Posts

NewTime-Span

I was investigating an issue with our identity provider and out of date passwords the other day. I needed to do a date comparison to find accounts with expired passwords. In the past I’d used (Get-Date).AddDays() and done an evaluation. It works, but to me the code is hard to read. I stumbled on the New-Timespan cmdlet which creates a timespan object. Creating a timespan object and referencing the days property is so much easier to read when you look at the code.

March 24, 2022 Read

Delegation

I’ve been working on a canvas app to track and manage major IT projects. The app uses a SharePoint list as a datasource. Our executives also use the app and the PowerBI dashboard to review projects that require executive approval in the form of what we call our Change Advisory Board (CAB). I recieved feedback from a member of our CAB. “It would be nice to separate out the completed projects from all the other projects.

March 13, 2022 Read

Hiding a Button

Problem You only want certain people to use a button on an app. The button can be for navigation, or an action. It doesn’t matter. Solution Use an Azure Active Directory group to control who can use see the button. This makes managing permissions for the button very easy. You don’t need to change the app, change the group membership. Components Azure AD Group with members Azure AD Group Object ID Some onStart code A button you only want certain people to see Office 365 Groups Connector Office 365 Users Connector Azure AD Create an Azure AD Group Add members Make a note of the ObjectID Sample Group

February 1, 2022 Read

Barcode Canvas App

Problem Barcodes are everywhere, and I needed a barcode scanner. So I made one. Solution This app started out as a single screen app where I could scan and email myself a barcode. It worked for the couple of odd times I needed a barcode off a piece of hardware. After getting a pile of equipment, scanning each item and sending an email approach wasn’t cutting it. I added a screen to my app for collecting many barcodes and emailing the result in an html table.

January 8, 2022 Read

Bingo Canvas App

Problem Not really a problem. Just an interesting mini project. The office holiday party is a virtual affair this year. Our leadership wanted to play Bingo to give away some extra gifts. Our web filter blocks pretty much anything that would host an online Bingo game, so I knocked out a Bingo Canvas App. Solution Canvas App based on American Bingo Random board is generated each time “New Game” is clicked.

December 15, 2021 Read

Microsoft Certificed: Power Platform Fundamentals

I just passed the PL-900 exam today for Power Platform Fundamentals certification. Feels good. Now on to buiding more things.

November 29, 2021 Read

PowerAutomate with Twilio Integration for Electricity Outages.

Problem We have a job site where power outages occur more often than we’d like. The site engineer and other key staff members need to know when the power fluctuates while they work out a more robust back up power system for their construction requirements. Naturally, we have an APC UPS on site for our network equipment. Why not use that as a monitoring device and get messages to our enginners.

November 5, 2021 Read

Starting at Obayashi

After a number of great years at OmnicomMediaGroup, I’ve accecpted a position at Obayashi as a Systems Engineer. It was great working with everyone at OMG, especially Jon Serrette.

November 3, 2020 Read

Hello from new website

‘Hello World!’ Now that I’ve gotten that taken care of, onward to other things. I’m a Systems Admin working at OmnicomMediaGroup. Lately I’ve been working on a PowerShell module for API calls into our in house developed onboarding platform. In my spare time, I’ve been working on a few Raspberry Pi projects to automate video uploads and transcoding into AWS buckets. As I run across things that interest me, I’ll post about them.

August 21, 2020 Read

SMS Notification PowerApp with Twilio Integration

SMS Notification PowerApp with Twilio Integration Problem Obayashi has a subscription to an SMS Emergency Notification platform. Access to the platform costs Obyashi approximately $5000 per year even if no messages are ever sent. That’s five thousand to reserve the right to use the platform. I was asked to take a look at different platforms to reduce cost. Solution I built a PowerApp that uses a Twilio connector. We pay for the messages that we use at a rate of 0.

June 1, 2020 Read