worrying about managing infrastructure. Two of the most popular choices are Azure Functions and Azure Container Apps. While both enable developers to focus on code rather than servers, their use cases, scalability models, and operational models differ significantly. Let’s break down the key distinctions and help you choose the right tool for your next project. https://dellenny.com/azure-functions-vs-azure-container-apps-choosing-your-serverless-compute/The Hybrid Cloud Playbook Mastering Azure Stack
In today’s fast-paced digital landscape, organizations face a critical challenge: how to balance the agility and scalability of the public cloud with the control and compliance benefits of on-premises infrastructure. Enter Azure Stack, Microsoft’s hybrid cloud solution, designed to bring the power of Azure into your datacenter while enabling seamless integration with the public cloud. This blog serves as your playbook for mastering Azure Stack, guiding you through key concepts, strategies, and best practices to help your organization thrive in a hybrid cloud environment. https://dellenny.com/the-hybrid-cloud-playbook-mastering-azure-stack/
Passed AZ-104 Exam in 2025 with Practice Questions
I’m happy to share that I passed the AZ-104: Microsoft Azure Administrator exam on September 28, 2025, with a score of 865/1000. I began my preparation on July 10, 2025, mainly using Microsoft Learn modules, hands-on practice in Azure, and practice questions from SkillCertExams. The practice sets really helped me get familiar with scenario-based questions and time management. I received my official result on September 30, 2025, and I can say the effort was worth it. My advice: focus on understanding how Azure services connect, take practice tests under timed conditions, and carefully review every mistake. Good luck to everyone.How Azure AI is Revolutionizing Supply Chain Forecasting and Inventory
In today’s fast-paced global marketplace, supply chain efficiency can make or break a business. Companies face constant challenges such as demand fluctuations, supplier disruptions, and shifting customer expectations. Traditional forecasting methods—often reliant on historical data and rigid models—are no longer enough. This is where Azure AI is stepping in, transforming supply chain forecasting and inventory management with intelligent, adaptive, and real-time solutions. https://dellenny.com/how-azure-ai-is-revolutionizing-supply-chain-forecasting-and-inventory/End-to-End Confidence in the Cloud A Walkthrough of Azure Playwright Testing (Preview)
If you’ve been using Playwright for your end-to-end testing, you know how powerful it is for browser automation. But running large test suites locally or in CI can be slow, flaky, and resource-hungry. That’s where Azure Playwright Testing (Preview) — also called Microsoft Playwright Testing — comes in. This walkthrough will show you how to go from a plain Playwright project to running tests at scale in the Azure cloud, complete with reporting, debugging, and parallel execution. https://dellenny.com/end-to-end-confidence-in-the-cloud-a-walkthrough-of-azure-playwright-testing-preview/
Azure automation feature, improvements and bugs
This is by no means meant as critic as i love the Azure Automation Account product and its current features but these are thing that i would love to see as an offering/fixed for the future. Source Control (I can only speak for Github as that is what i use): Bugs: Tags being overwritten / removed by source controll both on full sync but also on incremential syncs (Already reported in case #2508010040002105) Features: Runbooks in source control is not being deleted in automation account when they have been deleted in source control. Support for diffrent sync types other than PowerShell 5.1 (Personally we will not consider upgrading to a newer version before there is source control implemented) Support for syncing the full repository instead of only a specific folder. So recursive source control for easier organisation in repositories I know we can setup multiple source control in azure automation but that seems a bit redundant and more maintance as the source control integration expires after 1 year does not matter if your PAT token is set to never expires Add support for syncing synopsis / description for at least PowerShell scripts so it grabs it directly from the given script and inputs it into the description field. Just the output of get-help .