Tag Archives: microsoft
Copilot a let down
Microsoft’s attempt at integrating Copilot into its Office suite has been nothing short of a letdown. What was touted as the next big thing in productivity tools has turned out to be a frustrating experience for many users. The promise was grand—Copilot was supposed to revolutionize how we work in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and more, but the reality has been far from it.
Let’s start with the basics. Copilot struggles to execute even the simplest of prompts. Whether you’re trying to format a document in Word, generate data insights in Excel, or create a presentation in PowerPoint, Copilot often fails to deliver. It’s supposed to be an AI-powered assistant, yet it feels more like a sluggish tool that barely gets the job done. For something that’s supposed to save time and enhance productivity, Copilot ends up wasting more time as users grapple with its limitations.
In contrast, tools like ChatGPT are light years ahead. When you ask ChatGPT to help with a task, it understands context, executes commands efficiently, and delivers accurate results. Whether it’s generating text, helping with coding, or providing insights, ChatGPT has proven itself as a reliable assistant that can handle a wide array of tasks.
But Copilot? It can’t even handle a basic document format without hiccups. It’s as if Microsoft has launched a half-baked product, expecting users to tolerate its shortcomings while they work out the kinks. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a tech giant overpromise and underdeliver, but it’s particularly disappointing coming from Microsoft, a company that has the resources and expertise to do better.
The worst part? Users are paying for this. Copilot isn’t a free add-on—it’s a feature that’s supposed to justify its cost with enhanced productivity. But when it can’t even perform fundamental tasks correctly, it feels more like a waste of money.
Microsoft, if you’re listening, it’s time to get your act together. Copilot needs significant improvements if it’s going to compete in the AI assistant space. Right now, it’s not even in the same league as ChatGPT. Users deserve better for the investment they’ve made.
What are your thoughts? Has anyone had a different experience, or do you agree that Copilot has been a massive disappointment? Let’s discuss.
Microsoft’s attempt at integrating Copilot into its Office suite has been nothing short of a letdown. What was touted as the next big thing in productivity tools has turned out to be a frustrating experience for many users. The promise was grand—Copilot was supposed to revolutionize how we work in Word, Excel, PowerPoint, and more, but the reality has been far from it.Let’s start with the basics. Copilot struggles to execute even the simplest of prompts. Whether you’re trying to format a document in Word, generate data insights in Excel, or create a presentation in PowerPoint, Copilot often fails to deliver. It’s supposed to be an AI-powered assistant, yet it feels more like a sluggish tool that barely gets the job done. For something that’s supposed to save time and enhance productivity, Copilot ends up wasting more time as users grapple with its limitations.In contrast, tools like ChatGPT are light years ahead. When you ask ChatGPT to help with a task, it understands context, executes commands efficiently, and delivers accurate results. Whether it’s generating text, helping with coding, or providing insights, ChatGPT has proven itself as a reliable assistant that can handle a wide array of tasks.But Copilot? It can’t even handle a basic document format without hiccups. It’s as if Microsoft has launched a half-baked product, expecting users to tolerate its shortcomings while they work out the kinks. This isn’t the first time we’ve seen a tech giant overpromise and underdeliver, but it’s particularly disappointing coming from Microsoft, a company that has the resources and expertise to do better.The worst part? Users are paying for this. Copilot isn’t a free add-on—it’s a feature that’s supposed to justify its cost with enhanced productivity. But when it can’t even perform fundamental tasks correctly, it feels more like a waste of money.Microsoft, if you’re listening, it’s time to get your act together. Copilot needs significant improvements if it’s going to compete in the AI assistant space. Right now, it’s not even in the same league as ChatGPT. Users deserve better for the investment they’ve made.What are your thoughts? Has anyone had a different experience, or do you agree that Copilot has been a massive disappointment? Let’s discuss. Read More
Gatekeeper: Enforcing security policy on your Kubernetes clusters
Microsoft Defender for Containers secures Kubernetes clusters deployed in Azure, AWS, GCP, or on-premises using sensor data, audit logs and security events, control plane configuration information, and Azure Policy enforcement. In this blog, we’ll take a look at Azure Policy for Kubernetes and explore the Gatekeeper engine that is responsible for policy enforcement on the cluster.
