Inspire Opening Keynote

I watched the Inspire keynote yesterday. It started with  @MelissaArnot (the first American woman to summit Everest without supplemental oxygen) talking about following her dreams with determination and collaboration. Dreams are a global language. Her introductory speech was so inspiring, encouraging you to never give up and to press on amidst adversity, to reach your goal.

Microsoft talked about the Intelligent cloud and intelligent edge. Technological changes are no longer bound to a single device. There is a profound shift to include AI in every application that is built. Data has gravity. It is about managing complexity on a new efficient frontier.

The new changes will be more profound that virtualisation. The new pillars for enabling digital transformation are: the modern workplace, business applications, applications & infrastructure and data & AI. It is about democratisation and making use of data and service, which are now digital. It is important to incorporate the customers needs in the solutions that we create.

Microsoft introduced a new intelligent solution, Microsoft 365. The modern workplace is shaping culture and it is necessary to empower people, to help share and transform, in disparate teams. It needs to be one simple framework or integrated system.

There were various other announcements but it is Data & AI changing model, that excites me.  Serverless and Microservices will be a revolutionary change but it is the fact that AI will be built into all services, that will define the next era.   Incorporating database richness, connecting into one digital data estate is the future, although it is not just about big data and analytics. It is about now trying to create value with small data.

Without data there is no AI. Data is the foundation.

It is not possible to succeed alone, so choosing your Partners is crucial. 

The Conference Year

Conferences add significant business value: from gaining knowledge, to problem solving, to learning about what the future has to offer and networking. Networking is a key enabler.  The question is always which conferences to attend and which keynotes to watch. The ones you attend can drive your future career path. So it is an important choice, particularly when there is so much choice. The choice could be about technologies and industries that you think will define the next decade and beyond or to help you with your present day tasks. I like to attend conferences for both reasons and the community. They enable you to "image" and "innovate".

I help at two community run conferences. These two conferences continue to inspire me, enable me to be better and to be a part of the community.

Microsoft Faculty Summit 2017: The Edge of AI

Research is at the forefront of innovation and drives the future. Blue-sky thinking is critical for new ideas to become reality. The 18th Annual Microsoft Research Faculty Summit is on July 17-18, 2017 and looks to have an interesting agenda. The theme is "The Edge of AI". It will reflect on the current state of AI and will discuss the research, the tools, the services, and the community engagement that the research community need to invest in to help accelerate innovation and democratize AI, in order to solve the world’s most pressing challenges. Microsoft will highlight some of the key challenges posed by artificial intelligence, and will identify the next generation of approaches, techniques, and tools that will be needed to develop AI to solve the world’s most pressing challenges.

It will be streamed live 8:30 AM Pacific Time (UTC-7)

Database Now! Online Webinars

Database Now Online is on 19th July 2017 between 8:00 am and 2:30 pm (Pacific Time). This free online event is a full day of live webinar sessions presented by industry experts, each designed to teach Architects, Modellers, Database Administrators, and IT Managers about the latest in enterprise solutions for data storage, data access, scaling out, and cloud based solutions. There looks like a raft of very interesting sessions to watch.

You can register now. 

Journey to the cloud

I have been reading a very interesting free ebook Enterprise Cloud Strategy by Barry Briggs and Eduardo Kassner. 

There are various types of modernisation discussed. 

It is based on Based on “Gartner Identifies Five Ways to Migrate Applications to the Cloud”, Gartner Inc., 2011. 

The overview of cloud migration principles discussed are summarised:

There is new a model that truly adopts cloud taking into account SaaS, PaaS and IaaS. This new architecture principle means considering the best placement of workloads, always looking at SaaS first.

This new way of thinking follows this placement decision tree which helps you make the correct decision on whether to use SaaS, PaaS, IaaS or private cloud.

On the data side, the paper talks about dividing your data into several categories related to risk. This is really about creating your own business data DNA. 'Data analytics' and 'BI and analytics'  cloud architectural blueprints are shared.

An interesting change for roles is the evolution of roles for the cloud. Microsoft suggest the data roles of Data Scientist and Information Architect emerge from the DBA and Statistician.