This Week I Learned - Week #155

This Week I Learned -

* Azure DocumentDB is ISO 27001, HIPAA, and EU Model Clauses compliant.

* Microsoft has open sourced an Azure Pack Connector that you can download and install to your Windows Azure Pack instance. You will then be able to add Azure subscriptions to tenants in Windows Azure Pack to enable Azure VM creation through WAP.

“Service Management” and “Resource Manager” (Azure RM) refer to two different REST APIs that enable access to Microsoft Azure cloud services. There isn’t 100% cross-compatibility between them. Certain resource types that are provisioned via the ASM API can be viewed through the ARM API, but generally speaking, the reverse is not true.  Each interface has a separate UI Portal experience, a separate REST API, a separate PowerShell module, and a separate “mode” of operation in the Azure Cross-Platform (xPlat) CLI Tool.

* Takeaways from Migrating Onpremise Web Applications to Microsoft Azure PaaS Cookbook [PDF]:
- Sharding is primarily used in scenarios where there is significant data growth in a particular database, or multi-tenant SaaS scenarios, where each customer’s data must be stored in a separate database. This approach ensures better data isolation and data security.
- Since Microsoft offers datacenters in many different regions, and many different time zones, it’s important to be cautious with time sensitive information.Some applications store Datetime in UTC format and handle the Datetime convention at the application layer which is a good practice to follow. The alternative is DateTimeOffset, which represents a point in time, typically expressed as a date and time of day, relative to Coordinated Universal Time (UTC) which uniquely and identifies a single point in time. It is advisable to update all the Datetime Objects, both in the application and database objects to Datetime Offset for better handling of the Datetime value in Azure SQL.
Standard GEO Replication and Active Geo Replication offers Estimated Recovery Time (ERT) less than thirty seconds & RPO/Recovery Point Objective of less than five seconds. Note that you can opt out from geo-replication at any time.
- Azure SQL Database supports only database level collation, SQL_LATIN1_GENERAL_CP1_CI_AS whereas on-prem SQL Server collation can be applied at the Instance/database/table/Column level
- Currently, the default .NET versions supported by Azure WebApp are .NETv3.5 and v4.5. During the migration, it’s recommended you recompile your application to target either v3.5 or v4.5 for better performance and security.
- In certain cases, your application might use third party tools and components which might expect a specific older version on which they are built. In such cases, you can go back to the respective vendor for the latest compatible component versions for the target application framework. Failing this, you may continue to support those old frameworks by specifying a value for the supportedRuntime tag in the web.config file.
- Azure Redis Cache has many advantages over the other two options. It supports running atomic operations on these types, such as:
• Appending to a string
• Incrementing the value of a hash
• Pushing values to a list
• Computing set intersection
• Identifying data unions and differences
• Defining the member with highest ranking in a sorted set
- Other features include:
• Support for transactions
• Publish/Subscribe (Pub/Sub)
• Keys with a limited lifespan
• Configuration settings to make Redis behave more like a traditional cache
- “Azure Operational Insights” is exclusive for applications hosted on VM/Physical Machine hosted on premise and private or hybrid clouds. It’s the cloud based Log/Security/Capacity Planning service fully managed by Microsoft. With Operational Insights, you can completely automate, store, analyze the logs.
Hybrid Connection Manager is a part of BizTalk services, provided by Microsoft to bridge the connectivity between on-premises solutions and Azure Cloud Services. It can be installed on a dedicated or shared server, inside your corporate firewall to allow Azure to connect to your designated databases including SQL Server, MYSQL & Oracle. Hybrid Connection Manager uses Shared Access Signature (SAS) to secure the connectivity between your Azure account and your on-premises database. 

* The SQLAzureMW Community’s “CookBook” [Word Doc] has useful "Recipes" for migrating Databases to Azure SQL Database update V12 (Published: January 2015, Applies to: Azure SQL Database V12)


Raghuram Rajan, Governor of the Reserve Bank of India, the central bank of India, earned his bachelor's degree in electrical engineering from the Indian Institute of Technology, Delhi, MBA from Indian Institute of Management, Ahmedabad & PhD from MIT Sloan School of Management. His father worked in the Research and Analysis Wing (R&AW). Throughout his childhood, Rajan presumed his father to be a diplomat since the family traveled on diplomatic passports.

Alibaba's investments in India include $500 million in Snapdeal and a large stake in Paytm as well

The United States Food and Drug Administration (FDA) considers BPA (or bisphenol-A (BPA), primarily used in hard plastics like polycarbonate) to be an endocrine disruptor, meaning it can alter hormonal levels if present in high enough quantities.

* Cholesterol is a lipid, or fat, in the blood that plays a critical role in physiological functions and overall health. The standard “total cholesterol” count is really just the number of molecules of high-density lipoproteins (HDL), low-density lipoprotein (LDL), and 20 percent of your triglyceride level - Go Ask Alice

* Chris "American Sniper" Kyle's father bought his son his first rifle when he was 8 years old. Chris went on to become a United States Navy SEAL and the most lethal sniper in U.S. military history, with over 160 kills officially confirmed by the Department of Defense. During four tours of duty in the Iraq War, he was shot twice and survived six separate IED detonations. He was shot and killed by a 25-year-old U.S. Marine whom he had reportedly taken to a gun range in Texas in an effort to help him with his post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

* The U.N. World Happiness Report identifies six key factors: G.D.P. per capita, life expectancy, social support, trust, generosity and perceived freedom to make life decisions.

* Streptomyces bacteria spew geosmin as a weapon against other bacteria in the soil where they live. But to us, that chemical produces a distinct smell known as petrichor, which we recognize as the earthy scent following a rainstorm.

* How do the flowers figure out that it is time to bloom?  Plants rely partially on environmental cues like temperature and light quality. Another signal, the length of the day, is also very important. Plants can sense day length because they have circadian clocks, as people do. In the spring, plants can tell the days are growing longer by measuring how long night lasts. They do this with their leaves, which are photoreceptors that react to sunshine - NY Times

* The song "Enjoy yourself , it's later than you think" was published in 1949

* "In God we trust, all others must bring data" - W Edwards Deming

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