Each Kubernetes environment is architected differently, but Azure Policy is enforced the same way across Azure Kubernetes Service (AKS), Amazon Elastic Kubernetes Service (EKS) in AWS, Google Kubernetes Engine (GKE) in GCP, and on-premises or IaaS. Defender for Containers uses an open-source framework called Gatekeeper to deploy safeguards and enforcements at scale. We’ll get into what Gatekeeper is in a moment, but first, let’s orient ourselves with a simplified reference architecture for AKS.
Every Kubernetes environment has two main components, the control plane which provides the core Kubernetes services for orchestration and the nodes which house the infrastructure that runs the applications themselves. In Azure managed clusters, the control plane includes the following components:
An API server named kube-apiserver which exposes the Kubernetes API and acts as the front end for the control plane
A scheduler named kube-scheduler which assigns newly created pods to available nodes based on scheduling criteria such as resource requirements, affinity and anti-affinity, and so on
A controller manager named kube-controller-manager which responds to node health events and other tasks
A key-value store named etcd which backs all cluster data
A cloud controller manager, logically named cloud-controller-manager, that links the cluster into Azure (this is the primary difference between Kubernetes on-premises and any cloud-managed Kubernetes)
We look to the API server when we need to enforce and validate a policy. For example, let’s say we want to set limits on container CPU and memory usage. This is a good idea to protect against resource exhaustion attacks, and it’s a generally good practice to set resource limits on cloud compute anyways. This configuration comes from the container spec – lines 53-54 in this example YAML template:
In this case, I didn’t specify any limit on CPU or memory usage for this container. Defender for Cloud will flag this as a recommendation that we can delegate, remediate, automate via a Logic App, or deny outright:
It’s not hard to imagine how Defender for Cloud can identify affected containers – it’s simply looking for quota values populated in the container spec. But Defender for Cloud is also giving us the option to enforce this recommendation by denying the deployment of any container with no specified resource limit. How does this work? To answer this, we need to dive into Gatekeeper.
Defender for Containers enforces Azure Policy through an add-on called Azure Policy for Kubernetes. This is deployed as an Arc-enabled Kubernetes extension in AWS, GCP, and on-premises environments and as a native AKS add-on in Azure. The add-on is powered by a Gatekeeper pod deployed into a single node in the cluster.
Gatekeeper is a widely deployed solution that allows us to decouple policy decisions from the Kubernetes API server. Our built-in and custom benchmark policies are translated into “CustomResourceDefinition” (CRD) policies that are executed by Gatekeeper’s policy engine. Kubernetes includes admission controllers that can view and/or modify authenticated, authorized requests to create, modify, and delete objects in the Kubernetes environment. There are dozens of admission controllers in the Kubernetes API server, but there are two that we specifically rely on for Gatekeeper enforcement. First, the MutatingAdmissionWebhook is a controller that calls mutating webhooks – in serial, one after another – to read and modify the pending request. Second, the ValidatingAdmissionWebhook controller goes into action during the final validation phase of the operation and calls validating webhooks in parallel to inspect the request. A validating webhook can reject the request which will deny creation, modification, or deletion of the resource. Because the validating controller is invoked after all object modifications are complete, we use validating admission webhooks to guarantee that we are inspecting the final state of an object.
Gatekeeper has several components called “operations” that can be deployed into one monolithic pod or as multiple individual pods in a service-oriented architecture. The Azure Policy add-on deploys Gatekeeper’s operations individually in three pods:
The audit process, which evaluates and reports policy violations on existing resources (this should always be run as a singleton pod to avoid contentions and prevent overburdening the API server)
The validating webhook, and
The mutating webhook.
