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Highlights

Chat History Storage Patterns in Microsoft Agent Framework
When people talk about building AI agents, they usually focus on models, tools, and prompts. In practice, one of the most important architectural decisions is much simpler: where does the conversation history live?
Imagine a user asks your agent a complex question, clicks “try...
Read moreClick to read more about this postAzure MCP Server now available as an MCP Bundle (.mcpb)
Azure MCP Server is now available as an MCP Bundle (.mcpb), enabling one-click installation into Claude Desktop and other MCP-compatible clients.
Read moreClick to read more about this postAzure Data Studio is retired: Move your Azure SQL workflow to VS Code in 10 minutes
Azure Data Studio (ADS) retired on February 6, 2025, and support ended on February 28, 2026. The recommended path forward is Visual Studio Code with the MSSQL extension. If you used ADS daily, this guide gets you productive quickly in VS Code. The focus is on importing your existing...
Read moreClick to read more about this postLatest posts

Apr 29, 2026
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The New Loop: How Power Pages Builds Software with AI

Introduction
When I started writing software professionally in 2015, the tech landscape looked completely different. Tools and frameworks kept evolving since then, but the process of building software barely moved for a decade. That changed in the last couple of months. Here's what has...
Power Platform Developer Blog

Apr 28, 2026
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A2A v1 Is Here: Cross-Platform Agent Communication in Microsoft Agent Framework for .NET

As organizations move from single-agent prototypes to multi-agent production systems, the ability for agents to communicate reliably across platforms and organizational boundaries becomes essential. With the release of A2A Protocol v1.0 and updated support in the Microsoft Agent...
Microsoft Agent Framework

Apr 28, 2026
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Visual Studio April Update – Cloud Agent Integration

GitHub Copilot in Visual Studio is becoming more agentic with every release. This update brings cloud agent integration front and center, letting you start remote coding sessions without leaving the IDE.
Visual Studio Blog

Apr 28, 2026
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The problem: All-or-nothing batch processing in Azure Service Bus
Azure Functions lets you settle each Service Bus message on its own within a batch. Complete, abandon, dead-letter, or defer messages one by one to avoid duplicate processing and handle errors with precision.
Azure SDK Blog

Apr 28, 2026
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SharePoint Framework (SPFx) roadmap update – April 2026

SPFx is powering the future of Microsoft 365 with AI driven portals and deep integrations across SharePoint and Microsoft 365. The April 2026 update shares new features and the roadmap for the next evolution built for the AI era. This is a transparent community driven journey that we shape together.
Microsoft 365 Developer Blog

Apr 28, 2026
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Welcome to SkiaSharp 4.0 Preview 1

SkiaSharp 4.0 Preview 1 is here. Learn all about the new features and how Uno Platform has stepped up as a co-maintainer.
.NET Blog

Apr 28, 2026
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High-Performance Distributed Caching with .NET and Postgres on Azure

Adding caching to your application architecture can significantly improve key performance metrics, cut latency, and reduce load across downstream systems. In this walkthrough, we highlight the latest caching best practices and incorporate these design patterns into a reusable .NET application that you can reference when adding new capabilities to your application stack.
.NET Blog

Apr 28, 2026
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Developing a cross-process reader/writer lock with limited readers, part 1: A semaphore

A pot of tokens.
The Old New Thing

Apr 28, 2026
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Welcome to Azure Cosmos DB Conf 2026

Today is the day. Azure Cosmos DB Conf 2026, in partnership with AMD, is a free virtual developer event focused on building modern, scalable applications with Azure Cosmos DB. The agenda features Microsoft engineers, product team leaders, and members of the global developer community...
Azure Cosmos DB Blog

Apr 28, 2026
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PowerToys 0.99 is here: new monitor controls, easier window management, and Dock upgrades

We're back with a fresh PowerToys release! This month introduces Power Display for controlling your monitors from the system tray, Grab And Move for quickly moving and resizing windows, and a wave of improvements to Command Palette and the Dock, along with updates across the utility...
Windows Command Line

Apr 27, 2026
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Python Environments Extension for VS Code- April Update
The April 2026 release update includes the Python Environments extension... Keep on reading to learn more!
Microsoft for Python Developers Blog
Apr 27, 2026
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Azure Data Studio is retired: Move your Azure SQL workflow to VS Code in 10 minutes
Azure Data Studio (ADS) retired on February 6, 2025, and support ended on February 28, 2026. The recommended path forward is Visual Studio Code with the MSSQL extension. If you used ADS daily, this guide gets you productive quickly in VS Code. The focus is on importing your existing...
Azure SQL Dev Corner

Apr 27, 2026
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Announcing Shader Model 6.10 Preview and AgilitySDK 720 Preview

Overview
Today, we are pleased to announce that Shader Model 6.10 and other features have been officially released with Agility SDK 1.720-preview and complementary DXC 1.10.2605.2. AgilitySDK 1.720-preview exposes the following features. There's more detail further below, including...
DirectX Developer Blog

