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As you may already be aware, at TechEd this year in Orlando, several announcements about the new “R2” versions of various products were made.  Windows Server 2012 R2 and System Center 2012 R2 were just two of the products being updated later this year, and for which preview releases will be available...

In this episode I chat with Product Marketing Manager Adam Long from BlueStripe Software.  We discuss BlueStripe’s product FactFinder, which is a transaction and application monitoring tool that helps Operations Support teams manage IT systems availability and performance regardless of where it...

At the keynote on Monday of TechEd NA (June 3), we made some pretty big announcements around how Windows Azure Trials and various subscription benefits would be changing. So for today’s edition of our “ TechEd 2013 Favorites ” series, I thought I’d briefly introduce you to some surprising changes to...

The 21st annual TechEd North America conference happened this month (June) in New Orleans, and my three IT Technology Evangelist coworkers ( Brian Lewis , Keith Mayer , and Matt Hester ) and I had the privilege of attending and taking part. So in the interest of sharing our experiences and impressions...

Being as this is our last business/work-day of the month, it is also the last day of articles in our “ 20 Key Scenarios with Windows Azure Infrastructure Services ” series. “Yay!” I agree.  And once again Keith Mayer comes through for us with an outstanding topic: How to migrate virtual machines...

You read that title correctly.. We know that many of you are still using VMware .  And just about as many of you are already migrating or considering the migration of some (or all) of your virtualization to Microsoft ’s Hyper-V .  And if you’re already going that route, perhaps you should also...

One of the first questions that IT Pros have when considering using Windows Azure to host some (or all) of their company’s computing infrastructure is, “How do I move an existing virtual machine to the cloud?” “I was just about to ask that!” I bet you were. So, how does one take a virtual machine and...

What is the plural of Series? (And how is it pronounced?) Well.. that’s not so important. What’s important is that we – the Technology Evangelists of Microsoft DPE in the U.S. have been busy busy bloggers these past several months. You’ve seen many articles, and many links to...

In April of 2013 our team’s blogging focus was on how to build your Private Cloud . I hope you found our articles informative, that you have downloaded your free System Center 2012 SP1 trial, your Windows Server 2012 evalution, and have started your Windows Azure FREE TRIAL . Here is our...

So, you’ve got your Windows Azure subscription all set up (and if you don’t you can set up a FREE TRIAL HERE ), and now you want to use PowerShell to work with your Windows Azure-based resources. In case you weren’t aware, Microsoft provides a Windows Azure PowerShell module for scripted...

If you are a developer, or if you are a member of an IT organization which supports a software development organization, then you know that sometimes you need more hardware than you can realistically afford.  And if you do buy the hardware, it becomes obsolete all-too-soon, or just sits there idle...

Perhaps you’re not aware of this, but Windows Azure supports web sites.  In fact, it makes it very easy to create and run any web site – from the most simple to the most high-end, complex web application scaled for global reach. To show off how easy it is to get started, my friend Brian Lewis has...

Well, do you? “Yes!  And I bet you’re going to tell me to use Windows Azure .” You’re catching on!  In today’s article in our “ 20 Key Scenarios with Windows Azure Infrastructure Services ”, my friend Keith Mayer shares some excellent tips, resources, and a step-by-step for building a SharePoint...

Welcome to another installment of our May series of articles – “ 20 Key Scenarios with Windows Azure Infrastructure Services ”.  Today I’m going to describe a scenario, a problem, and then propose a solution.    The Scenario : Single Sign-On support using Active Directory , Windows Azure...

Windows Azure Infrastructure Services allows you to build complex solutions, hosted in Microsoft datacenters, as readily a you would have them running in your own lab or datacenter. For today’s article in our “ 20 Key Scenarios with Windows Azure Infrastructure Services ”, my friend...

If you can extend your datacenter into the cloud using a secured network path and Windows Azure , it sure should follow that you can take advantage of cloud-based virtual machines to perform some of your more common infrastructure tasks.  For example: File Servers. “Yeah, I get it, Kevin. ...

This just in… The demand has been so great for more information about using Windows Azure Infrastructure Services as an extension of your datacenter and IT Operations, that we’ve decided to schedule a few more FREE events to close out the end of our fiscal year here in Central Region...

“Hey Kevin… I would like to use Windows Azure as a location where I set up a SQL Server database mirror.  Is this something I can do?” Absolutely, yes!  In fact, it doesn’t even require anything fancy as far as setting up special connectors or site-to-site VPN in order to try this out (though...

As many of you may already know, this month my Microsoft US DPE Central Region teammates ( Matt Hester , Brian Lewis , and Keith Mayer ) and I are blogging about “ 20 Key Scenarios with Windows Azure Infrastructure Services ”. Throughout this month I’ll be adding links, making any updates...

This is going to be good!  The folks at the Microsoft Virtual Academy are once again hosting a full-day online training event on May 16, 2013 from 9am to 5pm Pacific Time.  The title: Windows Azure for IT Professionals . Make Windows Azure Your Datacenter! This Jump Start will help you understand...

“Hey Kevin.. How do I get high availability out of my SQL Server?” Cluster. Shared Storage. Windows Failover Clustering supports that. “But… I want my SQL Servers running in Windows Azure. And I don’t have shared storage in “the cloud”. But I still need...

Today’s installment of our “Build Your Private Cloud in a Month” series is the last of our 5-part mini-series we’re calling “Deploying Private Cloud Workloads”.  This week we ( Tommy Patterson , Blain Barton and I) gave you the details and demonstrated some of the key areas in System Center 2012...

Today’s installment of our “Build Your Private Cloud in a Month” series is the fourth of a 5-part mini-series we’re calling “Deploying Private Cloud Workloads”. This week we ( Tommy Patterson , Blain Barton and I) are going to detail and demonstrate some of the key...

Today’s installment of our “Build Your Private Cloud in a Month” series is the third of a 5-part mini-series we’re calling “Deploying Private Cloud Workloads”.  This week we ( Tommy Patterson , Blain Barton and I) are going to detail and demonstrate some of the key areas in System Center 2012 SP1...

“Georgia?” No!  GA means General Availability !  It’s like RTM, but better.  We’ve been talking about Windows Azure virtual machines, and using Azure as “Infrastructure-as-a-Service” (IaaS) for many months now.  We’ve been promoting the heck out of the 90-day free trial of Windows...