You can see these pods in your cluster by filtering on the ‘gatekeeper.sh/system’ label:
Here we can see one gatekeeper-audit pod and two gatekeeper-controller pods. Note that the two webhook pods are not distinguished by function – we’ll encounter this later on when we view logs from the mutating admission controller. Running these operations in different pods allows for horizontal scaling on the webhooks and enables operational resilience among the three components.
In our earlier example, we wanted to deny the creation of any container that doesn’t have CPU and/or memory usage limits defined in its container spec. Defender for Containers will use Gatekeeper’s validating admission webhook to reject any misconfigured requests at the API server. But what if we wanted to take some other action – for instance, if we were rolling out a new policy and wanted to audit compliance rather than directly move into enforcement? Or what if we want to exempt certain namespaces or labels from a policy rule? For this, we will need to explore parameters and effects.
First, let’s find our policy definition in the Azure portal by navigating to Microsoft Defender for Cloud > Environment settings and opening the Security Policies in the settings for our Azure subscription. Our built-in policy definitions come from the default Microsoft Cloud Security Benchmark which contains 240 recommendations covering all Defender for Cloud workload protections. Filtering on a keyword will surface our policy definition:
Click the ellipses at the right of the definition to view the context menu. Select “Manage effect and parameters” to open a configuration panel with several options:
First, let’s talk about the policy effects. Sorted by their order of evaluation from first to last, we have:
Disabled – this will prevent rule evaluation throughout this subscription.
Deny – this will block creation of a new resource that fails the policy. (Note that it will not remove existing resources that have already been deployed.)
Audit – this will generate an alert but not block resource creation. Audit is evaluated after Deny to prevent double-logging of an undesired resource.
What about the additional parameters? Our policy rule allows us to set rule parameters such as the maximum allowed memory and CPU values, as well as exclude namespaces from monitoring, select labels for monitoring, and exclude images from all container policy inspection. This configuration block is critical for managing exemptions such as containers that should be allowed to run as root or similar scenarios. Several Kubernetes namespaces are excluded by default: kube-system, gatekeeper-system, azure-arc, and others are commonly excluded from these policy definitions.
If we inspect the policy itself, we will see its execution logic. Of particular interest is the “templateInfo” section in lines 178-181:
This invokes the URI for the CustomResourceDefinition (CRD), a YAML file that describes the schema of the constraint and specifies the actual constraint logic in the Rego declarative language. In our example, the CRD is located at
You might have noticed that our Azure policy effects of “audit” and “deny” map directly to the validating admission webhook, which can check resource create/modify/delete requests against our policy configuration. What about the other Gatekeeper component, the mutating admission webhook? Instead of simply rejecting creation of a container that is missing a resource usage quota, we could dynamically edit the API request to set our own limit and allow the container to spawn. Let’s check out another built-in Azure policy definition to see this one in action.
First, let’s take a look at the policy reference list from the AKS documentation. Search or scroll down to find a policy named “[Preview]: Sets Kubernetes cluster containers CPU limits to default values in case not present.” The documentation includes links to the Azure portal (login required) and the JSON source code for the definition in the Azure-Policy GitHub, currently at version 1.2.0-preview as of the date of this blog post. Let’s click into the Azure portal where we can view the policy definition and assign it to our Kubernetes cluster. Notice our available effects – instead of “Audit” and “Deny”, we now have “Mutate”:
The linked CRD (line 64) is a short one, assigning a limit of “500m” if not present:
(Direct link: https://store.policy.core.windows.net/kubernetes/mutate-resource-cpu-limits/v1/mutation.yaml)
We can assign the policy to the tenant, subscription, or resource group(s) in our environment, set exclusions, and optionally configure resource selectors and overrides to customize the rollout of this policy. Once deployed, we will need to wait for up to 15 minutes for the Azure Policy add-on to pull changes to policy assignments. Once the new assignment is updated, the add-on will add the appropriate constraint template and constraints to the policy engine. On the same fifteen-minute timer, the add-on will execute a full scan of the cluster using the Audit operation.
