CIAOPS Need to Know webinar–July 2016

I am happy to announce the inaugural CIAOPS Need to Know webinar which will be held next Thursday the 21st of July at 11am Sydney Australia time. You can register for the event here:

https://attendee.gotowebinar.com/register/547641828883643908

To kick things off I’ll look at the differences between OneDrive for Business and SharePoint Online and how you can make the most of each one of these technologies.

Not only will we cover this topic but I’ll bring you the latest Office 365 and Microsoft Cloud news as well as open up the floor for an open Q & A session at the end. The main session will take no more than 30 minutes but I’ll hang around as long as required afterwards to answer any questions people may have.

The CIAOPS Need to Know Webinars are free to attend but if you want to receive the recording of the session you need to sign up as a CIAOPS patron (for only USD$10 per month) which you can do here:

https://www.patreon.com/ciaops

I’m now aiming to run these webinars once a month and cover a specific topic as well as news and events from the Microsoft cloud to keep you up to date with the fast changing world of products like Office 365. Come along to the inaugural event and let me know what topics you’d like to see covered. Also feel free at any stage to email me directly at director@ciaops.com with your webinar topic suggestions.

I’d also appreciate you sharing information about this webinar with anyone you feel may benefit from the session.

I look forward to seeing everyone on the webinar.

Power BI content pack for Xero now available

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Microsoft has just announced the ability to connect Xero accounting systems to Power BI:

https://powerbi.microsoft.com/en-us/blog/explore-and-analyze-your-xero-data-with-power-bi/

This means you can easily view and report on your business accounting analytics using Microsoft’s free Power BI dashboard reporting tool.

More and more software vendors are moving to using Power BI as their reporting tool rather than attempting to building their own reporting engine. Why? First, because Power BI is such a great analytics tool and secondly because Microsoft have made the base Power BI offering free.

That therefore means there is little reason not be using Power BI to analyse your accounts but there is also the massive opportunity for IT resellers to sell services to customers using Xero now thanks to Power BI.

If you haven’t see Power BI then check out my tutorial here:

and then start getting into the opportunity Power BI provides!

Delve Windows 10 app preview now available

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I’m a big fan of Delve and have written previously about how important I believe Delve is in changing the way you look at being productive in a business:

Why Delve should be the centre of you Office 365 universe

Microsoft have just released a Windows 10 app (in preview) which you can find here:

https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/store/apps/delve/9nblggh4n0bv

It is free and allows you to connect your desktop Windows 10 directly to your Delve.

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Don’t forget that this Windows 10 Delve app is still in preview, so expect to see plenty of new improvements and enhancements coming soon.

Need to Know Podcast–Episode 107

In this episode Marc is joined by Steve Hosko to talk about the latest with System Center. You’ll also get the latest news om Azure.

Listen to this episode at:

http://ciaops.podbean.com/e/episode-107-steve-hosko/

or subscribe to this and all episodes in iTunes at:

https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/ciaops-need-to-know-podcasts/id406891445?mt=2

The podcast is also available on Stitcher at:

http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/ciaops/need-to-know-podcast?refid=stpr

Don’t forget to give the show a rating as well as send me any feedback or suggestions you may have for the show.

Resources

Marc Kean – @marckean

Azure News:

https://marckean.com/2016/06/30/azure-news-2016-week-26/

Reddit (SCCM):

https://www.reddit.com/r/SCCM/comments/4qhcwg/amawe_are_the_configmgr_team_here_to_talk_about

Facebook pages about SCCM:

https://www.facebook.com/groups/ConfigMgr2012

https://www.facebook.com/groups/techkonnect

https://www.facebook.com/groups/mssccm

https://www.facebook.com/groups/windowsnoob

Guest Twitter:

@Steve_Hosko

Other:

Azure Stack user group meet-up, hear all about Azure Stack Vs Azure Public

http://www.meetup.com/Sydney-System-Center-and-Infrastructure-User-Group/events/232103039

Need to Know Podcast–Episode 106

In this episode we talk with Stephane Budo from Vigilant IT all about Azure stack and how Microsoft is bringing what it has learned from running the public cloud and making that available to people who want to run their own private cloud. Azure stack provides a consistent way of managing datacentre resources no matter where they may be. Allowing management via a single consistent interface provides a lot of benefits as Stephane explains.

