Microsoft Ignite this week
This week I will be "attending" Microsoft Ignite, a virtual event. Ignite is similar to Google I/O except that Ignite actually happens because Microsoft has the technology to host a virtual event, something Google seems to be lacking in its alphabet list of products.
I say "attending" because I will not be there physically. Between TechEd and Ignite, I have been to eight different cities in three countries over the past ten years or so. Travel was essential in my role for more than ten years. This past year has been an adjustment, no question.
A few weeks ago my daughter told me about Geoguessr. The website has been around for a long time, but only recently did GeoGuessr have an iPhone app. Geoguessr has allowed me to visit places, familiar and new, without leaving my couch.
The phone app starts by dropping you anywhere in the world. You then wander around, gathering clues as to your location, and then drop a pin to guess where you are. It's a nice reminder of my fraternity days.
Anyway, the closer you guess to your actual starting point, the more coins you earn. You then use coins to unlock other maps. The first map I unlocked was "Famous Places". Now, some places are more famous than others. I'm fortunate to have traveled enough to not only recognize places, but to drop a pin on a map as to their exact location.
But there are times where I am at a place I visited, but do not recognize where I am. The photo above is from Arles, France. I've been there. I've walked those streets, visiting those Roman ruins, but GeoGuesser stumped me on this one.
The opportunity to revisit places I have been, and make a list of places I want to still visit, is powerful to me. It's helping me get through this final stage of lockdown. And GeoGuessr is allowing me to experience random access memories, right as Daft Punk announce their retirement.
If you are getting excited to go places and do things again, GeoGuesser might be a good way for you to get started.
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SolarWinds
Back in October SolarWinds purchased Sentry One, makers of SQL Sentry, giving SolarWinds a comprehensive suite of cross-platform database performance monitoring and tuning tools for both Earthed and Cloud workloads. In other words, if you have a database problem, we can solve it.
Community Links
Plansplaining Archives - SQL Server Fast
If you are responsible for tuning SQL Server queries, you need to follow Hugo's Plansplaining series. Hugo is one of the top five non-Microsoft people in the world when it comes to reading execution plans.
The Missing Cryptoqueen
Since I mention Bitcoin a couple of times, I think you should have a listen to the Missing Cryptoqueen podcast. It's a brilliant series from Jamie Bartlett and the BBC.
Webcasts
Our Plan for a Safer SolarWinds and Customer Community
I hosted a webcast with Sudhakar and Alex talking about SolarWinds and our plans for building a safer SolarWinds and customer community.
Data Janitor Roundup
SQL Assessment API
I am excited to see this released so that all SQL Server customers (Earthed and Cloud) can take advantage of a basic assessment of their database instance. In many ways this seems like the evolution of Policy-Based Management to me, and it is long overdue.
Amazon RDS for SQL Server now supports Always On Availability Groups for Standard Edition
AWS often says the world of commercial database systems is trash, unless those systems happen to be hosted at AWS, in which case they will gladly help you migrate your data and money to them.
Azure Cost Management and Billing updates – February 2021
I've noticed Azure has been putting time into making their billing and cost management easier to consume and comprehend. This includes efforts to bring AWS billing into Azure Cost Management.
Shared responsibility in the cloud
Security is a shared responsibility. You may have heard me say that phrase a few times over the years. I love how Microsoft has taken the time to document this. So has AWS as well. Sadly, few people read the documentation. We need to change this mindset, and get everyone to put security ahead of things like performance.
Musk: Starlink will hit 300Mbps and expand to “most of Earth” this year
Collecting credit card data. Convincing people that Bitcoin is a good thing. Robot cars. Solar powered batteries in everyone's home. Tunneling under major cities. Deploying satellites to control data connectivity to devices worldwide. I was today year's old when I realized Elon Musk is a James Bond villain, many times over. The only thing missing from his resume is making gold radioactive, something I am certain he is working on right now.
Amazon SageMaker Clarify – Bias Detection and Explainability
This past week I learned about Amazon Sagemaker Clarify, a service to detect potential bias in your dataset. And then I found Azure has a similar service, using the Fairlearn SDK. Excited to see both companies making an effort here. If you are not examining your data for potential bias, you are at risk of building sub-optimal models.
Electricity needed to mine bitcoin is more than used by 'entire countries'
Bitcoin is like a diamond. Neither have any real value, except for what the market will pay. And both take an huge amount of effort, and toll, on natural resources to mine. On top of this, Bitcoin is essentially just a multi-level marketing scheme, taking advantage of those that enter at the bottom of the pyramid.
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Tweet of the Week
@j_angliss: I hate to open stupid tickets on stuff like this, but which engineer, product manager, and QA engineer, thought that sorting by "Meeting or Call ID" by default was the right solution?
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