Let’s connect to our Kubernetes cluster and run some commands to validate our new mutate-effect policy. First, we’ll need to set up kubeconfig by setting subscription context and saving credentials for our cluster. Follow the instructions in the documentation and check by running ‘kubectl cluster-info’ to validate that the shell is connected correctly:
View constraint templates downloaded by the Azure Policy add-on using ‘kubectl get assign’:
Now let’s spawn a container that will violate this policy to view the mutation in action. You can use any YAML template or the single-image application wizard in the Azure console. If you use the wizard, be sure to zero out the default limits in Application Details.
Since we’re using a mutation effect, the mutating admission webhook in Gatekeeper should insert default values for CPU and memory when it’s called by the admission controller before passing the object creation request back to the API server. The container should deploy without any interference from a Deny effect policy because the request was modified prior to the validating admission webhook being called. Sure enough, our deployment is successful!
Now let’s check the logs for the gatekeeper pod to view audit and mutation events. Note that the two gatekeeper-controller webhook pods are not differentiated in the console – check both pod names to find the one that is executing mutate actions in your cluster.
We can see the mutate event at the end of the log:
Copied in text form, it reads as follows.
{“level”:”info”,”ts”:1723829551.9305975,”logger”:”mutation”,”msg”:”Mutation applied”,”process”:”mutation”,”Mutation Id”:”a4155642-5417-48c9-a15a-e31040807e66″,”event_type”:”mutation_applied”,”resource_group”:””,”resource_kind”:”Pod”,”resource_api_version”:”v1″,”resource_namespace”:”default-1723829546418″,”resource_name”:”web-dvwa-nolimit-8c9f967d4-“,”resource_source_type”:”Original”,”resource_labels”:{“app”:”web-dvwa-nolimit”,”pod-template-hash”:”8c9f967d4″},”iteration_0″:”Assign//azurepolicy-k8sazurev1resourcelimitscpu-f81c1c050a0fb6b965bc:1″}
We can validate that our new container has a limit applied by inspecting the pod YAML:
There it is – the mutation applied a CPU limit before passing the request back to the API server, and the resource was created successfully!
For more reading on Gatekeeper and Azure Policy for Kubernetes, check out these resources:
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/governance/policy/concepts/policy-for-kubernetes
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/aks/use-azure-policy
https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/aks/policy-reference
https://open-policy-agent.github.io/gatekeeper/website/docs/
https://github.com/open-policy-agent/opa
Microsoft Tech Community – Latest Blogs –Read More
MS Teams Feedback/Requests
1) Add the ability for users to choose how long they would like Teams Banner Notifications to be set for; currently the notification disappears too quickly.
2) Allow users to pin more than 15 contacts in the chat window
3) In the People window, there is currently some type of error where if a contact cannot be found in the favorite tab, but is already added in the “all contacts” tab, MS Teams will not let you update, reconcile, delete, update, etc and the Person cannot be added to the Favorite tab.
4) Allow users to create their own chat categories
1) Add the ability for users to choose how long they would like Teams Banner Notifications to be set for; currently the notification disappears too quickly. 2) Allow users to pin more than 15 contacts in the chat window 3) In the People window, there is currently some type of error where if a contact cannot be found in the favorite tab, but is already added in the “all contacts” tab, MS Teams will not let you update, reconcile, delete, update, etc and the Person cannot be added to the Favorite tab. 4) Allow users to create their own chat categories Read More
Sentinel Data collection rule initial setup
I am trying to setup a Data collection rule (common event format (CEF) via AMA) for getting our firewall logs into sentinel via a syslog server, but I am not sure what facility(ies) to use, is there an article about the setup of this (these) rules? I tried doing searches but have found nothing relevant
I am trying to setup a Data collection rule (common event format (CEF) via AMA) for getting our firewall logs into sentinel via a syslog server, but I am not sure what facility(ies) to use, is there an article about the setup of this (these) rules? I tried doing searches but have found nothing relevant Read More
How to grant permissions on behalf of the organization Script
Hello everyone!
