dataMinds News Round up – March 2021
Microsoft Ignite, the most prominent technology innovation event of the year, hosted by Microsoft, is just around the corner. There has been a lot going on during the past week: this 2021 edition was full of surprises and had some amazing announcements in store. This month’s news round-up is all about it!
Power Automate Desktop
Power Automate Desktop, Microsoft’s RPA tool for desktop recording, records common or repetitive interactions with applications, either in a browser or in a native application, then can uses those recordings as the basis of an automated process. PAD will be made available to Windows 10 users at no additional cost. Stephen Siciliano elaborates on how you can automate everyday tasks and free up time for higher-value work.
Microsoft Mesh
Microsoft just announced its new mixed-reality platform called Microsoft Mesh that allows people in different physical locations to join and collaborate on projects from anywhere and using any device including HoloLens, PC, tablets, and smartphones. Mahesh Chand guides you through this piece of art!
Microsoft Viva
To help people achieve balance, collaborate smartly, and find focus wherever and whenever they need it, we’re excited to announce insights and experiences that are part of Microsoft Viva, the employee experience platform built on Microsoft 365 that empowers people and teams to be their best from wherever they work. Microsoft Viva brings together communications, knowledge, learning, resources, and insights into an employee experience that integrates seamlessly into the apps you use every day, such as Microsoft Teams. Seth Patton describes how Microsoft takes hold of the next phase of this experiment.
New Digital Event Experiences For Microsoft Teams
For some people, 2020 felt like the year work and learning moved home. For others, work continued to happen on-site—with the added challenges of staying safe on the job and learning new ways to connect to remote colleagues. But the reality is: 2020 is the year work and learning moved to the cloud. To cope with this change of work environment, Microsoft released a ton of brand-new features for Microsoft Teams during Ignite 2021 as well which will ship later this year for Microsoft Teams. Jared Spataro shines his light on these upcoming beauties!
Azure Synapse
Looking for a way to Build Near Real Time Power BI reports using Synapse Link and SQL On-Demand? Lionel Pénuchot guides you through from A to Z.
Azure Data Factory
Azure Data Factory is a fully managed, easy-to-use, serverless data integration solution to ingest your on-premises, hybrid, and multi-cloud data. You probably already knew this. But what about the product feedback on User Voice? Wee Hyong Tok dives into 10 (!) new releases for ADF, fresh on!
Power BI Premium Per User
Arun Ulag explains how Power BI Premium Per User license lowers the threshold for SME’s with a strong analytical demand willingly to opt in on premium capabilities such as XMLA endpoint support, paginated reports, AI & deployment pipelines, without the necessity of paying at least $5.000 a month. Read how PPU is priced & when it will reach general availability.
Learn
Microsoft has added a Azure Data Factory path to its existing learning platform that can help you jumpstart your Azure Data Factory learning journey. If you are new to ADF, or looking at continuously learning new ADF skills, check out the learning paths on Microsoft Learn for Azure.
In the slipstream of Microsoft Ignite, a unique Ignite Challenge program has just been released. The Microsoft Ignite Cloud Skills Challenge 2021 exists in 7 different challenge, each containing several modules, helping you continue skilling up your technical expertise! Not convinced yet? Well, all participants who complete at least one challenge are eligible for a free certification exam, which can be redeemed to obtain the following certifications. This offer is due on April 1st, so make sure to grab this opportunity with both hands!