Apr 27, 2026
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D3D12 LinAlg Matrix Preview
Welcome to the D3D12 LinAlg Matrix Preview release!
Today, we are excited to announce the preview release for the D3D12 Linear Algebra APIs! This feature set unlocks comprehensive hardware acceleration for Matrix-oriented operations across various use cases. Previously, we announced...
DirectX Developer Blog

Apr 27, 2026
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Looking at consequences of passing too few register parameters to a C function on various architectures

It's bad news no matter how you slice it, but Itanium makes it even worse.
The Old New Thing

Apr 24, 2026
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Azure MCP Server now available as an MCP Bundle (.mcpb)

Azure MCP Server is now available as an MCP Bundle (.mcpb), enabling one-click installation into Claude Desktop and other MCP-compatible clients.
Azure SDK Blog

Apr 24, 2026
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Chat History Storage Patterns in Microsoft Agent Framework
When people talk about building AI agents, they usually focus on models, tools, and prompts. In practice, one of the most important architectural decisions is much simpler: where does the conversation history live?
Imagine a user asks your agent a complex question, clicks “try...
Microsoft Agent Framework

Apr 24, 2026
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Defending against exceptions in a scope_exit RAII type

But maybe it's not worth it.
The Old New Thing

Apr 24, 2026
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Axios npm Supply Chain Compromise – Guidance for Azure Pipelines Customers
On March 31, 2026, malicious versions of the widely used JavaScript HTTP client library Axios were briefly published to the npm registry as part of a supply chain attack.
The affected versions — 1.14.1 and 0.30.4 — included a hidden malicious dependency that executed during...
Azure DevOps Blog

Apr 23, 2026
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Combining API versioning with OpenAPI in .NET 10 applications
Learn how to implement API versioning in your .NET 10 applications using OpenAPI for better API management and documentation.
.NET Blog

Apr 23, 2026
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What's new for .NET in Ubuntu 26.04

Ubuntu 26.04 (Resolute Raccoon) ships today with .NET 10. Here's how to install .NET 10 from the archive, use the new -resolute container tags, build Native AOT apps, and install .NET 8 and 9 from the dotnet-backports PPA.
.NET Blog

Apr 23, 2026
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LangChain.js for Beginners: A Free Course to Build Agentic AI Apps with JavaScript
Yohan,
Dan
Want to build AI agents with JavaScript that go beyond basic chat completions? Agents that reason, call tools, and pull from knowledge bases on their own? We put together a free, open source course to help you get there.
LangChain.js for Beginners is 8 chapters and 70+ runnable...
Microsoft for Developers

Apr 23, 2026
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General Availability: Single Sign-On (SSO) from Native Apps to Embedded Web Views in Microsoft Entra External ID Native Authentication

We’re excited to announce the General Availability (GA) of Single Sign-On (SSO) from Native Apps to Embedded Web Views for Microsoft Entra External ID (EEID) Native Authentication.
This release marks a major milestone in delivering end-to-end seamless authentication experiences for...
Microsoft Entra Identity Platform

Apr 23, 2026
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CodeAct in Agent Framework: Faster Agents with Fewer Model Turns

Modern AI agents often aren't bottlenecked by model quality, they are bottlenecked by orchestration overhead. When an agent chains together many small tool calls, each step typically requires a new model turn, driving up latency and token usage.
With CodeAct support in Agent...
Microsoft Agent Framework

Apr 23, 2026
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Another crash caused by uninstaller code injection into Explorer

Inadvertently destroying a staircase while standing on it.
The Old New Thing

Apr 23, 2026
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Lessons Learned from Building a Well-Matching Intelligence Layer
Emmeline,
Oscar,
Kavitha
Key insights from the EDA and Ground Truth journey for solving well identity resolution in the Energy industry—challenges that extend to any entity matching problem across distributed systems.
ISE Developer Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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Take the 2026 ISO C++ Developer Survey!

The 2026 ISO C++ developer survey is now open: 2026 Annual C++ Developer Survey "Lite" : Standard C++
It takes about 10 minutes and directly informs the standardization committee and tooling vendors so the C++ ecosystem can continue evolving the right way. Please share your feedback...
C++ Team Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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C++ Code Intelligence for GitHub Copilot CLI (Preview)

We recently brought C++ code understanding tools to GitHub Copilot in Visual Studio and VS Code. These tools provide precise, semantic understanding of your C++ code to GitHub Copilot using the same IntelliSense engine that powers code navigation in the IDE. Until now, these capabilities...
C++ Team Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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Visual Studio Code 1.117

Learn what's new in Visual Studio Code 1.117
Read the full article
VS Code Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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Write azd hooks in Python, JavaScript, TypeScript, or .NET

