We’re pleased to announce that the May 2024 release (version 1.9.0) of the Azure Developer CLI (azd) is now available. As always, you can learn about how to get started with the Azure Developer CLI by visiting our documentation.

Here’s what’s new in azd this month:

• New demo mode (azure-dev#3848)
• .NET Aspire enhancements

Our team is working on some exciting updates in relation to AI, so this month’s release is a little smaller than usual. Stay tuned though because we’ll have announcements in relation to Microsoft Build. The conference kicks off on May 21 and registration is still open. You can register for free to attend virtually. We look forward to seeing you there!

New demo mode

We love seeing azd‘s presence grow and it being included in demos! When showing azd outputs publicly, it was a common practice to blur your subscription ID. Because that can be tedious, we’re introducing a new demo mode in which your subscription ID won’t be displayed in the console. No more spending your precious time blurring IDs before uploading a video of you building cool stuff with azd!

This mode introduces the environment variable: AZD_DEMO_MODE. To enable demo mode, run:

export AZD_DEMO_MODE=true

If you want demo mode to persist across reboots, you can also run:

setx AZD_DEMO_MODE true

or in PowerShell:

$env:AZD_DEMO_MODE="true"

.NET Aspire enhancements

As a part of azd‘s continued partnership with .NET Aspire, we made a couple noteworthy changes:

• Support for multiple endpoints
• Aspire dashboard support (Region availability varies. As of blog publishing, the support is available in the westcentralus region.)

To learn more about these and other enhancements, check out .NET Aspire’s latest product updates.

Other changes and enhancements

We also added smaller enhancements and fixed issues requested by users that should improve your experience working with the azd. Some notable changes include:

Other features for azd core:

• Filter azd template list using tags (azure-dev#3840)

Bug fixes for azd core:

• Fix cross-build configuration (azure-dev#3707)
• Allow azd env refresh without Bicep (azure-dev#3787)
• Aspire – support args on project.v0 and dokerfile.v0 resources (azure-dev#3678)

New Templates

We officially have over 100 templates in our Awesome-azd template gallery! New templates this month include:

• Chat with your data – Solution accelerator
• Zip Deploy Azure Function from community contributor FBoucher
• RAG using Semantic Kernel with Azure OpenAI and Azure Cosmos DB for MongoDB vCore from community contributor john0isaac
• Serverless AI Chat with RAG using LangChain.js

Do you have an azd template you’d like to share with the rest of the community? You can learn how to with our contributor guide.

Community contributions

We’d also like to extend a special thanks to the community contributors of this release:

• pamelafox:
  • Update search-services.bicep with disableLocalAuth compatibility (azure-dev#3677)
  • Update cognitiveservices.bicep with disableLocalAuth compatibility (azure-dev#3769)

You can use the Azure Developer CLI from:

• Your terminal of choice on Windows, Linux, or macOS.
• Visual Studio Code or GitHub Codespaces by downloading the extension from the Marketplace, or installing it directly from the extension view (Ctrl + Shift + X for Windows or Cmd + Shift + X for macOS) in Visual Studio Code.
• Visual Studio by enabling the preview feature flag.
• You can learn more about the Azure Developer CLI from our official documentation.
• If you run into any problems or have suggestions, file an issue or start a discussion in the Azure Developer CLI repository. You can also try checking out our troubleshooting documentation.