October 18, 2023
Welcome to the twenty-first edition of the Azure World Newsletter in 2023.
Hello again, my friends from around the world. I’m so happy you continue to subscribe and read this bi-weekly newsletter on Azure. I enjoy sitting down each week to research and write this, and hopefully, you will continue to find value in it. Feel free to invite your co-workers or others to subscribe if you think they would find it helpful.
It’s been a bit of a slow couple of weeks when it comes to news. Microsoft Ignite is coming in November, and perhaps they are saving a few big announcements for the middle of the next month.
The unsubscribe link is at the bottom if you want to stop receiving these emails.
ONE.
I must admit that I haven’t been paying attention to a new open-source end-to-end web app testing framework called Microsoft Playwright. Microsoft this week announced a new Microsoft Playwright Testing (MPT) service in preview mode.
Playwright is a web testing tool similar to Selenium. This falls into the category of web automation testing software. You can record or program your app tests using this tool, and it will run through the web automation tests using either a desktop browser, mobile browser, and can even test API calls.
You can write your tests in many languages, including JavaScript, TypeScript, Java, Python or C#. Of course, it’s cross-platform for Windows, Mac, Linux, Android or iOS. It supports geolocation, where you simulate your tests from different regions of the world. It also supports all main browsers, including Chromium, WebKit, or Firefox-derived browsers. It can also support headless mode if you don’t want your monitor to be taken over during testing.
The Microsoft Playwright Testing service is built into Azure, and you can set up your application tests to run in the cloud. You can scale the tests to run in parallel, so that you’re not waiting hours for the tests to complete. It was recently in private preview, but Microsoft has now opened that up to a public preview. Anyone can try it.
If you want to test your web apps in the cloud, check it out.
And here:
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/products/playwright-testing/
AZURE PLATFORM UPDATES.
The following updates to the Azure platform were announced in the last two weeks:
- Microsoft Playwright Testing service: Scalable end-to-end testing for modern web apps, in preview
- App Service: Backup and Restore over Azure Virtual Network
- ExpressRoute Traffic Collector is now generally available
- Announcing Public Preview of Azure API Management Pricing Tiers: Basic v2 and Standard v2
- Virtual Machine Scale Set Default Orchestration Mode changing from Uniform to Flexible on PowerShell, Azure CLI
- Azure Dedicated Host – Resize, in GA
- Windows Server 2012/R2 reaches end of support
- VMSS Automatic Instance Repairs – Reimage, Restart Repair Actions, in preview
The following services are being retired, please take note:
- Support for Azure Machine Learning Explanation and Fairness Dashboards is ending on 14 March 2025
- Support for TLS 1.0/1.1 on Azure Cache for Redis ending on 30 September 2024
- Azure Activity Logs Legacy solution is replaced by Diagnostic settings
- Azure Cosmos DB built-in Jupyter notebooks will be retired March 30, 2024
- Bing Speech will be retired on 3 November 2023
- Azure Functions support for Python 3.8 is ending on 14 October 2024
Be sure and check out the Azure Updates page if any of these affect you.
https://azure.microsoft.com/en-us/updates/
COMING UP FOR ME.
So far in October, I’ve recorded or re-recorded 6 hours of videos for my AZ-204, AI-900. AZ-104, and DP-900 courses. These updates keep the videos fresh, showing the latest Azure UI, covering new or changed Azure features, and ensure the courses continue to be the most relevant available on the topics.
We have also launched many new Practice Test courses for various Azure Certifications. There are new practice test courses for:
- AZ-700 Azure Networking
- AZ-500 Azure Security Technology
- AZ-104 Azure Administrator
- AI-102 Azure AI Engineer
My team and I continue to work hard to keep the courses up-to-date and help you in your certification journey.
WHERE TO FIND ME.
And that’s it for issue 4.21 Thanks for reading this far. Talk to you again in two weeks.
What is your favorite platform to be on? Perhaps we can connect there.
Facebook Page: https://www.facebook.com/getcloudskills/
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/scottjduffy/
Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/getcloudskills.ca/
Twitter: https://twitter.com/scottjduffy
Udemy: https://www.udemy.com/user/scottduffy2/
LinkedIn Learning: https://www.lynda.com/Scott-Duffy/1993589682-1.html