The API playground is a pre-authenticated software testing tool which is part of the Dataverse Accelerator App. API playground allows you to quickly interact with the Microsoft Dataverse Web API - check out Explore and test Dataverse in the Web API playground (Preview)
I recently finished reading Beyond diversification from Sebastien Page. Sebastien Page (Chief Investment Officer at T. Rowe Price) explains in Beyond diversification the different approaches to forecasting returns, risks and correlations across asset classes by combining academic research and practical hands-on examples.
This book is most likely targeted at the sophisticated investor and should not be the first book to pick up if you want to understand diversification but it provides great insights on how asset managers think about their portfolios.
The book also extensively refers to a number of academic papers that Sebastien Page has written on asset allocation, risk measurement and return forecasting. It explores a number of dynamic asset allocation strategies, acknowledging that risk is time-varying and requires adaptive approaches. Sebastien Page also explains why the typical fixed weight asset allocation (60-40 portfolio) does not deliver a constant risk exposure.
2024 Release Wave 2
Release plans for 2024 release wave 2 are now publicly available - Release plans for Dynamics 365, Power Platform, and Cloud for Industry - Dynamics 365 | Microsoft Learn - from July 29th, early access will be available for activation - other key dates for 2024 release wave 2 are also available . Also check out the videos like Dynamics 365 Service 2024 Release Wave 2 or Dynamics 365 and Power Platform 2024 Release Wave 2 - these might also contain features/functionality which are not listed in the release plans.
Copilots, AI and machine learning
The Get-AzSubscription PowerShell cmdlet gets the subscription ID, subscription name and home tenant for subscriptions that the current account can access. You can also pass this values in as a parameter e.g. "Get-AzSubscription -SubscriptionId" to find the name of a subscription.
The easiest way to execute this cmdlet (without having to install anything on your machine) is by using Azure Cloud Shell. A handy feature of Azure Cloud Shell is predictive intellisense - use the RightArrow key to accept an inline suggestion.
If you are not familiar with Agile or DevOps, I highly recommend the books below:
This is a long overdue feature which allows Dataverse plug-ins to connect to Azure resources (e.g. Azure Key Vault) using managed identities, eliminating the need for credential management and enhancing security. It currently is available in public preview but GA is expected for November 2024
You will need to create a managed identity record in Dataverse and link it ot your specific plugin assembly - for more details take a look at Set up managed identity for Power Platform (Preview) and Power Platform managed identity overview (Preview) for more details.
In your plugin, you will need to the implement the IManagedIdentityService interface which allows your plugins to interact with managed identities. Using this interface, your plugin can request an access token for a specific Azure resource. I asked Copilot to generate the code for this below but did not check it yet ...
References:
As outlined in Large AsyncOperationBase increase in Dataverse/Dynamics 365 CE: the canary in the coalmine - an increase in the amount of storage consumed by system jobs (visible in the Power Platform Admin Center storage capacity report) is a tell-tale for a Dataverse or Dynamics CRM environment which has some hidden problems.
The AsyncOperationBase table keeps a record of all asynchronous jobs (Async plugins, async workflows, internal Microsoft jobs, etc ...) which are running in the background processing data in your environment. If you have a lot of failed or cancelled jobs, there might be an issue with plugins or workflows. If you see a lot of awaiting resources jobs, there might be a big data load happening on your environment (or maybe an infinite loop).
During a periodic review of the System jobs health status, we noticed that there were a lot more jobs in status "Waiting for resources" then we were used too (More than 200.000). We raised a Microsoft support ticket for this and we got an update on this (redacted version below):
"Microsoft is rolling out a new way of how audit logs are being written in station 4 (EMEA) in a deferred manner. Entities representing these deferred operations are created in the AsyncOperationBase table.
These operations, while rolled up in the AsyncOperationBase table, execute outside of the Async Service and are not meant to be interpreted as additional backlog that the Async Service needs to process. These operations have no negative impact on System Job throughput. When the Audit operation has been fully processed outside of the Async Service, these operations will be removed from the AsyncOperationBase table. Event Expander Operation jobs are used as part of this new audit functionality, these are important jobs to ensure auditing is not lost.
These jobs are however processed by a separate service, so they do not affect async throughput, etc. in any way. Seeing a lot of these jobs (operation type 92 - event expander operation) is not an issue, as these are constantly churning in order to write audit history. If you have custom reporting in place to monitor system jobs - you should exclude AsyncOperationType 92"
A couple of weeks ago, I uncovered an old Raspberry Pi 2 in a drawer and I wanted to try to upgrade the OS to a more recent version. The Raspberry PI still had Debian 8 (Jessie) installed. After a number of failed attempts I just gave up and did a fresh install with Debian 11 (Bullseye)
PS To check the installed Raspberry PI OS version type "cat /etc/os-release" in the command prompt or "hostnamectl"
"The most powerful person in the world is the storyteller - Steve Jobs"
I recently read the Harvard Business Review article : your strategy needs a story and the central idea resonated with me: "storytelling is crucial for business leaders because it effectively bridges the gap between strategy and action, making complex strategies engaging, memorable, and motivating for implementation1". Steve Job's quote also aligns with this view on the importance of storytelling in business and marketing
Story telling transforms the complexity of numbers and logic behind a business strategy into simplicity and action. (Narrative and numbers: the values of stories by Aswath Damodaran is a great book on this same topic, but with a different take on it)
93% of a company's employees do not understand its strategy and storytelling can be a solution to make sure that employees understand and implement the strategy and customers understand your value proposition.
PS Although the quote "The most powerful person in the world is the storyteller" is often attributed to Steve Jobs, there's no definitive evidence that he actually said it.
