An Important Update on Microsoft Training and Certification

There are some important updates that have been released regarding Microsoft Training and Certification in response to the coronavirus (COVID-19).

These updates are how Microsoft, together with the partner training ecosystem, is adapting to the current environment to ensure that all of you can continue to learn and get certified on Microsoft technologies, while staying safe.

Updates include details of testing center closings and online proctoring capacity increasing to meet that demand.

Normal reschedule rules are being relaxed and cancellation fees are being waived for the time being.

Probably the biggest announcement is the delay in the retirement dates of the MCSA, MCSD, and MCSE certifications and related exams extended

As we’re all aware from prior messaging, the Microsoft Certified Solutions Architect (MCSA), Microsoft Certified Solutions Developer (MCSD), and Microsoft Certified Solutions Expert (MCSE) certification(s) were slated to be retired on June 30th of this year (2020).

Because of all the uncertainty in the current environment and the impact of all of that on the learners and their ability to finish their certification training and testing before the original retirement date, Microsoft has pushed out the retirement date for these specific certifications to January 31, 2021.

Changes have also been made to the expiring role-based certifications. If you have a role-based certification that is expiring between now and December 31, 2020, Microsoft is extending the certification and that expiration date by six months. Microsoft has indicated as an example, “if your certification is set to expire September 30, 2020, it will now expire on March 30, 2021.”

Certification expiration dates will be automatically updated. You will be able to view your updated expiration date in your certification dashboard within the next 30 days or so (the date of this post is basically the end of March 2020 so “by April 30, 2020”)

They also identified that if you have a Pearson VUE delivered certification exam voucher or discount offer that is expiring between March 26 and August 31, 2020, it will be extended until January 31, 2021.

Read the full details on all of these changes at the Microsoft Learning Blog.

Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-500 Q001 – ANSWERED

To use Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) Privileged Identity Management (PIM), your directory must have a valid license.

Which licenses will you require? (Make three selections – each answer is a complete solution).

A) Azure AD Premium P1
B) Azure AD Premium P2
C) Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) E3
D) Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) E5
E) Microsoft 365 F1
F) Microsoft 365 M3
G) Microsoft 365 M5

CORRECT ANSWERS:
B) Azure AD Premium P2
D) Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) E5
G) Microsoft 365 M5

Licensing requirements

To use Privileged Identity Management, your directory must have one of the following paid or trial licenses:

Azure AD Premium P2
Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) E5
Microsoft 365 M5

Deploy Azure AD Privileged Identity Management (PIM)

License requirements to use Privileged Identity Management

Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-103 002 – ANSWERED

Your enterprise environment is presently using Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS).

You have been tasked with configuring directory synchronization with your Office 365 E5 subscription.

You need to set up support for Single Sign-on (SSO) and you want to confirm that all of the domain user names in use meet the formatting standard and will not cause any issues with the synchronization.

What should you do? (Choose the best option)

A) Make changes to the default configuration of Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) Connect sync
B) Confirm the synchronization settings in the Synchronization Rules Editor
C) Run Azure AD Connect sync with the defaults
D) Run the IdFix tool
E) Run the Synchronization Rules Editor and create a custom rule

Correct answer: D

The correct answer is (D) Run the Office 365 IdFix tool – the tool is used to search for problems in your directory and then fix the errors in the GUI.

Common errors detected by IdFix include illegal characters, duplicate entries / values, format violations, length limitations, to name a few.

While you can make changes to the default configuration in Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) Connect sync and / or run Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) Connect sync with the default settings, neither of these options would address any potential issues that might be found where there are the formatting exceptions and where these may cause issues with the synchronization.

The Synchronization Rules Editor is used to see and change the default configuration. It is configured with the default rules and you can add custom changes to the rules, such as flow, precedence, scoping, and so on, but this will not address the issue with any potential issues that might be found where there are the formatting exceptions and where these may cause issues with the synchronization.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/hybrid/how-to-connect-sync-change-the-configuration

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/hybrid/how-to-connect-sync-service-manager-ui

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/active-directory/hybrid/how-to-connect-sync-whatis

Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-500 Q001

To use Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) Privileged Identity Management (PIM), your directory must have a valid license.

Which licenses will you require? (Make three selections – each answer is a complete solution).

A) Azure AD Premium P1
B) Azure AD Premium P2
C) Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) E3
D) Enterprise Mobility + Security (EMS) E5
E) Microsoft 365 F1
F) Microsoft 365 M3
G) Microsoft 365 M5

And here is the updated blog post with the answer – Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-500 Q001 – ANSWERED

Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-900 001 – ANSWERED

When looking at using a cloud service, what expenditure type are cloud services based on?

