I am excited to be on another panel for the Come Cloud With Us folks!
This time this panel is focused on Platform Engineering. It will be at the end of February. You wont want to miss this panel! Here is more info about the panel:
When:
Thursday, February 29, 2024 at 4:00 PM to 5:30 PM CST
Where:
Online event
ThePanel: Steve Buchanan – Principal Program Manager at Microsoft Kaslin Fields – Developer Advocate at Google Marino Wijay – Cloud Native Solutions Engineering and Advocacy at Solo Michael Levan – Chief Engineer/Consultant, Content Creator, and Trainer Saim Safdar – Technical Leader and CNCF Ambassador Kat Morgan – Developer Advocate at Pulumi Whitney Lee – Staff Technical Advocate at VMware Robin Smorenburg – Lead Cloud Architect – Azure MVP & CNCF Ambassador
What to Expect: A comprehensive exploration of Kubernetes, including architecture, best practices, practical demonstrations of AKS deployment and management, insights into optimizing containerized applications, and valuable networking opportunities with industry professionals.
Who should attend: Whether you’re a developer, IT professional, Azure enthusiast, student, or learner, this event is designed for you.
Mark your calendars and RSVP now! See you there! 🚀
I am excited to announce an addition to my journey in tech. I will be serving as the Fractional Chief Technology Advisor for Gebeya Inc. Gebeya, an edtech startup based in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia, is making waves across Africa by upskilling developers and reshaping the continent’s tech landscape.
With over 7 years of impactful work, 90+ dedicated employees, and backing from renowned VCs, Gebeya’s mission is truly commendable. I’ll be working closely with their CEO, CTO, VP of Engineering, and other tech leaders to provide guidance and cultivate strategic partnerships.
My connection with Amadou Geybeya’s CEO dates back several years, where we discovered our shared passion for empowering those in African communities and the diaspora through tech. As our friendship flourished, so did our collaborative spirit. Fast forward to 2023, when Amadou asked me to directly contribute to Gebeya’s journey.
My commitment to fostering tech growth in Africa and empowering underrepresented communities aligns perfectly with Gebeya’s vision. The chance to shape a SaaS platform while expanding tech skills in Africa is both exciting and fulfilling.
I am not leaving my position at Microsoft; this new adventure represents an additional commitment for me, albeit in a fractional capacity. Instead, this new endeavor allows me to broaden my horizons while making a meaningful impact in a fractional capacity. In fact this gives me another touchpoint in the startup world, complementing Microsoft’s growing commitment to making Azure the premier cloud for startups.
It enables me to provide leadership and guidance, driving positive change for technical teams and contributing to the development of Gebeya’s SaaS platform.
It’s a thrilling addition to my tech journey and start to 2024. Onward and upward! 🚀
Exciting announcement for the new year. My 23rd course with Pluralsight has published! This one is a Generative AI related course. It is titled “GitHub Copilot for IT Pros“. This is my first course in 2024.
Github Copilot is not just for Developers, its also for IT pros. In today’s world, AI is ubiquitous, enhancing efficiency and acting as a valuable assistant. GitHub Copilot, an AI-powered para-programmer, accelerates coding for developers, making the process faster and more efficient. IT professionals can also leverage Copilot to enhance their efficiency across various domains, including automation and Infrastructure as Code (IaC).
This course is for folks in roles such as Platform Engineers, DevOps Engineers, Systems Engineers, Cloud Engineers, and more. It will help you learn how GitHub Copilot can be leveraged as coding sidekick, speeding up IaC and automation script development.
This course shows you how to use GitHub Copilot, the AI-powered peer developer integrated into Visual Studio Code. First, you’ll explore GitHub Copilot and its features. Next, you’ll discover GitHub Copilot IDE integrations. Finally, you’ll learn how to use GitHub Copilot’s various features. When you’re finished with this course, you’ll have the skills and knowledge of GitHub Copilot needed to utilize GitHub Copilot as an IT pro.
Some of the major topics covered include:
What AI & Common AI Terminology is?
Understanding GitHub Copilot and its Features.
How to setup GitHub Copilot with VS Code?
How to use GitHub Copilot features like: suggestions, autofill, code testing, Copilot chat & more.
When you’re finished with this course, you’ll have a better understanding of GitHub Copilot all up and how it can be a critical tool for IT pros.
Check out the “GitHub Copilot for IT Pros“ course here:
In the Microsoft Copilot Product Journey path you will also find courses on the following (NOTE: many of the courses are still being developed):
Introduction to Microsoft Copilot Copilot for Microsoft 365 Apps (Microsoft Office) Copilot for Microsoft Teams Copilot for Web Copilot for Microsoft Windows Copilot for Microsoft SharePoint and OneDrive Copilot for Power Platform: The Big Picture
I hope you find value in this new GitHub Copilot for IT Pros course. Be sure to follow my profile on Pluralsight so you will be notified as I release new courses!
Here is the link to my Pluralsight profile to follow me:
💡 Starting the new year with another event! We kicked things off with a “Career in Cloud Panel” hosted by the Azure Community Enthusiasts (ACE) user group. Based in the UK, ACE brings together passionate individuals diving into the world of Azure.