We generated a necessary Script to create the API/APP/Service Principal in Entra ID, and assign some delegated and application permissions.
However, I need to grant permission on behalf of the organization for these permissions, during the Script itself.
I have tried several times, in different ways, but all without success.
Does anyone know how this can be done? If it can be done? And could you help me with this?
Thank you all.
Best regards
Hello everyone! We generated a necessary Script to create the API/APP/Service Principal in Entra ID, and assign some delegated and application permissions. However, I need to grant permission on behalf of the organization for these permissions, during the Script itself. I have tried several times, in different ways, but all without success. Does anyone know how this can be done? If it can be done? And could you help me with this? Thank you all.Best regards Read More
Conditional Formatting with Multiple Cell Values
Hello, I am hoping someone know how to help me set up conditional color coding in excel. I am needing certain cells to populate one color if the others cells are filled out wrong and another color if the cells are filled out right.
Example:
If there is a number in cell E and cell H says F1IL and cell J isn’t blank and cell P is blank all these cells turn red.
But if there is a number in cell E and cell H says (anything but F1IL) and cell J is blank and cell P has a number then all these cells turn green.
My goal is to have errors pop up when someone doesn’t fill out the information correctly, but to also not have anything highlighted if there is no information entered on that line.
Thank you for your help!
Hello, I am hoping someone know how to help me set up conditional color coding in excel. I am needing certain cells to populate one color if the others cells are filled out wrong and another color if the cells are filled out right. Example:If there is a number in cell E and cell H says F1IL and cell J isn’t blank and cell P is blank all these cells turn red.But if there is a number in cell E and cell H says (anything but F1IL) and cell J is blank and cell P has a number then all these cells turn green.My goal is to have errors pop up when someone doesn’t fill out the information correctly, but to also not have anything highlighted if there is no information entered on that line. Thank you for your help! Read More
Discovered but not crawled
Hi
I have problem with bing webmaster. Most of my site URL’s including the root domain having error when I request “URL Inspection”. I have search many times, read different articles including Bing Help forums but didn’t find a possible solution. Please some one help me regarding issues. For further tests I am including my site URL TechSAA . My speed speed is Good as you can check on speed testers.
Here is the image
I am using “Bing Webmaster Url Submission” plugin with API access. I don’t know why Bing webmaster is sending this error. While Google webmaster have no errors and indexing all of my site pages.
I am not a technical person so please help me, if you can recomend any WordPress Plugin to solve my problem.
I am also using Cloudflare (Cloudflare firewall) and Youst (Youst Indexnow).
I am waiting for best help.
Thank you Very much.
HiI have problem with bing webmaster. Most of my site URL’s including the root domain having error when I request “URL Inspection”. I have search many times, read different articles including Bing Help forums but didn’t find a possible solution. Please some one help me regarding issues. For further tests I am including my site URL TechSAA . My speed speed is Good as you can check on speed testers. Here is the image I am using “Bing Webmaster Url Submission” plugin with API access. I don’t know why Bing webmaster is sending this error. While Google webmaster have no errors and indexing all of my site pages. I am not a technical person so please help me, if you can recomend any WordPress Plugin to solve my problem. I am also using Cloudflare (Cloudflare firewall) and Youst (Youst Indexnow). I am waiting for best help. Thank you Very much. Read More
What determine the storage size in sharepoint online admin center
I am working on 2 online tenants, one has 1.85 storage size:-
the other has 1.02 storage size:-
so what determine this storage size and why they are different in 2 tenants?
