Browse All Posts (110)

Authorised Territory shows how to use Git worktrees in the Visual Studio 2026 August update to pause half-finished work without stashing, by creating a separate working directory tied to a new branch while keeping current changes intact.

Microsoft Developer shares a quick developer news roundup covering Bring Your Own Model entering preview in Visual Studio, updates to the model router in Microsoft Foundry Models (including region expansion and refreshed model pool), and the announced date for .NET Conf 2026.

meghasony shares guidance on structuring dbt jobs in Microsoft Fabric, focusing on how to place Bronze/Silver/Gold layers across Lakehouse and Warehouse, and how to separate architecture decisions from orchestration choices using Fabric pipelines or native scheduling.

bytecascade explains how Microsoft Fabric Eventstream can securely ingest private operational data (like factory MQTT telemetry) for real-time analytics by using an Azure virtual network bridge and a Fabric streaming virtual network data gateway, without exposing public endpoints.

FabSubhojit announces the general availability of Fabric Migration Assistant for SQL database, a guided workflow for assessing schema compatibility, provisioning SQL database in Fabric, deploying schema with fix suggestions, and copying data. The update adds a Validate step that analyzes a DACPAC before any Fabric resources are created.

anishta announces GA support for sending Azure Service Bus messages directly from Azure API Management using the send-service-bus-message policy, turning APIM into a governed HTTP front door for asynchronous workloads. The post explains message property controls, failure-handling options, and securing access with Microsoft Entra managed identity and Azure RBAC.

Lily Ma explains how to extend Azure SRE Agent with operational tools by hosting Model Context Protocol (MCP) servers on Azure Connector Namespace. The post walks through deploying an Azure SQL MCP server with azd, wiring it into SRE Agent as an MCP connector, and securing access using managed identity.

Naorbt announces a preview feature that lets you embed a Fabric Map as a reusable tile inside Microsoft Fabric Real-Time Dashboards, so teams can add geospatial context to operational monitoring without duplicating map queries, layers, filters, or styling across dashboards.

Sudha Mahajan introduces Azure Multicloud Interconnect, a jointly engineered Microsoft and AWS managed service for private, high-throughput connectivity between Azure and AWS, aimed at reducing the operational complexity of stitching together ExpressRoute, Direct Connect, routers, BGP peering, and encryption.

Filisha Shah explains what to focus on as more application logic shifts into AI agents, highlighting why observability and evaluation become core skills and how Azure AI Foundry brings datasets, evaluations, and monitoring together for keeping agentic systems healthy.

robece-msft continues the Microsoft Fabric Business Events series by outlining five real-world business event scenarios and the shared event-driven pattern used to turn business moments into trusted signals and downstream actions across Fabric.

Visual Studio Code announces MCP Live (September 9) and invites developers to register to hear updates and learn what’s new across the Model Context Protocol (MCP) ecosystem.

John Savill gives an overview of Azure Linux 4.0 (formerly CBL-Mariner), explaining why Microsoft built it, how it’s put together, where it can be used in Azure, and how it relates to Azure Container Host and WSL scenarios.

John Savill's Technical Training gives a quick overview of Azure Linux 4.0, focusing on what it is and why it matters for running Linux workloads on Microsoft Azure.

John Edward lays out a practical checklist for taking an AI agent from demo to production using Microsoft Copilot and Azure AI Foundry, focusing on architecture choices, grounding with enterprise data, controlled tool permissions, evaluation, monitoring, and cost/latency controls.

hcamposu outlines Microsoft’s end-of-sale timeline for BizTalk Server 2020 and Host Integration Server 2020, the planned support milestones through 2030, and the recommended migration paths to Azure Logic Apps Standard or Azure Logic Apps Hybrid, including tooling and key capability exclusions to plan around.

Allison’s August 2026 changelog rounds up GitHub Copilot updates shipped across VS Code 1.132–1.135, focusing on agent sessions, chat navigation and review, an integrated browser for UI feedback, and improved dictation—plus new ways to inspect per-model token usage during conversations.

