The Top 10 TechNet UK Articles of 2020!

A drawing of Bit the Raccoon in London, featuring a red double decker bus and Big Ben.

We’re now arriving at the end of 2020, so as is tradition we’re taking a look back at the articles that were most popular by you, the TechNet UK audience! It’s great to see a mix of names amongst the authors, complimenting a wide variety of different topics.

A massive thank you to our guest writers and contributors for providing these articles, and we hope to work with writers new and old in 2021 to create even more great content for everyone at TechNet UK.

If you’re interested in writing for TechNet UK, drop us an email at UKTechStories@microsoft.com with a rough idea about what topic you’d like to cover and we’ll get back to you as soon as we can!

Without further ado, here’s the top ten!

An image of a conch shell made with ASCII art, next to an illustration of Bit the Raccoon.

10. Using open source software to boost your PowerShell skills

by Joel Sallow

When open source is paired with passionate people, we get innovative, creative solutions to help others. Meet Joel Sallow, who is using his open source PSKoans to rocket your PowerShell skills to the next level.

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The text "Azure Mythbusters", to the left of an illustration of Bit the Raccoon.

9. Azure Mythbusters: I don’t need a Data Warehouse now that I have a Data Lake

by Pratim Das and Greg Loxton

This article and video, by Pratim Das and Greg Loxton, is the first in a new series that aims to bust some of the myths surrounding Azure technologies.

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8. Configure access to Azure Data Lake Gen 2 from Azure Databricks

by Nicholas Hurt

This article provides customers of Azure Data Lake (ADLS) and Azure Databricks with an introduction of the common approaches in which data can be accessed and secured in ADLS from Databricks.

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7. I want to skill up – but what do I learn?

by Chris Walden

The topic of what you should learn is a broad and tricky subject. I asked some of the Microsoft MVPs for their thoughts on what topics you should consider and why. If you’re unsure about what you should focus on, why not give these a go?

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6. Enterprise-wide orchestration using multiple data factories

by Nicholas Hurt, John Mallinder and Mark Jones

Building simple data engineering pipelines with a single Azure Data Factory (ADF) is easy, and multiple activities can be orchestrated within a single pipeline. More sophisticated data engineering patterns require flexibility and reusability through Pipeline Orchestration.

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5. 10 high demand roles for developers and how to skill up

by Chris Walden

We’re excited to provide learning and employability tools to help 25 million people around the world gain the skills they need to skill up and pursue roles that are in-demand in an increasingly digital economy. Using existing and new resources from LinkedIn, GitHub, and Microsoft, this initiative will be grounded in three areas of activity.

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4. Running Python scripts on demand with Azure Container Instances and Azure Logic Apps

by Dr Basim Majeed

Data scientists have not been lacking in terms of tools for developing their algorithms but when it comes to deploying their solutions, especially in a hybrid environment, the available tools have not been flexible enough.

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3. Creating an API to tap into Twitter with Open Source Software

by Jamie Maguire

Jamie Maguire shows how and why he created his Social Opinion API, as well as how you can best take advantage of it.

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2. A look at the announcements from Microsoft Build

by Chris Walden

This year’s digital edition of Microsoft Build is in full swing, so be sure to tune in live on the official website. However, with a day of sessions behind us, let’s walk through some of the announcements.

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1. Building your Data Lake on Azure Data Lake Storage gen2 – Part 1

by Nicholas Hurt

In part one of this two-part series, Nicholas Hurt will provide guidance to those planning their data lake and addresses some key considerations around planning, design and structure.

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