Of course you’ll get the latest Azure and Office 365 news from Marc and myself as well as plenty of opinions as to what’s happening with Microsoft and the Cloud. We appreciate you taking the time to listen and look forward to your feedback.

Listen to this episode at:

http://ciaops.podbean.com/e/episode-106-stephane-budo/

or subscribe to this and all episodes in iTunes at:

https://itunes.apple.com/au/podcast/ciaops-need-to-know-podcasts/id406891445?mt=2

The podcast is also available on Stitcher at:

http://www.stitcher.com/podcast/ciaops/need-to-know-podcast?refid=stpr

Don’t forget to give the show a rating as well as send me any feedback or suggestions you may have for the show.

Resources

Stephane Budo from Vigilant.IT,  +61 2 8925 1800, sales@vigilant.it

Marc Kean – @marckean

Robert Crane – @directorcia

Microsoft buys Linkedin

Azure updates from Marc Kean

Hybrid architecture for IT Pros

Office 365 Planner is generally available

GigJam preview now available to all

All about E5

I presented on a webinar yesterday with Ingram Micro around the Office 365 E5 license. I did a quick dive into some of the major additions that E5 bring to the tables as well as the business benefits these can provide for both customers and resellers.

The features, I believe, that are the most exciting are the improvements that are coming with Skype for Business, including the connectivity to landlines via the PSTN connectivity feature. I wrote about these details here:

I’m totally blown away with what’s coming with Skype for Business

and encourage those interested to check out the video that is there, especially from around the 28 minute mark.

I’ve also posted up the slides for the E5 presentation at:

https://doc.co/2VRHMh/qcihGm

which you can download and review.

E5 has lots of features for customers and lots of opportunities for resellers to provide services and configuration around these. For information on the full feature set visit:

https://products.office.com/en-au/business/office-365-enterprise-e5-business-software

Azure Backup overview

There are three different forms of Azure Backup, many of which I have detailed previously here including:

Azure desktop backup – https://blog.ciaops.com/2014/12/azure-desktop-backup.html

Azure Backup Server for Applications configuration – https://blog.ciaops.com/2016/01/azure-backup-server-for-applications.html

Backup files and folders using Azure – http://bit.ly/1TkoBe7

Restoring files and folders with Azure backup – http://bit.ly/1WBVsih

Azure Backup for Applications using Resource Manager – http://bit.ly/1WkWC1N

However, I have decided to pull of this information together and update it for Azure Resource Manager (ARM). The result is the video presentation above and accompanying slides which you can find at:

https://doc.co/BV66nP/qcihGm

Hopefully, this makes understanding and configuring Azure Backup and lot easier for people and encourages them to start using it.

Setting Partner of Record in new Office 365 Admin portal

A little while ago I wrote a post on how to set the partner of record in Office 365.

Since then, the Office 365 billing interface has changed so here’s an updated tutorial on how to set the partner of record in Office 365 tenant.

You’ll firstly need to login to the Office 365 web portal as an administrator with the appropriate rights.

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Once you have logged onto the web console navigate to the Office 365 admin center using the app launcher.

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From the menu on the left of the page you will find a heading Billing which you will need to expand.

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Below the Billing heading you should find an option Subscriptions which you need to select.

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Now what actually appears here depends on what licenses you have in the Office 365 tenant but at first glance of the above screen shot the location to enter your partner of record is not very obvious.

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You need to select the More Actions pull down in the bottom right as shown above. When you do this a menu will appear.

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In this menu option you will find the option Add partner of record.

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Selecting this will slide an options screen from the right hand side of the page as shown above.

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You can then enter you Microsoft Partner ID in that field and select the Check ID button.

if you have completed all the partner pre-requisites you should see that your organisation has been located and is displayed in all green indicating everything is good.

You now need to go to the bottom of this slide and Save the changes and apply that partner to this tenant.

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When you do that, administrators in the tenant will be sent a confirmation email like that shown above indicating that a new partner of record has been set.

Remember, what you see in the subscriptions area may vary depending on what licenses have been added to the tenant. Some licenses should already have your partner of record set but it is worthwhile double checking that each license for the tenant is set appropriately to ensure you receive credit for managing that tenant. Details from tenants about partner of record is reported back to Microsoft and feeds into things such as the Microsoft partner competencies.

It is therefore important, as a partner, you ensure you receive full recognition for your involvement with the tenant and why you should always ensure your partner of record is appropriately set. Hopefully, this article has made that a bit easier.