We live in fractious times! Let’s escape for a few minutes to consider how Microsoft is moving us toward calm and synchrony. Together with a consistent, organized design aesthetic, the Fluent Design System delivers a User Experience bridge across apps, platforms, and devices. Fluent UI is a package of tools we can use to build for our customers faster and with a consistent UX. Across Platforms The Fluent Design System applies to five platforms: Web, Windows, iOS, Android, macOS (recently […]
Recently we integrated Azure QnA Maker Service with SharePoint Search page for one of our DoD Customers so thought to share my experience and lesson learned with broader audiences. Generally, QnA Maker is used when designing a Chatbot, but, according to customer requirements, we integrated with an existing search page, so users do not need to go to multiple places for information. A single place to search all the contents, including static Questions and Answers (FAQs). Introduction Azure QnA Maker […]
Executive Summary This blog post is for anyone working with AWS CloudFormation Templates and are looking for ways to improve template versatility by including mappings. It begins by describing how the scenario was discovered. It then describes the solution for generating mappings. The Scenario I worked with AWS Cloud Formation and was looking for a starting point for a Windows Server 2012 R2 with an Active Directory template. The AWS CloudFormation Templates page has plenty to start with; I went […]
Building cross-platform applications is an excellent option for many organizations that need to support different technology vendors. Today, we can build websites that reach a massive audience regardless of the device that they use. Additionally, cross-platform mobile applications are an attractive option. All that is left now are the beloved applications that sit on our desktops. With tools such as Electron, desktop applications do not have to suffer from a lack of operating system support. Electron is a framework that […]
Kubernetes has become the go-to orchestrator for running containers. At AIS, we are working with clients using Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), applying our expertise in DevOps. One concern is delivering HTTPS certificates to containerized web applications; let’s use Azure Key Vault to achieve this. Azure Key Vault is a cloud service that provides hardware security modules (HSMs) for securely storing and delivering secrets, encryption keys, and certificates. The Key Vault FlexVolume driver for Kubernetes offers a means for mounting certificates […]
Introduction As enterprises start to utilize Azure resources, even a reasonably small footprint can begin to accumulate thousands of individual resources. This means that the resource count for much larger enterprises could quickly grow to hundreds of thousands of resources. Establishing a naming convention during the early stages of establishing Azure architecture for your enterprise is vital for automation, maintenance, and operational efficiency. For most enterprises, these aspects involve both humans and machines, and hence the naming should cater to […]
It would not be unfair to say that Azure Storage is one of Azure’s most essential services. Almost all the other services in Azure use Azure Storage in some shape or form. AIS has been involved with Azure since it’s beta days, under the code name Red Dog. We’ve seen Azure Storage grow from a service with a limited set of features and capabilities to a service with an extensive collection of features, supporting storage requirements of small organizations and […]
Assumptions This write up is executed in sequence in that if you jump to a section, it assumes you have completed the parts before it. This write-up assumes the following; You have a Power Apps tenant with administrative privileges. For the source control and CI/CD sections; An Azure DevOps project configured with the Power Apps Build Tools Extension. 3 Power Apps environments; development, staging/build, and production. Executive Summary This write-up is for anyone looking to learn how to automate the […]
Summary To break this series apart into more manageable chunks, in this installment, we’ll focus on setting up the API in Azure API Management (APIM) and the custom connector. If you missed the first installment where we set up our On-Premises Data Gateway and Azure Logic App, please check it out here. Scenario The company has an on-premises SQL Server database that contains customer data that needs to be available to various apps built on the Power Platform and/or Azure. […]
I support projects where we have platforms like SharePoint, are looking towards adopting PowerApps, and have Azure Government subscriptions. While learning about containers, I wondered where they could fit into an environment where many applications are developed on top of SharePoint. This helped me better understand containers and discover the perfect use case. I thought of sharing my architecture idea through this blog post. If you would like to learn more about container architecture, read this blog post on Container […]