I am working on 2 online tenants, one has 1.85 storage size:- the other has 1.02 storage size:- so what determine this storage size and why they are different in 2 tenants? Read More
pull data from list
Hi everyone
I’m very much a beginner with excel and I’m in need of some help.
I’m currently using an excel sheet for work that pulls data from various other excel sheets and i wanted to create a bit of a summary sheet, i currently have quite a long list of locations and using x lookup its pulling what item code is in this location and if there’s orders for this today as below:
I’m wanting it to show me all the “Empty” locations and all the “no order for today” locations, i know i can use filter but i want to see both lists side by side and will be adding some more in future too.
I’ve tried using =filter but cant seem to get it to work.
any help will be massively appreciated
Hi everyone I’m very much a beginner with excel and I’m in need of some help. I’m currently using an excel sheet for work that pulls data from various other excel sheets and i wanted to create a bit of a summary sheet, i currently have quite a long list of locations and using x lookup its pulling what item code is in this location and if there’s orders for this today as below:I’m wanting it to show me all the “Empty” locations and all the “no order for today” locations, i know i can use filter but i want to see both lists side by side and will be adding some more in future too. I’ve tried using =filter but cant seem to get it to work. any help will be massively appreciated Read More
Unable to print on macOS 15 beta
Universal Print has stopped working on macOS 15 beta and I’m wondering if anyone else has encountered this or knows of a workaround.
The job enters the print queue but it essentially says “Printer is busy”, even though the printer sleeping, and the progress bar continually swipes back and forth. Trying to use ipptool results in “GETTOKEN” and the function cupsError() returns “Unauthorized”.
I’ve logged in to the UP preference panel, I have permission to print to the printer and it’s shared to the Mac, checked via the portal. I’ve deleted and added the printer via the UP preference pane and the Printers & Scanners panel shows the printer as idle. In all cases, the Mac just won’t communicate to the server to submit the job
None of the troubleshooting steps are relevant nor help, does anyone have an idea of what to try next?
Thanks,
Dave
Universal Print has stopped working on macOS 15 beta and I’m wondering if anyone else has encountered this or knows of a workaround.The job enters the print queue but it essentially says “Printer is busy”, even though the printer sleeping, and the progress bar continually swipes back and forth. Trying to use ipptool results in “GETTOKEN” and the function cupsError() returns “Unauthorized”. I’ve logged in to the UP preference panel, I have permission to print to the printer and it’s shared to the Mac, checked via the portal. I’ve deleted and added the printer via the UP preference pane and the Printers & Scanners panel shows the printer as idle. In all cases, the Mac just won’t communicate to the server to submit the job None of the troubleshooting steps are relevant nor help, does anyone have an idea of what to try next? Thanks,Dave Read More
Does the Storage Size shown inside SharePoint online admin center cover both SharePoint and OneDrive
When we access the SharePoint Online admin center it shows the available storage out of the total size:-
so do the available size and the total size cover both SharePoint sites and OneDrive? or only SharePoint? and is exchange mail box also calculated here?
When we access the SharePoint Online admin center it shows the available storage out of the total size:- so do the available size and the total size cover both SharePoint sites and OneDrive? or only SharePoint? and is exchange mail box also calculated here? Read More
Copilot, Sharepoint Online, and LLM Training Data
When one creates a Copilot for a SPO site, what data becomes part of the model’s training? Are prompts used by msft in training the model? Is any part of the site data or AI’s reponses used in training the model? This is a critical issue for any organization with protected data, like law firms, health care delivery orgs, etc.
When one creates a Copilot for a SPO site, what data becomes part of the model’s training? Are prompts used by msft in training the model? Is any part of the site data or AI’s reponses used in training the model? This is a critical issue for any organization with protected data, like law firms, health care delivery orgs, etc. Read More
File locations in SPO subsites vs. Teams group sites
Current practice: Org is a law firm with one tenant, that has multiple subsites and some secondary subsites below those. Subsites are topical, one of which contains active clients, and each of those has a subsite. Matters are folders within the subsites. Collaboration with externals is either by invitaton per file or by access by Entra groups that include the necessary externals. This allows easy synching via the OneDrive client, easy searching, and easy archiving.
