That's kind of neat

Tuesday, September 8, 2026

Learn MS Graph with Graph Explorer

With MS Graph Explorer, you can both test/play and actually use the Graph API. Often easier than powershell for the occasional Graph need.

https://developer.microsoft.com/en-us/graph/graph-explorer

Sunday, April 12, 2026

Open Source NTP clients: Meinberg and Nettime

Meinberg NTP client. https://www.meinbergglobal.com/english/sw/ntp.htm

Nettime. https://timesynctool.com/

Both are Windows GUI, open-source apps for synchronizing time.

Monday, March 30, 2026

Use the Microsoft Learn Platform to imrpove our Azure, Defender, etc. skills

From Reddit

One of the biggest frustrations when I was trying to get hands-on with Microsoft's stack was that you simply can't practice the actual tools without paying. Azure costs are absurd, Sentinel and Defender XDR licenses aren't cheap, and free tiers don't give you the real environment.

I work in a SOC using both daily, and recently I became a Microsoft Student Ambassador. When I joined I found out about Applied Skills a section of their Learn platform that gives you a real Azure environment, hands you a scenario, and evaluates what you actually configured. No multiple choice, no memorization tricks, no way to fake it.

I did the Defender XDR one. Even with daily production experience, I ran into things I hadn't set up before. Worth the few hours. There are labs for Azure Monitor, Sentinel, Defender XDR, secure storage, Azure networking, GitHub Actions pipelines and a lot more I haven't gotten to yet. You get a badge on completion good for LinkedIn if you're into that kind of thing.

Catalog of labs is here (Azure, security, networking, data):

learn.microsoft.com/credentials/applied-skills/?wt.mc_id=studentamb_506171