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Satya Nadella has publicly shared five practical GPT‑5 prompts he uses inside Microsoft 365 Copilot — a short, replicable playbook that turns Copilot from a drafting tool into what he describes as “a new layer of intelligence” across meetings, project oversight, risk spotting, and stakeholder communications. Background Microsoft quietly completed a coordinated rollout that put OpenAI’s GPT‑5 family into the Copilot stack: Microsoft 365 Copilot, consumer Copilot apps, GitHub Copilot, Copilot...

Microsoft and the U.S. General Services Administration have struck a sweeping OneGov agreement that puts Microsoft’s cloud and AI stack — including Microsoft 365 Copilot, Azure services, Dynamics 365, and security tooling — on preferential terms for federal agencies, with Microsoft and GSA projecting more than $3 billion in savings in the first year and a package of no-cost or deeply discounted offers designed to accelerate government AI adoption. Background Federal procurement is in the...

Microsoft and Samsung have quietly turned the living room into the next battleground for conversational AI: Microsoft Copilot is now embedded in select Samsung 2025 TVs and Smart Monitors, offering a voice‑first, animated assistant that speaks aloud, displays large, distance‑legible visual cards, and can be optionally personalized via a Microsoft account. Background Samsung announced the integration on August 27, 2025 as part of its broader Samsung Vision AI strategy, and Microsoft frames...

Microsoft and the U.S. General Services Administration (GSA) have struck a OneGov agreement to deliver steep discounts on Microsoft cloud services for federal agencies — including no‑cost access to Microsoft 365 Copilot for eligible G5 users for up to 12 months — a package GSA and Microsoft say could save the government roughly $3.0–$3.1 billion in the first year and deliver multi‑year savings in the billions more. (reuters.com, gsa.gov) Background Microsoft’s federal pricing move lands...

Microsoft’s offer to make Copilot available at no charge to U.S. government workers marks a significant shift in how enterprise AI is being positioned for public-sector users, promising quick adoption benefits while raising immediate questions about procurement, security, and long-term costs. Background In recent months Microsoft has broadened Copilot’s footprint across consumer and enterprise products and has been actively tailoring variants for government use — including Government...

Satya Nadella has publicly shown how he uses five short, repeatable ChatGPT-style prompts inside Microsoft Copilot to “supercharge” his executive workflow — calling Copilot “a new layer of intelligence spanning all my apps” and framing the assistant less as a drafting tool and more as a persistent, context‑aware chief‑of‑staff for meetings, project assessments and time audits. Background Microsoft’s push to embed advanced generative models into everyday productivity tools has accelerated...

Microsoft Active Directory remains the single most critical identity service in most enterprises—and in 2025 the vendor landscape for Active Directory backup and forest recovery has crystallised around a small set of purpose‑built products that go well beyond system‑state snapshots. The difference is now obvious: native tools and generic VM/image backups protect servers; AD‑aware platforms protect identity, relationships, and business continuity. The Petri roundup of the “Top 9 Active...

If you manage servers, opening a port in the Windows Server firewall is one of those routine tasks that’s trivial to execute but easy to get wrong — and a single misconfiguration can expose services to the public internet. This feature explains the exact, supported ways to open ports in Windows Server using both the GUI and PowerShell, verifies the steps against official Microsoft guidance and community-tested commands, and walks through secure best practices so you open only what you must...

Microsoft and Phison have now all but closed the book on the late‑August panic: after weeks of community reports, lab reproductions and headlines warning that Windows 11 24H2’s August cumulative (KB5063878) was “bricking” SSDs, thorough vendor and Microsoft testing found no reproducible link between the update and mass SSD failure. BornCity’s latest post relays Microsoft and Phison’s findings and confirms the update shows no detectable impact on drives after coordinated investigation...

Setting up DNS on a Windows Server is one of the most consequential tasks an administrator can perform: it turns raw IP addresses into human-friendly names, anchors Active Directory functionality, and forms the backbone of service discovery across the network. Proper DNS configuration reduces user friction, supports replication and authentication in AD environments, and helps isolate performance or security issues before they ripple through your infrastructure. This guide delivers a...

Microsoft has pushed Windows 11, version 25H2, into the Release Preview channel — a near‑final enablement‑package update identified in preview builds as Build 26200.5074 — opening the formal validation window for Insiders, IT pilots and commercial customers ahead of a broader, staged rollout later this year. Background Microsoft’s annual client update model has matured into a shared servicing branch strategy: feature binaries are staged across monthly cumulative updates for the active...

Microsoft’s push to fold advanced generative AI into Azure and Microsoft 365 is no longer an experimental add‑on — it’s a full‑scale platform strategy that reshapes product roadmaps, enterprise buying decisions, and how companies monetize intelligence across workflows. Background Microsoft first set the tone with the March 16, 2023 introduction of Microsoft 365 Copilot, embedding large language models (LLMs) directly into Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook and Teams to automate drafting...

Microsoft and the University of Southampton have published what the teams describe as a watershed result in optical communications: a hollow‑core optical fiber with measured attenuation of 0.091 dB/km at 1,550 nm, a performance level that — if reproduced in production volumes and field conditions — would beat the long‑standing practical minimum for silica glass single‑mode fiber and reopen design possibilities for long‑haul and data‑center networks. (arxiv.org, networkworld.com) Background...

Lyft CEO David Risher’s recent public praise for Oura Ring, Starbucks, and Microsoft lands at a moment when Microsoft itself has signaled a major strategic pivot — shipping its first in‑house MAI models and doubling down on an AI‑centric infrastructure plan that changes the calculus for Copilot, Azure customers, and investors alike. The juxtaposition is telling: Risher lauds companies that get the basics — customer obsession, simplicity, and consistent experiences — right, while Microsoft’s...

Mody Khan’s nine‑month search after a December 2024 layoff from Microsoft’s Azure division lays bare a harsh reality: even seasoned cloud engineers with six‑figure resumes are running out of runway in a tech job market that has shifted from hiring frenzy to selective scarcity. Overview The headline is deceptively simple: a former Microsoft cloud engineer who once commanded a comfortable salary now faces dwindling savings, potential foreclosure, and an unyielding pile of rejections. But...

Microsoft’s decision to make multifactor authentication (MFA) mandatory for Azure sign‑ins is no longer an abstract recommendation — it’s a phased, platform‑level enforcement that changes how administrators, DevOps engineers, and security teams authenticate to the Azure control plane and related admin portals. The move begins with portal sign‑ins that required MFA starting in October 2024 and expands to command‑line, programmatic, and Infrastructure-as‑Code (IaC) workflows in a later phase...

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Microsoft has quietly moved one of the most sensitive elements of cloud security — the Hardware Security Module — from dedicated cluster appliances into the silicon and chassis of individual Azure servers, embedding a custom Azure Integrated HSM ASIC across new fleet servers as part of a broader “Secure Future” engineering push unveiled at Hot Chips 2025. Background The last decade of cloud security has been dominated by software controls, networked HSM appliances and, more recently...

It’s a blockbuster start to September on Xbox: the long‑awaited Hollow Knight: Silksong drops day one on Xbox Game Pass, while a crowded slate of indie, mid‑tier and AAA releases — including NBA 2K26, Cronos: The New Dawn, and Daemon X Machina: Titanic Scion — land across Xbox and PC between September 1 and September 5, delivering one of the busiest opening weeks of the fall release calendar. (xbox.com, gematsu.com, newsroom-asia.2k.com) Background / Overview The first week of September is a...