So, what's Microsoft Entra all about? Richard chats with VPN guru Richard Hicks about his experiences with Microsoft Entra. More than just a new name for Azure Active Directory, Entra includes essential tooling to provide secure access to all sorts of services - and not only Microsoft ones! Richard talks about how Azure Conditional Access can be applied across all types of Microsoft products and with Entra Application Proxy, you can access your internal services and servers. Many of the capabilities are in preview now - but the future looks bright for Entra and Conditional Access!

Links:

• Microsoft Entra
• Microsoft Global Secure Access Client
• Azure Conditional Access
• Microsoft Entra Private Access
• Microsoft Entra Application Proxy
• RDP using NPS and Entra
• Microsoft Secure Access Service Edge
• Implementing Always On VPN

Recorded October 10, 2023

How do large language models fit into your organization? Richard chats with Ulrika Hedlund about the challenges sysadmins face with large language models in their company. Ulrika talks about how employees are already using large language models like ChatGPT - potentially risking leaking company data. Tools like Bing Chat Enterprise bring the same capabilities as ChatGPT but with a focus on keeping company data secure. Once you're comfortable with Bing Chat, you can explore Microsoft 365 Copilot, which can index company data as part of its model. Training is essential, as is good data protection management, but the productivity benefits can be huge!

Links:

• Bing Chat Enterprise
• Microsoft 365 Copilot
• Copilot Licensing

Recorded October 10, 2023

How does green fit into IT? Richard talks with Mike Halsey about his book The Green IT Guide. Mike starts out talking about not waiting for government regulation - there are things we can do today to reduce our organization's environmental impact. The trend is to keep PCs longer, but what happens when you need new ones? There are more organizations than ever for repurposing old PCs and other devices and recycling. The conversation also digs into right-to-repair, with replaceable batteries and upgradable parts. We can do a lot just by including environmental impact in our buying decisions!

Links:

• The Green IT Guide
• Framework Laptop

Recorded October 12, 2023

How do you choose an Azure data storage solution? Richard talks to Nicole Stevens about her experiences helping companies move data into the cloud - typically in SQL Server. The obvious answer is Azure SQL, but that doesn't always make it the best solution! Nicole talks about a customer moving to Cosmos DB for the unstructured data capabilities and a lot of speed. But does the price make sense? All these factors are in play in choosing a data storage solution, and there is never one right choice - often, a mix of services makes the most sense!

Links:

• Azure SQL
• Azure Cosmos DB
• APIs in Cosmos DB
• Azure Table Storage
• Azure Queue Storage
• Azure Messaging Services
• dapr - Distributed Application Runtime
• Microsoft Certifications
• Data Architecture Guide
• Data Landing Zones
  Azure Security Baselines

Recorded September 6, 2023

What can large language models do for you and your organization? Richard chats with Seth Juarez about the reality behind large language models like ChatGPT – how they are built, what they are good at, and most importantly, what they are not suitable for. Seth talks about the tremendous hype around these technologies and how to cut through the noise to focus on the value they can provide. As an IT Pro, you will be asked how to utilize large language models, so it is helpful to clearly understand their potential and help your company benefit from them while minimizing the risks.

Links:

• ChatGPT
• GitHub Copilot
• Microsoft Security Copilot

Recorded September 18, 2023

Ready to inject a little chaos into your systems? Richard talks to Kelly Shortridge about her book Security Chaos Engineering. Kelly discusses the challenges of modern cybersecurity - how do you find weaknesses in your infrastructure and security systems? This leads to a discussion about challenging assumptions by exploring the workflows that exist in your infrastructure today. Exploring the workflows shows where assumptions exist, and that opens the door to testing them. There's sure to be some low-hanging fruit you can deal with, but eventually, you're left with tests that have to be set loose on your system - and you'll find out how resilient you really are!

Links:

• Fastly
• Security Chaos Engineering
• Deciduous

Recorded August 22, 2023

It's episode 900! Richard brings friend Dana Epp onto the show to talk a bit about the last one hundred episodes of RunAs Radio - and a little look to the future as well. With Dana around, you know there will be lots of security conversation. Over the past hundred shows, ransomware has had quite the story arc, especially around Exchange Server and other products. The conversation then turns to more future-looking topics, including the various Microsoft Copilots being built - could these be tools to help sysadmins? Probably a topic for episode 1000!

Links:

• Windows Sandbox
• Microsoft Viva
• Microsoft Purview Data Loss Prevention

Recorded September 15, 2023

Your SharePoint is on-premises (at least for now), but you want to take advantage of some of those cool SharePoint Online features - is there a way? Richard talks with Sandy Ussia about her talk at the Thrive Conference in Slovenia about how on-premises SharePoint can use Power Automate and other tools to create powerful workflows. Sandy discusses the limits of the free version of Power Automate and how paying for the premium edition lets you build workflows that will more than cover the license cost. The conversation also dives into the subscription model of on-premises SharePoint 2019, which looks to be the final destination for on-premises SharePoint, with ongoing support and features being added!

Links:

• Thrive Conference
• Lightning Tools
• Upgrade to SharePoint Server Subscription Edition
• Power Automate and SharePoint
• Power Automate Desktop
• Power Automate Pricing
• SharePoint On-Premises Data Gateway

Recorded August 1, 2023

How do PowerBI and Microsoft Fabric work together? Richard talks to Mike Carlo about his experiences with Fabric so far. Mike explains how it is early days for Fabric and something you should experiment with, not roll out to production. The conversation dives into how we structure data analytics and the potential of Fabric to bring forward more of the pipeline work that analytics needs - so you can explore and get results faster. This leads to the idea of a new relationship between analysts and data engineers, one where you generate results first, then can optimize them with back-end engineering. There is enormous potential in PowerBI and Fabric together to change the data analytics game!

Links:

• PowerBI.Tips
• DataBricks
• PowerBI
• Azure Synapse Analytics
• Microsoft Fabric
• Azure Data Factory
• The Infinite Game

Recorded August 4, 2023

2023 has been a challenging year for sysadmins so far - how do we do more with less? Richard talks to Sonia Cuff about the current climate for IT in organizations and how we can still be successful. It's not all about building new things but being more efficient. Sonia talks about measuring more precisely - making sure that the expenses that IT has get assigned to revenue centers so that you're not cutting indiscriminately but associating costs with income - then those costs will more naturally adjust. The conversation also dives into new technologies that can be explored on the basis that they can improve efficiency - like large language models and their associated products. There's still a lot to do, but with a slightly different focus!

Links:

• Reality-Based Leadership
• Azure Sticker Shock
• FinOps Foundation
• ChatGPT
• M365 Copilot
• Old People's Home From 4 Years Olds

Recorded July 27, 2023