Objective: To use Teams for internals and externals on cases requiring a lot of collaboration.
Problem: If one sets up a team in Teams with channels for cases, unless something has changed those files are kept in a dedicated SPO site, located hierarchically directly under the tenant. That interrupts the current file management system. Is there a way to use Teams and channels with externals while keeping the files in their current SPO subsites and folders? Or am I envisioning incorrectly how this would work?
Current practice: Org is a law firm with one tenant, that has multiple subsites and some secondary subsites below those. Subsites are topical, one of which contains active clients, and each of those has a subsite. Matters are folders within the subsites. Collaboration with externals is either by invitaton per file or by access by Entra groups that include the necessary externals. This allows easy synching via the OneDrive client, easy searching, and easy archiving. Objective: To use Teams for internals and externals on cases requiring a lot of collaboration. Problem: If one sets up a team in Teams with channels for cases, unless something has changed those files are kept in a dedicated SPO site, located hierarchically directly under the tenant. That interrupts the current file management system. Is there a way to use Teams and channels with externals while keeping the files in their current SPO subsites and folders? Or am I envisioning incorrectly how this would work? Read More
In Outlook how to create common event Categorize for the whole organization
How to create event categories for calendar events to be selected by the user when creating a new event. Example
Needs analysis Demo Contract Renewal
How to create event categories for calendar events to be selected by the user when creating a new event. Example Needs analysis Demo Contract Renewal Read More
Powershell masking password
Hello Everyone,
I have the script (API POST) below which is working fine.
$UserPass = “username:password”
[string]$stringToEncode=$UserPass
$encodedString=[Convert]::ToBase64String([System.Text.Encoding]::UTF8.GetBytes($stringToEncode))
[Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = [Net.SecurityProtocolType]::Tls12
$headers = New-Object “System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary[[String],[String]]”
$headers.Add(“content-type”, “application/json”)
$headers.Add(“accept”, “application/json”)
$headers.Add(“Authorization”, “Basic ” + $encodedString)
Invoke-RestMethod -Uri “https://api_base_url/session” -Headers $headers -Method POST
I want to mask the password instead of plain text. So modified it to below which will ask to enter the masked password.
$UserPass = “username:$(Read-Host -Prompt “Please type the password” -AsSecureString)“
But the whole script is not working anymore. When I troubleshoot, there is a difference in encoding/decoding. I ran an online base64 decode and encode, the result is different.
Plain text password – username:password
dXNlcm5hbWU6cGFzc3dvcmQ= —> username:password
Masked password – username:$(Read-Host -Prompt “Please type the password” -AsSecureString)
dXNlcm5hbWU6U3lzdGVtLlNlY3VyaXR5LlNlY3VyZVN0cmluZw== —> username:System.Security.SecureString
How can I mask the password but able to read the System.Security.SecureString as the actual password?
Thank you in advanced.
