Information Technology Navigator

Pure Storage Portworx has established itself as the gold standard for cloud-native Kubernetes data storage, offering scalable persistent storage, multi-cloud data mobility and zero RPO data protection and disaster recovery. At Daymark, we have been impressed with Portworx and view it as being in a class of its own when compared to other suppliers of storage for Kubernetes-orchestrated container apps. Once you transition from development to production with Kubernetes, persistent storage and enterprise data services become critical components of your Kubernetes environment.

A recent report by research house GigaOm concurs, recognizing Portworx as an “Outperformer” — the only product with that designation in the report. The GigaOm Radar for Kubernetes Data Storage Report reviewed nine vendors in the Kubernetes data storage space, down from twenty-two vendors in 2021.

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Companies performing work in the Defense Industrial Base (DIB) often contemplate whether they should use a cloud service provider for their business, then wonder which version of the cloud service they should consider. The rules and regulations passed down to the DIB from the Federal Government are quite confusing when it comes to trying to figure out what their requirements are. In this article, we will try to clear some of that up!

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Microsoft has recently issued some retirement notices that impact VM default internet access on Azure and Basic Public SKUs. While there is runway on both of these notices, Microsoft recommends planning all new deployments with these changes in mind. We at Daymark agree. Here’s a quick summary of the announcements:

Default Internet Access Retirement

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HashiCorp recently held their annual conference, HashiConf 2023, in San Francisco (and virtually) to unveil some exciting enhancements to their suite of multi-cloud infrastructure automation software. Key themes revolved around infrastructure and security with an emphasis on how to use the cloud operating model to achieve operational cloud maturity and improve the developer experience while enabling platform teams to put controls in place to manage risk and cost.

 

Here are some of the important enhancements to their products that we think will benefit Daymark customers (with links to additional information at the end of this blog):

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Microsoft’s Azure Virtual Machine (Classic) is approaching its full retirement date of September 1, 2023. "Classic" in IaaS VMs refers to VMs managed by Azure Service Manager (ASM). While ASM has full IaaS capabilities and many enhancements over the years, the management of IaaS VMs through Azure Service Manager was deprecated by Microsoft in February 2020. ASM is the old control plane of Azure, responsible for creating, managing, and deleting VMs as well as performing other control plane operations. It’s estimated that 10% of IaaS VMs are still using Azure ASM. Those organizations need to start planning their migration today, given that full retirement is less than three months away.

Impact of this Retirement Notice

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The popularity and wide adoption of Microsoft Azure public cloud has transformed the way millions of businesses operate. It provides a wide range of services where customers can choose to develop and scale applications in a “pay for what you use” model. Getting the most out of Azure in a cost-effective way requires technical acumen, attention to detail and strong organizational skills.

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Azure Sentinel is a cloud native Security Information Event Management (SIEM) and Security Orchestration, Automation and Response (SOAR) solution from Microsoft. It was the topic of discussion at one of our recent Daymark Cloud Clinics where our technical cloud consultants offer complimentary technical training and tips on a wide range of Azure and Office 365 features.

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Impossible travel. Is it sending a human to Saturn or Venus? Well maybe, but in the context of Microsoft Office 365, Impossible Travel is a security feature that is a great indicator of potential hacking attempts. The concept is straightforward. If you login to Office 365 from your office in Boston and then 20 minutes later you try to login from Dallas, or you login from home in Chicago and five hours later from Beijing, Office 365 basically says “wait a minute, that’s impossible” and it denies login from Dallas and immediately sends an IT security alert. Get tips to optimize Impossible Travel here.

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Microsoft recently held its annual Ignite Conference where they announced over 100 updates to its suite of cloud services and products. Daymark was on the ground at the Convention Center in Seattle to explore the innovations and engage with Microsoft on the latest changes. 100 updates is a lot to digest! Here are our thoughts on 5 important ones worth paying attention to.

 

1. Microsoft Teams Premium

What is it?

Microsoft Teams Premium is an add-on scheduled for release in December of this year, and will provide exciting new features around security, artificial intelligence, and personalization

 

Why is it important?

The AI will provide intelligent meeting summaries and will automatically assign tasks based on its review/recap of the meeting. In addition, it will provide personalized insights in meeting recordings that will call out important moments in the meeting, such as when a user’s name was mentioned, a screen was shared and when people have joined or left.

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The Cybersecurity Maturity Model Certification (CMMC) Framework is used by the DoD to verify that sensitive data being handled by defense industrial base (DIB) contractors is properly protected on the contractors’ systems to avoid risk of a compromise from a cybersecurity attack. CMMC uses third-party assessment organizations to verify contractors’ safeguarding of controlled unclassified information (CUI) including International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) data, federal contract information (FCI), and compliance with certain mandatory practices, procedures and capabilities that can adapt to evolving cyber threats.

What’s New in CMMC 2.0

In November 2021, the DoD announced CMMC 2.0. It’s important to understand key changes and timelines associated with CMMC 2.0, how it compares to CMMC 1.0, and what you need to do to prepare. 

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