\ScriptName.ps1 Logging: Bugs: From time to time we see that logs is being displayed twice after each other so lets say you get the first result of logs. For this example lets say the first 10 entries in the All log page and scroll down further then the same 10 entries are repeated again and again and again this can also be seen by the time stamp of the log entry. (No new network requests for logs is being made so i believe this might be a bug in a javascript without being 100% certain) The most often time we see this bug is when a runbook is still running so it might be the log output stream that messes this up. And just to provide a picture for refrence without exposing anything sensitive the bug can be seen based on timestamps here: PowerShell 7 and above log outputs seems to contain some non escaped ASCI characters which makes the logs harder to read and also makes a log object being split into multiple log entries in Azure automation Log outputs Seems to have been fixed since i last tested Features: Searching for a specific job id in the general job list. Currently there is a work arround by going into a specific runbook - go to jobs - Press "Find job" and then you can lookup a jobid globally but the UI is not being updated correctly as displayed here: Would love to see a button here or be able to search for a jobid Formatting log outputs so you can do multi line output in a single log output entry E.G. "Write-output "New´r´nLine" So the output entry contains multiple lines for easier human readable log outputs Runbook page: Bugs: Searching for runbook names seems a bit buggy as far as i have seen there is 3 diffrent results for the end user Base image intialy looking at all runbooks One option is that it is not able to find a runbook with that name I have not been able to replicate it to get a picture of it. Another is that it displays a list of runbooks none of which matches what you searched for Third is that when you have searched for something and remove your search it does not return the original view Features: Ability to go to a previous job and re-run it/restart it with the same parameters. Think a bit like the way you can restart a github action run Scheduling: Features: More of a feature request but adding the schedule for a runbook directly in the code is awesome. (This is something we currently do by adding a parameter that contains the scheduling information then we have a runbook going over all our runbooks every hour and looking for this parameter and then constructing a schedule if it does not exist and links the runbook to the schedule and finally we also add a tag mentioning If the schedule name is enabled or not (*back to the issue in source control removing the tag*)) Hybrid workers: Features: I personally would love the ability to pause a hybrid worker in a hybrid worker group - Why? - Well we currently have 4 hybrid workers all running windows and have monthly patch windows and if a job hits a hybrid worker that is in patch then the jobs would go into a suspended state and not be picked up again Now we could remove the hybrid worker from the group but that would also remove the extension which would be reinstalled when added and then we would hit this https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/automation/troubleshoot/extension-based-hybrid-runbook-worker#scenario-runbooks-go-into-a-suspended-state-on-a-hybrid-runbook-worker-when-using-a-custom-account-on-a-server-with-user-account-control-uac-enabled This is an issue we originally started experiencing when we migrated from agent-based hybrid workers to extension based due to the discontinuation of agent-based. Another great reason is when needing to troubleshoot something on a specific hybrid worker or even when needing to update modules on a specific hybrid worker as this can not be done while the hybrid worker is still running jobs unless you use force or hit a time that it is not running or by manually stopping the service and then again end up with suspended jobs that is not being picked up again. Additional features that i personally would love to see as an offering: A front end for azure automation for end users (Think self-service portal) as some kind of add-on feature allowing a specific group of people to start a given runbook but supplying a more user friendly front end for it while also including some more limitations for end user groupings. I know there is already third party solutions for this and tbh I almost created one my self on my last maternity leave but my company chose not to pursue it further as the statement is we have 1 self service platform being servicenow can be viewed https://github.com/Mynster9361/Self-Service-Frontend-Azure-Automation just to give some inspiration if needed RBAC permissions for individual runbooks (as far as i remember this can already be done through cli) A General overview management blade for managing webhooks and the associated runbooks Currently there is no way to know which runbooks has an active / inactive webhook assigned to them as the only way to see this is by going to a runbook go to the webhooks blade and look if there is one or not. Personally i would love to see a blade on the general overview called "Webhooks" that looks similar to this table maybe: RunbookNameExpirationLast triggeredStatusRunbook1 (Clickable to get directly to the runbook)Custom_name_for_this webhook02/01/2022 16:00 EnabledRunbook2webhook211/11/2026 16:00TodayDisabledRunbook3webhook311/11/2027 16:00TodayEnabled