In June this year, I wrote a brief update on what I’ve been up to lately. Weeks fly by so fast, I realized it’s time to provide another brief update after almost 6 months has passed. Hello from Haarlem I’m attending the Office 365 & SharePoint 2019 Connect even in beautiful Haarlem, The Netherlands. I think this is the 9th year for this event, and sadly also the last time it’s being held. It’s bittersweet… Read More »What’s up?
I currently own three mice – a Microsoft Arc mouse, and two MX Master 2S from Logitech. I carry the Microsoft one with me, as it’s lightweight and folds neatly to consume space, and the Logitech ones I use at home. These are all excellent devices, yet I wish I could use them less. I love using a keyboard when I’m working. It’s so efficient, and I don’t need to switch my thoughts or move… Read More »Top 10 Windows 10 shortcuts you didn’t know existed
TechDays Finland 2020 will be held in Helsinki next year, March 5 to 6 (Thu-Fri). The Call for Speakers just opened about 45 minutes ago, and you can submit your session proposals here. We’re using Sessionize, so if you already have existing sessions listed, it’s very easy to submit them. But perhaps take a few minutes to update your submission details, if you haven’t done that recently. We are expecting about 1000 attendees, and through… Read More »TechDays Finland 2020 Call for Speakers is open – and you need to submit today!
I’m an avid fan of challenges, especially those that are just hard enough but where I can still prepare to have enough confidence for accomplishing my goals. Certification exams are among my favorite types of challenges – they are challenging, fairly easy to prepare for but hard to master and pass. In 2019 I’ve completed four certification exams. This year it’s been a lot of upgrades and transition exams on Azure and Microsoft 365. Last… Read More »How I prepare and (often) succeed with technical Microsoft certification exams
We had our fourth annual SharePoint Saturday Helsinki event this past Saturday. Weather was great, and overall the event was a huge success! If you’re not familiar with the concept, it’s a global event where different cities organize a free event on a Saturday of their choosing, with often tens of breakout sessions and networking opportunities. You can read more about the SharePoint Saturday concept here, and also see the upcoming events around the world.… Read More »Passing the torch: New leadership for SharePoint Saturday Helsinki
I wrote about my experiences and challenges when building a secure remote access solution for Azure-based virtual machines back in February 2019. It’s one of my more popular posts in this blog, and I guess it’s helpful for many because it travels through the options and provides justification for the choices. As that’s often one of the challenges when working with Azure and architectures – there is plenty of choices, and it might be burdensome… Read More »Building a secure remote access solution using Azure Bastion Host
Today, Microsoft announced that Azure Sentinel is now Generally Available (GA). What this means, is that Azure Sentinel can be used in production, the pricing has been revealed and it’s stable for enterprise-grade usage. In this post, I’ll have a look at what Azure Sentinel is, how to get started and what to keep an eye for in the future. What is Azure Sentinel? Azure Sentinel is Microsoft’s vision of a cloud-based SIEM – which… Read More »Understanding and getting started with Azure Sentinel
I love gadgets, and I love reading, too. It’s a nice combination, as there’s always a new shiny gadget that one just has to buy – for reading, of course. I currently own an Amazon Kindle Oasis (2018) device, a rather old iPad (that the kids are using for YouTube), and a Surface Go. I do have a few work laptops, and a beefy workstation that I do most of my work on. This got… Read More »Choosing a suitable device for reading articles, docs, and ebooks
It’s not a secret by now, that I love writing. Yesterday I wrote 15 pages for my upcoming book on Microsoft Azure – it will be a sequel volume to the one that was published in May by ShareGate: (You can get a free digital copy here) I’ve written more actively this year – about 50 blog posts for my own blog, and plenty of other pieces online. The more I write, the easier it… Read More »Insights: How I write and what I’ve learned on writing this year
It’s exactly 3877 days since I founded my company. That’s about 25% of my life. I had just resigned from Microsoft, after moving back to Helsinki from Dublin. This wasn’t a solo journey, as I had my brother to start and bootstrap the company with me. We named the company Onsight Helsinki, as I’ve been a keen rock climber for almost two decades so it only made sense at the time. We focused on delivering… Read More »Announcing my departure from the company I helped found and build