Hello Everyone, I have the script (API POST) below which is working fine. $UserPass = “username:password” [string]$stringToEncode=$UserPass$encodedString=[Convert]::ToBase64String([System.Text.Encoding]::UTF8.GetBytes($stringToEncode)) [Net.ServicePointManager]::SecurityProtocol = [Net.SecurityProtocolType]::Tls12$headers = New-Object “System.Collections.Generic.Dictionary[[String],[String]]”$headers.Add(“content-type”, “application/json”)$headers.Add(“accept”, “application/json”)$headers.Add(“Authorization”, “Basic ” + $encodedString) Invoke-RestMethod -Uri “https://api_base_url/session” -Headers $headers -Method POST I want to mask the password instead of plain text. So modified it to below which will ask to enter the masked password. $UserPass = “username:$(Read-Host -Prompt “Please type the password” -AsSecureString)” But the whole script is not working anymore. When I troubleshoot, there is a difference in encoding/decoding. I ran an online base64 decode and encode, the result is different. Plain text password – username:passworddXNlcm5hbWU6cGFzc3dvcmQ= —> username:password Masked password – username:$(Read-Host -Prompt “Please type the password” -AsSecureString)dXNlcm5hbWU6U3lzdGVtLlNlY3VyaXR5LlNlY3VyZVN0cmluZw== —> username:System.Security.SecureString How can I mask the password but able to read the System.Security.SecureString as the actual password? Thank you in advanced. Read More
Expose Prompt Flow as API
Hi,
We have a few POCs implemented with Azure AI Prompt Flow.
Is there any way to expose Prompt Flow as an API and have it called by an external web app (ex: for instance developed with React)?
I searched the Internet and got no promising results.
Thanks
Hi,We have a few POCs implemented with Azure AI Prompt Flow. Is there any way to expose Prompt Flow as an API and have it called by an external web app (ex: for instance developed with React)? I searched the Internet and got no promising results. Thanks Read More
365 CoPilot for Outlook using shared calendars
Is there any update coming where I can use 365 copilot to look across multiple shared calendars to schedule a meeting. This seems like it would be a prime use of CoPilot.
Is there any update coming where I can use 365 copilot to look across multiple shared calendars to schedule a meeting. This seems like it would be a prime use of CoPilot. Read More
Cannot switch users in microsoft to-do
Because multiple services use microsoft, I have to log in with multiple microsoft accounts. When going to the to do webpage, it says my account isn’t on exchange online. It doesn’t because it is an admin login and there is no way to switch to the other account that has to do.
Because multiple services use microsoft, I have to log in with multiple microsoft accounts. When going to the to do webpage, it says my account isn’t on exchange online. It doesn’t because it is an admin login and there is no way to switch to the other account that has to do. Read More
API: Anonymous user can start meeting
Dear community.
Similar to this request: https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-teams/allowing-guests-to-start-a-meeting-without-the-organizer-present/m-p/2080397/page/2 , which recommends to set this setting on account level.
Is it possible to enable this setting via API just for a specific call? I was unsuccessful in finding this in the documentation.
Thank you for any help!
Dear community.Similar to this request: https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-teams/allowing-guests-to-start-a-meeting-without-the-organizer-present/m-p/2080397/page/2 , which recommends to set this setting on account level.Is it possible to enable this setting via API just for a specific call? I was unsuccessful in finding this in the documentation. Thank you for any help! Read More
Timeline Not Matching Other Filters
Hello all,
I tried to find a similar topic discussion on here but have not seen one. I currently have a pivot table with a few sliders and one timeline filter. One of the filters is a “Six Month” filter, which shows items that are due for review within the next 6 months. This filter is from a column on the original table that shows either “Six Months Review” or “Do Not Need to be Reviewed” and is based off a formula of a date column. My issue is, when I click to filter on “Six Months Review”, the date timeline doesn’t filter on those 6 months, it still shows all the dates present in the table. Is there a way for the Timeline filter to show data based off of the other filters as well?
Would appreciate any insight at all, thank you!
Hello all,I tried to find a similar topic discussion on here but have not seen one. I currently have a pivot table with a few sliders and one timeline filter. One of the filters is a “Six Month” filter, which shows items that are due for review within the next 6 months. This filter is from a column on the original table that shows either “Six Months Review” or “Do Not Need to be Reviewed” and is based off a formula of a date column. My issue is, when I click to filter on “Six Months Review”, the date timeline doesn’t filter on those 6 months, it still shows all the dates present in the table. Is there a way for the Timeline filter to show data based off of the other filters as well? Would appreciate any insight at all, thank you! Read More