Hooks are one of the most popular features in azd, and now you can write them in Python, JavaScript, TypeScript, or .NET, not just Bash and PowerShell.
What's new?
The Azure Developer CLI (azd) hook system now supports four more languages beyond Bash and PowerShell. You can write hook...
Azure SDK Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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PIX 2604.27004-preview - support for new D3D12 Preview features, and more

Today we released PIX version 2604.27004-preview, which can be downloaded here. This release has initial support for the new D3D12 features, notably Batched Asynchronous Command List APIs, that was released in a preview DirectX Agility SDK today. Please visit this blog post for more...
PIX on Windows

Apr 22, 2026
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7 tips to optimize Azure Cosmos DB costs for AI and agentic workloads

AI apps and agentic workloads expose inefficiencies in your data layer faster than any previous generation of apps. You’re storing embeddings, serving low-latency retrieval, handling bursty traffic from chat and orchestration, and often operating across regions. Done right, Azure Cosmos...
Azure Cosmos DB Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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Introducing Toolboxes in Foundry
Linda,
Maria,
Ronak
Available in Public Preview Today
Toolbox is a new way to curate, configure, and reuse tools across all of your AI agents without rewiring them every time from Foundry.
Today, teams build agents across different frameworks and runtimes. Each agent often wires tools directly,...
Microsoft Foundry Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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From Local to Production: The Complete Developer Journey for Building, Composing, and Deploying AI Agents
Takuto,
jeffhollan
When we launched Microsoft Agent Framework last October, we made a promise: building production-grade AI agents should feel as natural and structured as building any other software.
Today, we’re delivering on that promise — with the v1.0 release of Microsoft Agent Framework and the...
Microsoft Foundry Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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Introducing the new hosted agents in Foundry Agent Service: secure, scalable compute built for agents
Takuto,
jeffhollan,
Lakshmi
Agents are already transforming how developers solve problems. Whether it's a coding agent that refactors your repo overnight, a research agent that synthesizes hundreds of documents into a brief, or an ops agent that monitors and remediates infrastructure — the pattern is clear....
Microsoft Foundry Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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Optimizing Git policy management at scale
With just a single improvement in the REST API of Azure DevOps, we achieved a massive reduction in CPU usage and execution time when managing Git policies: 2x less CPU and 10-15x faster execution!
This change is already available to all users of Azure DevOps, and it's time to share a bit...
Azure DevOps Blog

Apr 22, 2026
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Securing MCP: A Control Plane for Agent Tool Execution

The Model Context Protocol (MCP) is quickly becoming a common way for AI agents to discover and use tools. It provides a consistent interface to databases, APIs, file systems, and third-party services, which makes it easier to plug capabilities into agent workflows.
However, MCP...
Microsoft for Developers

Apr 22, 2026
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Windows App Development CLI v0.3: new run and ui commands, plus dotnet run support for packaged apps

Windows App Development CLI v0.3 is here! This release brings some of our best features yet including a full run-and-debug experience outside Visual Studio and built-in UI Automation from the command line.
With v0.3, we've unlocked a whole class of agentic and automation scenarios....
#ifdef Windows

Apr 22, 2026
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Mapping the page tables into memory via the page tables

So-called "fractal page mapping".
The Old New Thing

Apr 22, 2026
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Public Preview: Actual Result for Manual Tests in Azure Test Plans

We're excited to announce the public preview of the highly anticipated Actual Result (AR) feature for manual testing in Azure Test Plans! This feature has been one of the top requests of the community, and we're thrilled to make it available for you.
Why use the Actual Result...
Azure DevOps Blog

Apr 21, 2026
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I Wasted 68 Minutes a Day Re-Explaining My Code. Then I Built auto-memory.

~1,900 lines of Python. Zero dependencies. Saves you an hour a day.
GitHub → · pip install auto-memory
Now give Copilot CLI enhanced context recall. Point it at deploy/install.md and let it cook. 🍳
Are you tired of using the slash /compact command every 10 min?
The...
All things Azure

Apr 21, 2026
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Azure SDK Release (April 2026)

Azure SDK releases every month. In this post, you'll find this month's highlights and release notes.
Azure SDK Blog

Apr 21, 2026
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Getting Started with Agentic DevOps – Part 1: Foundations

This post is the first in a 3-part series:
Foundations (this post)
Start shipping (context engineering, MCP servers, orchestration)
App modernization (Java, .NET, PHP, microservices)
Bookmark this post for quick reference as you start exploring Agentic DevOps. It will be...
All things Azure

Apr 21, 2026
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The Polyglot tax – Part 4
The Agent-Ready Database: Security, Backup, and MCP
Part 4 of 4 – The Multi-Model Database Series
This is the final post in a four-part series on multi-model databases in SQL Server 2025 and Azure SQL - exploring how the optimizer, storage engine, and security layer treat each data...
Azure SQL Dev Corner
Apr 21, 2026
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.NET 10.0.7 Out-of-Band Security Update

We are releasing .NET 10.0.7 as an out-of-band security update to address CVE-2026-40372.
.NET Blog