Leslie Anjan's blog

I have heard from almost all customers during the initial discovery stage of the Intranet project highlighting their current Information Architecture issues. You would have heard these words – “Un Manageable, Grown exponentially, inconsistent, unusable”. Working for Prometix as consultant delivery IA in SharePoint and other Office 365 application, here are few pointers to consider & think about.  Having a solid information architecture (IA) is an important prerequisite for realizing a well-maintained and well-performing intranet. Good IA helps people find what they need and accomplish the tasks they want to complete – in a way that makes sense to them. A great IA helps improve user adoption, satisfaction, and productivity, reduce IT cost, reduce information overload, and minimize governance compliance and bad information risk. Great IA takes good planning. It requires knowledge of the domain or content, understanding of the customer inner workings, understanding the user an...

Azure Data Lake Storage Gen2 takes core capabilities from Azure Data Lake Storage Gen1 such as a Hadoop compatible file system, Azure Active Directory and POSIX based ACLs and integrates them into Azure Blob Storage. This combination enables best in class analytics performance along with Blob Storage’s tiering and data lifecycle management capabilities and the fundamental availability, security and durability capabilities of Azure Storage. The simplest way to enable Hadoop applications to work with cloud storage is to build a Hadoop File System driver which runs client-side within the Hadoop applications. This driver emulates a file system, converting Hadoop file system operations into operations on the backend of the respective platforms. This is often inefficient, and correctness is hard to implement/achieve. For instance, when implemented on an object store a request by a Hadoop client to rename a folder (a common operation in Hadoop jobs) can result in many REST requests. This is...

Recent times, things have changed for good. Working from home has become the norm. Microsoft have announced some major new features coming to Microsoft Teams, focused on improving the virtual interactions that continue to be a defining aspect of many of our lives during the ongoing global COVID-19 response. These new features have been directly guided by research that Microsoft has undertaken with experts in virtual reality, AI and productivity, and are intended to provide a more natural and engaging online meeting experience. Here are some of the features identified. Together mode The most significant change comes with the introduction of ‘Together mode’ – an entirely new meeting experience which uses AI to display all meeting participants on a shared virtual background, as though you’re sitting in the same room with everyone else. The ability to see everyone’s faces, read body language and easily see who’s talking in a more realistic setting is set to make all kinds of meetin...

Microsoft recently announced a new service called Dataflex. In short, it is a data platform for low-code apps that can be built right within Microsoft Teams. This is a brand new commercial offering and it comes bundled with every subscription of Office 365 / Microsoft 365 that includes the right to use Teams. Microsoft Dataflex delivers a built-in, low-code data platform for Teams, and provides relational data storage, rich data types, enterprise grade governance, and one-click solution deployment. Microsoft Dataflex enables everyone to easily build and deploy apps and intelligent chatbots in Teams with Microsoft Power Apps and Microsoft Power Virtual Agents.  Extension of DataFlex Pro. So what is Dataflex Pro? At the same time, Dataflex Pro became the new name for what used to be called Common Data Service (CDS). For those who are more familiar with Power Platform technology, you’ll know that CDS has served as the foundation for building your custom Power Apps as w...

Microsoft Teams crossed the 75 million DAU mark by the end of Q1, Microsoft Teams May 2020 update saw new apps were planned and launched. One of the new kid is Microsoft Lists. Microsoft Lists began roll out to Targeted Release (TR) customers in Microsoft 365, planned TR completion by end of August 2020 where we'll then begin broader production roll out.   If you didn’t know, Microsoft Lists is a Microsoft 365 app that helps you track information and organise your work. Lists are simple, smart, and flexible, so you can stay on top of what matters most to your team. Track issues, assets, routines, contacts, inventory and more using customizable views and smart rules and alerts to keep everyone in sync. With ready-made templates, you can quickly start lists online, on our new mobile app, and directly from within Microsoft Teams. And because it is part of Microsoft 365, you can rely on enterprise-grade security and compliance. Here are the key features: A web and mobile app –...

Microsoft recently announced Microsoft Dataflex for Teams and renaming of the Common Data Service to Microsoft Dataflex Pro. Microsoft Dataflex for Teams delivers a built-in, low-code data platform for Teams and enables everyone to easily build and deploy apps and intelligent chatbots in Teams with Microsoft Power Apps and Microsoft Power Virtual Agents. Data Types Dataflex for Teams supports relational data and includes capabilities to find, filter, and sort that data. It includes support for basic data types, as well as complex data types like images and files. Dataflex for Teams also includes a version of the currency data type found in Dataflex Pro as well as other popular capabilities such as the ability to do roll up and calculated fields. In Dataflex for Teams, the new editable grid will help you quickly create and populate new tables with your data. The included User table is based on the Common Data Model (CDM) and additional support for Common Data Model (CDM) based t...

Microsoft revealed “Lists,” the newest app for the Microsoft 355 subscription service. Not to be confused with Microsoft To Do, the new experience is quite different and is designed to help you track the information centered around your work. It is set for release later this summer, but here’s a look at what the app means for you, and how it will work. What is Lists? Different from Microsoft To Do, Lists is an experience that is designed to plug in with your work life. For those familiar, it also essentially superpowers the lists feature found in SharePoint online into a newer experience. Some use cases for Lists include tracking company assets like laptops, tracking contacts, inventory like office supplies, or even a daily routine. Lists will have its own website accessed via the Microsoft 365 app launcher, but they’re also will be a separate mobile app launching later this year. As with most Microsoft 365 apps, there will even be an integration with Microsoft Team...