This user group aims to create a community of enthusiasts and professionals passionate about learning Microsoft Azure. Their meetups are both online AND in-person (London or Birmingham). ACE can be found on Twitter here:
I had a blast being part of this Career in Cloud Panel with fellow panelist and long time friend Sam Ernskine (@samerskine) from the UK! Big shoutout to the hosts, friend and Microsoft MVP Kevin Greene (@kgreeneit) from Ireland, and the up and coming Nicholas Chang(@nick_cloudops), also an MVP from the UK. 👩💻👩🏿💻 It felt like a tech reunion! 🎉
We dove into some cool topics such as: what got us hooked on tech, the building blocks of tech skills throughout our careers, staying flexible by not tying the knot with one technology, whether cloud certifications are the golden ticket to landing a job, and more. Being on this panel was a total blast – a mix of fun and insightful vibes! 🌐
For those who missed it, you can catch the recording here:
To kick off the new year I am trying something new. For the 1st time I will be speaking on a Twitter space. This Twitter space is about Platform Engineering. It was hosted by cloud native and open source champion SAIM SAFDAR (@cloudnativeboy).
On this twitter space we talked about how to prepare your journey of learning and navigating the Platform Engineering (PE) landscape, my latest PE course, the PE guide from Microsoft and emerging best practices, and taking question’s from folks on the space.
We even had special guest Kubernetes and Platform Engineering expert Michael Levan (@TheNJDevOpsGuy) show up on the space! He shared some great insight on PE as well.
If you missed the space you can watch a recording of the space here:
✨️ I am thrilled to be one of the experts in Pluralsight‘s Cloud Transformation Strategy Guide! The strategy guide is a series of video sessions with various cloud experts. In the guide cloud experts at AWS, Microsoft, and more share their insights to help you build a cloud strategy, close the cloud skills gap, and upgrade your people and processes for the long haul.
It was an honor to join David Tucker in the ☁ “Exploring multicloud: Strategies, pitfalls, and real-world insights” session!
💡In this session we talked about how to thrive in a multicloud environment, develop a multicloud strategy, and navigate the challenges of managing multiple cloud providers. You can watch it here:
In the cloud strategy guide, you’ll learn how to use cloud technology to push your organization forward.
For a while, I have been hearing chatter around “What is Microsoft doing in the Platform Engineering space?” and “What is Microsoft’s stance on Platform Engineering?”. Well, today is the first day of Microsoft Ignite 2024 and I am happy to say Microsoft has officially released a Platform engineering guide. It can be found here: https://aka.ms/plat-eng-learn
It is broken down into the following sections: Overview, Concept, How-To Guide, and Architecture!
Working through this guide will help you discover how platform engineering teams can leverage technologies from Microsoft and other vendors/providers to craft highly personalized, optimized, and secure developer experiences.
This guide essentially gives you the scoop on Microsoft’s perspective when it comes to Platform Engineering. It can be used to help you along your Platform Engineering journey!
Shout out to the core team that built this! DevDiv: Mark Weitzel, Chuck Lantz, Russell Conard and AKS Engineering: Daniel Sol.
Another cool thing launched today is Microsoft’s Platform Engineering Interest Group.
At Microsoft, we want to hear about your challenges with Platform Engineering and provide opportunities to connect with other teams, at Microsoft and at other companies, who are working together to build solutions in the Platform Engineering space. Joining this group will let you get exclusive early access to new tools and services from Microsoft. Sign up here:
The last thing I want to mention in this post is a new open-source product from Microsoft named Radius. Radius is a single tool to describe, deploy, and manage your entire application. Radius is dedicated to addressing the platform engineering challenges associated with facilitating application deployments across on-premises infrastructure and major cloud providers such as Microsoft Azure and Amazon Web Services.
Radius is not an IDP. It’s an optional part of an IDP focused on the applications that provides infrastructure Recipes, simplifying the platform configurations like permissions, connection strings, and more to manage the application and its resources.
Radius empowers developers to comprehend their applications, recognizing that an application extends beyond Kubernetes alone. Radius assists developers in visualizing all the components that form their application. More about Radius here: radapp.io
This week I will be co-hosting another Microsoft Learn Live session. This one is “Learn Live: Building Resilient Intelligent Apps On AKS” in the Intelligent apps series. It is going to be action-packed full of several Microsoft technologies, AI, and AKS.
It is a part of Microsoft Reactor.
Microsoft Reactor provides events, training, and community resources to help startups, entrepreneurs, and developers. More on Reactor here: https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/reactor.
In this Learn Live, I will be co-hosting as Cloud Native Developer Advocate Paul Yu will be leading us through a workshop.
Under the Computer Science Education Advancement Act (HF 759 and SF 757) (https://csforallmn.org/cs-ed-bill-2023/), the Minnesota Department of Education (MDE) has been charged to form a working group that will develop a strategic plan to improve Computer Science for k-12 education in the state of Minnesota. 🎓
🔄 There is an urgent need to elevate Minnesota’s computer science k-12 education position. Minnesota is currently last in the United States when it comes to computer science.
🔄I am thrilled to share that, among 80 applicants, I have been chosen as a member of this new “Minnesota Computer Science Education Working Group” by MDE! 🌟 It’s an honor to stand alongside esteemed technologists and educators from our state. Together, we are committed to crafting a comprehensive statewide computer science education program.
Our mission is clear: bridge the tech education gap in Minnesota’s schools through a plan for long-term and sustained growth of computer science education in all k-12 school districts and charter schools. The working group will develop a robust plan, slated to be presented to legislative committees overseeing education in the state. Upon approval, this plan will be set to improve computer science education statewide.
I am thankful to work at an organization such as Microsoft that supports employees to engage in initiatives such as this. This is a testament to Microsoft’s mission to “empower every person and every organization on the planet to achieve more”.