Instead of webhook being a gentleman agreemnet on when you can enable and when you shouldn't enable and naming and such you have 1 general overview of all webhooks which would give value in regards to security and easier management of webhooks The things i see as most critical or highest on my wish list: To list 2 things i would like to see sooner rather than later Source control definitely needs to be updated/revamped so it both supports other languages/versions and also does not remove tags. Another thing that would be nice to have is to force it to follow source control so if i delete something that is in source control it is also deleted in azure automation Hybrid workers in maintenance mode so it completes running jobs and you are able to work on the hybrid worker whether it be bugs or just regular updates.Azure AI Studio / Azure AI Foundry A Powerful Platform for Generative AI
In recent years, generative AI has moved rapidly from research labs to real-world applications. Microsoft’s offering in this space has evolved to meet demand: Azure AI Studio (also known under the broader banner Azure AI Foundry) is Microsoft’s integrated environment for creating, customizing, deploying, and managing AI models, agents, and applications. This blog explores what Azure AI Studio is, why it matters, what features it offers, its advantages and constraints, and how you might leverage it in your own projects. https://dellenny.com/azure-ai-studio-azure-ai-foundry-a-powerful-platform-for-generative-ai/Generative AI in Azure A Practical Guide to Getting Started
Generative AI has quickly become one of the most transformative technologies in the cloud era, enabling businesses to create content, enhance productivity, and unlock entirely new use cases. With Microsoft Azure’s AI services, developers and organizations can harness powerful generative AI capabilities without the need to build everything from scratch. In this blog, we’ll explore what generative AI in Azure looks like, the key services available, and how you can get started using them in your applications. https://dellenny.com/generative-ai-in-azure-a-practical-guide-to-getting-started/Top 7 Azure Services You Didn’t Know You Needed
When most people think of Microsoft Azure, they immediately picture the big players: virtual machines, databases, and storage. But Azure is more than just the backbone of cloud computing—it’s a treasure chest of lesser-known services that can transform the way your business operates. Whether you’re a developer, IT leader, or entrepreneur, these hidden gems can unlock new possibilities, save time, and cut costs. Here are 7 Azure services you didn’t know you needed—until now. https://dellenny.com/top-7-azure-services-you-didnt-know-you-needed/Azure for Beginners How to Launch Your First Cloud Project in 30 Minutes
Cloud computing might sound intimidating if you’re just getting started, but launching your first project on Microsoft Azure can actually be quick and beginner-friendly. Whether you’re a student, a developer testing ideas, or an IT professional exploring the cloud, Azure provides all the tools you need to spin up resources in minutes. In this guide, we’ll walk through the basics and show you how to launch your first cloud project on Azure in about half an hour. https://dellenny.com/azure-for-beginners-how-to-launch-your-first-cloud-project-in-30-minutes/How to Cut Your Azure Bill in Half Without Losing Performance
Cloud services like Microsoft Azure give you the scalability and flexibility to run nearly any workload, but they also come with a downside: costs can spiral quickly if you’re not careful. The good news? With the right strategies, you can reduce your Azure bill by up to 50% without sacrificing performance. Let’s walk through some practical steps you can apply today. https://dellenny.com/how-to-cut-your-azure-bill-in-half-without-losing-performance/Centralized Logging in Azure Proven Observability Patterns for Modern Apps
As modern applications move to distributed and cloud-native architectures, observability becomes critical for ensuring system reliability, diagnosing issues, and improving performance. Among the three pillars of observability—logs, metrics, and traces—logs often form the foundation for troubleshooting. However, in distributed environments, logs are scattered across multiple services, making centralized logging an essential pattern. https://dellenny.com/centralized-logging-in-azure-proven-observability-patterns-for-modern-apps/
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- Introduction Azure Functions on Azure Container Apps lets you run serverless functions in a flexible, scalable container environment. As the platform evolves, there are two mechanisms to deploy Ima...Oct 14, 2025
- 3 MIN READCo-authors: Choudary Maddukuri and Bhushan Mehendale AI infrastructure is scaling at an unprecedented pace, and the complexity of managing it is growing just as quickly. Onboarding new hardware int...Oct 14, 2025