This week's Weekly AI Roundup focuses on turning AI assistants into systems you can govern, budget, and operate. GitHub Copilot moves toward clearer org guardrails with explicit billing behavior, a unified policy for chat and cloud agents, and expanded code review support for bot and agent-authored pull requests. On the tooling side, VS Code's Agent Host and Visual Studio's BYOM preview push multi-model, portable agent workflows closer to everyday development, while Microsoft Agent Framework and Foundry guidance emphasize tracing, evaluation, and constrained tool execution. Security and operations round out the picture with real-world attacks on AI gateways, stronger secret-handling patterns, and new cost-aware tooling that brings FinOps into the agent loop.

Welcome to this week's DevOps roundup, where GitHub sharpened the knobs teams use to manage CI/CD evidence and policy enforcement. Actions retention is expanding beyond artifacts and logs to include checks, workflow runs, and statuses starting October 1, 2026, so teams that depend on long-lived history for audits, incident timelines, or DORA-style reporting should review retention and export plans now. On the governance side, rule insights is now generally available at repo and org scopes with filters, bypass reporting, and CSV export, while push rules added path exceptions in preview to help you enforce strict controls where they matter without blocking low-risk paths.

This week's GitHub Copilot updates center on governance that admins can actually operate: unified policies across chat and cloud agents, clearer seat and usage billing behavior, and GA model controls that affect compliance and cost attribution. On the workflow side, the Copilot app's Customize tab is now the place to standardize MCP servers, plugins, and shared tools, while shared agent sessions in Slack and Microsoft Teams push Copilot work into auditable team spaces. Code review expands eligibility (including bot and cloud agent PRs) and adds better lifecycle tracking, and the IDE story keeps evolving with Visual Studio and VS Code adding practical model selection, effort controls, BYOM options, and even persistent agent sessions via Agent Host and AHP.

This week's Security roundup focuses on how attackers and defenders are converging on the same idea: the control points between users, automation, and your internal network matter as much as endpoints. Microsoft Threat Intelligence detailed ClickFix (TerminalFix) tradecraft and a second wave of intrusions aimed at exposed AI gateways and orchestration layers, reinforcing priorities like tightening script execution, monitoring egress, and treating AI infrastructure like production identity and networking. On the defensive side, guidance and platform updates emphasized repeatable guardrails for agentic AI (verification, governed tool access, tracing, and secret boundaries), plus practical improvements in tenant governance and managed response coverage. We close with supply chain and collaboration controls, including GitHub moderation updates and evaluation patterns for LLM-based security workflows that help teams scale trust signals without losing auditability.

This week in Azure, the focus shifted from agent prototypes to the concrete work of shipping and operating agents in production using Azure AI Foundry, Microsoft Agent Framework, and MCP-based tool calling. Updates covered deployment and governance patterns (evaluation, tracing, and secret handling), plus real-world operational upgrades like Foundry Hosted Agents via azd and Azure SRE Agent VNet integration and Live Reports. Security guidance added urgency by calling out AI gateways and orchestrators as high-value targets, while networking and platform news (BGP route summarization, DNS plus Traffic Manager linked records, and zonal APIM Standard v2) rounded out the reliability story.

This week in ML and data engineering, Microsoft Fabric pushed further on standardization and operability with Runtime 2.0 (Spark 4.1 and Delta Lake 4.2), a GPU query acceleration preview, and more policy-driven OneLake governance, including a preview mirror of Google Lakehouse Runtime Catalog metadata for Iceberg tables. On the workflow side, Fabric Warehouse CI/CD moved closer to familiar database project patterns with DacFx and a VS Code Schema Compare path, while agent updates (including GPT-5.1 references and MCP-based connections) continued the shift from assisted authoring to tool-connected automation that still needs validation and logging. Rounding out the week, new guidance focused on practical cost loops in Azure Databricks and on building AI-ready apps with vector search and RAG in Azure SQL Database, plus a broader view of how Work IQ, Foundry IQ, and Fabric IQ frame RAG as the grounding layer for enterprise agents.