A) Capital Expenditure (CapEx)
B) Friendly expenditure
C) Maximum expense
D) Operational Expenditure (OpEx) – CORRECT ANSWER

Explanation

Operational Expenditure (OpEx) is the correct answer. Cloud services operate on an Operational Expenditure model. It is regular, repeated expenditure that you pay for using cloud services.

Capital Expenditure (CapEx) is not the correct answer. Capital Expenditure (CapEx) is not required to be paid upfront when looking to start using a cloud services. There are no up-front costs to use cloud services. You pay for what you consume, under a consumption-based model.

Friendly expenditure and Maximum expense are not defined expenditure types.

https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/azure/cloud-adoption-framework/strategy/financial-models

Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-103 002

Your enterprise environment is presently using Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS).

You have been tasked with configuring directory synchronization with your Office 365 E5 subscription.

What should you do? (Choose the best option)

A) Make changes to the default configuration of Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) Connect sync
B) Confirm the synchronization settings in the Synchronization Rules Editor
C) Run Azure AD Connect sync with the defaults
D) Run the IdFix tool
E) Run the Synchronization Rules Editor and create a custom rule

And here is the updated blog post with the answer – Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-103 002 – ANSWERED

Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-900 001

When looking at using a cloud service, what expenditure type are cloud services based on?

A) Capital Expenditure (CapEx)
B) Friendly expenditure
C) Maximum expense
D) Operational Expenditure (OpEx)

And here is the updated blog post with the answer – Azure Certification Question of the Day (QOTD) – AZ-900 001 – ANSWERED

Certification QOTD – AZ-103 001 – ANSWERED

QUESTION 1 – ANSWERED

You’re running your environment in Azure and you review the following resources

Resource Group – rgmain001

Storage Account – samain001

Azure File Sync – afs001

samain001 contains a file share called IMAGES that contains 1,000 image files.

You need to synchronize the files in Azure to an on-premises Windows server named IMGSYS001.

Which three actions should you perform? Each correct answer presents part of the solution.

A) Mount the current Blob storage in state as a file system

B) Transfer data with the AzCopy

C) Create a sync group and a cloud endpoint

D) Register IMGSYS001
E) Install the Azure File Sync agent on IMGSYS001

Correct answer:

C, D, E

Step 1 (E): Install the Azure File Sync agent on IMGSYS001 – The Azure File Sync agent is a downloadable package that enables Windows Server to be synced with an Azure file share

Step 2 (D): Register IMGSYS001.

Register Windows Server with Storage Sync Service – establishes a trust relationship between your physical server (or cluster) and the Storage Sync Service.

Step 3 (C): Create a sync group and a cloud endpoint – defines the sync topology for a set of files. Endpoints within a sync group are kept in sync with each other. A sync group must contain one cloud endpoint, which represents an Azure file share and one or more server endpoints. A server endpoint represents a path on registered server.

AzCopy is a command-line utility designed for copying data to/from Microsoft Azure Blob, File, and Table storage, using simple commands designed for optimal performance. You can copy data between a file system and a storage account, or between storage accounts but it is not the best answer to fully synchronize files in Azure to an on-premises server.

You can mount Blob storage as a file system with blobfuse, but this is only available through the Linux file system. Blobfuse is a virtual file system driver for Azure Blob storage.

Certification QOTD – AZ-103 001

We are kicking off the Certification Question of the Day [QOTD] with a question for Exam AZ-103: Microsoft Azure Administrator.

Passing this exam will grant you the Microsoft Certified: Azure Administrator Associate certification.

Here is your question – remember, tomorrow I will provide the answer to the question, so be sure to come back.

AZ-103 001

You’re running your environment in Azure and you review the following resources

Resource Group – rgmain001
Storage Account – samain001
Azure File Sync – afs001

samain001 contains a file share called IMAGES that contains 1,000 image files.

You need to synchronize the files in Azure to an on-premises server named IMGSYS001.

Which three actions should you perform? Each correct answer presents part of the solution.

A) Mount the current Blob storage in state as a file system
B) Transfer data with the AzCopy
C) Create a sync group and a cloud endpoint
D) Register IMGSYS001
E) Install the Azure File Sync agent on IMGSYS001

And here is the updated blog post with the answer – Certification QOTD – AZ-103 001 – ANSWERED

Certification Question of the Day [QOTD]

As part of getting back into regular blogging, I would like to announce that the Certification Question of the Day is going to be making its return.

I did this in the past for prior MCSE and MCSA certifications on my old blog (from many, many moons ago) and I thought it might be cool to give it another go now under the mantle of Azure certifications and the new role based training that I am involved with.

As I did prior, I will put “QOTD” in the category field for easier searching here on the site as well as the certification it applies to (e.g. “AZ-103” or “AZ-500” – etc.)

A day after a post, I will re-post the question with the accompanying answer.