This week in .NET, the tooling story centered on agentic workflows becoming a first-class part of everyday development, with Visual Studio 2026 expanding Copilot into configurable, team-managed agents and adding practical Git upgrades like worktrees and deeper submodule support. Model choice and tool connectivity also tightened up as Bring Your Own Model (BYOM), Model Context Protocol (MCP), and the Microsoft Agent Framework converged into a clearer path from prototype agents to production hosts with observability and governance. On the platform side, C# 15 preview discussions focused on union types (plus closed hierarchies and safety-related changes), while debugging and testing workflows in both Visual Studio and VS Code moved toward tighter loops for reproducing, fixing, and validating failures.

jkordick lays out a practical framework for verifying agentic AI output in application modernization work, focusing on how to replace “looks good to me” with layered checks that produce concrete, actionable results for reverse engineering and code generation.

Microsoft Security Research, Sagar Patil, Suriyaraj Natarajan and Parasharan Raghavan break down the TerminalFix (ClickFix) intrusion chain, where a fake Cloudflare CAPTCHA leads users to run PowerShell that triggers DLL sideloading, steganographic payload delivery, Active Directory recon, and a Python reverse WebSocket tunnel, plus Defender detections and hunting queries.

Microsoft Developer walks through the practical work needed to take an AI agent from prototype to production using Azure AI Foundry and Microsoft Agent Framework, including model selection, MCP-based prompts, tool calling, tracing, evaluation, monitoring, and governance guardrails.

Amanda Silver reflects on major technical shifts behind Visual Studio and Visual Studio Code, focusing on VS Code’s open-source architecture and extension ecosystem, and how GitHub Copilot and AI-assisted coding changed what developers expect from an editor and its connected cloud services.

Amanda Silver reflects on how Visual Studio Code grew from an open source editor into a platform shaped by its extension ecosystem, and how GitHub Copilot changed expectations for developer tools by bringing AI-powered coding assistance into everyday workflows.

Allison summarizes the August 2026 update for GitHub Copilot in Visual Studio, including organization-level custom agents, usage visibility, model selection and “thinking effort” controls, and a Git agent that can review uncommitted changes or commits before opening a pull request.

Allison summarizes the August 24 weekly GitHub Copilot updates, covering shared agent sessions in Slack and Microsoft Teams, the Copilot app’s new Customize experience (including MCP servers and plugins), Copilot CLI session and permission defaults, and IDE improvements across VS Code, JetBrains, and Visual Studio.

erikbailey explains how Azure “advertised gateway prefixes” let hub-and-spoke environments summarize many hub/spoke routes into a smaller set of CIDRs for ExpressRoute or VPN Gateway BGP advertisements, helping reduce route-table growth and avoid advertised-prefix limits.

sbaynes breaks down three concrete architecture choices PONS made to build a legal AI platform on Azure for regulated customers: separating public legal knowledge from private client data, leaning on managed Azure services to reduce ops overhead, and turning compliance requirements into enforceable technical controls.

Juan Lavista Ferres describes how ALERTCalifornia and Microsoft’s AI for Good Lab use AI-powered imaging to detect wildfire smoke earlier, helping dispatchers and firefighters validate incidents faster and respond with better situational awareness.

goupadhy announces the August 2026 on-premises data gateway release (version 3000.330), highlighting Power BI Desktop compatibility plus updates across security, authentication, diagnostics, and reliability, along with guidance to upgrade to stay current with dependency and CVE-related fixes.

Yo-Lei Chen demonstrates how to build a full-stack app around SQL Server using GitHub Copilot in VS Code, from database schema design and query assistance through to generating backend code and wiring up REST or GraphQL endpoints.

Visual Studio Code shares a quick tip focused on staying in the editor flow by creating new files quickly while you work.

Allison outlines three upcoming GitHub Copilot changes that affect how organizations pay for seats and usage, how Copilot Chat and the cloud agent are governed under a single policy, and what to expect from the new default “Balanced” effort level for Copilot code review.

Learn Microsoft AI explains how edges in Microsoft Agent Framework workflows control message routing between executors, including conditional paths for dynamic branching based on message content or execution results.

John Savill shares a short weekly Azure update, highlighting what’s new across Microsoft Azure and pointing viewers to related learning resources and playlists on his channel.