Multizone | All our technotes
If we've published it, you can find it here.
You can select dashboards and reports and publish them as an app, either to a group or to your whole organization, but how do you package up a Power BI app for a third party, as part of an application lifecycle management (ALM) system for good governance? — Let's find out what best practice looks like in September 2023!
Publishing apps in Power BI
Microsoft say "You can publish apps to people outside your organization, too. They can view and interact with the app content, but can't share it with others. Now you can create template apps and deploy them to any Power BI customer." (See: Ways to collaborate and share in Power BI — Microsoft). That is quite hard to unpick.
- Details
Heres a little cookbook of utilities that make working with Android devices easier.
TL:DR – Sync music or movies to your android device, pull videos our of your phone storage onto your computer, take a screenshot and save it on your local computer, record a movie of the screen of your android device – and more!
- Details
Read more: Using developer tools to transfer files on Android
So the 𝕏 logo above is taken from the X Brand toolkit and it looks ok and is a .png graphic. They also provide a .svg so you can create whatever size you need. But thats extra work managing images and who needs that?
The 𝕏 just above here isn't an image, its just a big single text character. <span style="font-size: 128pt;">𝕏</span>. This is much easier to deal with and the differences are imperceptible unless you line them up side by side.
Wait, whats this, the 𝕏 is just a font character!
Instead of using an image you can just use a Unicode symbol which has been around since 2001. Its called the Mathematical Double-Struck Capital X. Not exactly catchy but its helpful nonetheless. Because it has been around so long, it has widespread adoption in typefaces you might use. It also has what is known as an html entity, which makes it easy to type. Try 𝕏 on any web page editor and you'll see.
TL:DR — Mathematical Double-Struck Capital X was added to Unicode 3.1 in March 2001. Any difference from the X Corp design is imperceptible to me and it is trivial to add to any html page using and html entity 𝕏 which renders as 𝕏. Perfect!
- Details
Read more: Quick and easy 𝕏 Logo for Twitter for documents and websites
Introduction – The X / Twitter landscape has changed
You know when you think a baby has finally exhausted their ability to tantrum by throwing their rattle our of their pram. And at that point they become more even more destructive including of themselves and end up uncontrollably screaming. Well, thats where we are with X, the site formerly known as Twitter and I've had it. I'm out.
There is no tinge of sadness really because the site I've known since 2009 and the development community there that I loved and helped to nurture has been eviscerated. Theres nobody left there of the old place. The new place is a strange new land where I don't want to participate anymore.
So with that, I'm deleting all my X / Twitter accounts except for my original one, which is going to be left to auto tweet this blog and that's it. No more DM's, no more interaction. Just pushing content out for clicks. Their loss.
TL:DR – "I believe X / Twitter is finished. Its MySpace, Bebo, Friends Reunited, Geocities, msn, Aim, and Icq moment has come. I've had it. I'm out."
- Details
Read more: How to download tweets & delete your twitter account
Chromebooks have evolved. Their initial limitations have been overcome. Some models have emerged as contenders for development machines and theres probably no better place to look than at the sadly discontinued Google branded Chromebooks. All current new Chromebooks can run Android Studio for Linux, and Android simultaneously alongside the usual ChromeOS experience.
Once relegated to lightweight note-taking, these devices now have prowess, thanks to Google Play compatibility and the ability to run Android apps. The discerning developer audience, particularly those creating and testing Android apps, might just find a sweet spot here. Chromebooks enable app development without the sluggishness of emulators—offering the real deal with an authentic Android experience.
I still recommend the original Google Pixelbook i7, with its beautiful display, metal quality build and 16GB Ram and a 512GB SSD (at Computer Exchange for £290 in Spring 2024 - Google Pixelbook/i7-7Y75/16GB Ram/512GB SSD/13"/ChromeOS/B) or the newer widescreen Google Pixelbook Go i7, with 16GB Ram and a 256GB SSD (at Computer Exchange for £370 in Spring 2024 - Google Pixelbook Go/i7-8500Y/16GB Ram/256GB SSD/13"/ChromeOS/Just Black/B). These are still the best development chromebooks. Cheap chromebooks are awful. These are not! They make almost perfect development machines, excepting that you cannot build for iOS or macOS on a Chromebook, you will need a Mac for that!
- Details
Kali Linux – The most advanced penetration distribution. Ever. On Windows 11, via Windows Subsystem for Linux (WSL)
WSL enables you to run Linux on your Windows computer in a container. Kali provide this configuration via the Microsoft Store and its an easy way to get started if you already have Windows 11 and permission to install WSL and Kali Linux in your environment.
TL:DR – On Windows 11 with WSL 2.0 it "just works".
- Details
Limited time deal – 48% for prime day - starts at £129.99, down from £249.99
The new Amazon Fire Max 11 (May 2023) is a formidable contender for the best budget tablet available. It represents the 13th generation of innovation from Amazon with Fire OS which underneath the Amazon launcher is based on Android 11 with API level 30. Fire Max 11 promises to redefine your digital media consumption experience and it delivers. You can also turn it into a pro level editing and communication tablet if you want to add android apps to make it better at everything but there's a catch, and that is that you must take some time to learn just enough about Android tools, side loading and the free and open source app stores and their apps to make it into your perfect tablet. This is not difficult, does not require any firmware hacks or rooting the device and it is well worth the effort.
I bought an Amazon Fire Max 11 tablet (newest gen), our most powerful tablet yet, vivid 11" display, octa-core processor, 4 GB RAM, 14-hr battery life, 128 GB, Grey, without Ads on Prime day (for £189.99 - it went back to regular pricing of £299 after. As of May 2026 it has a regular price starting at £249 with ads but is often on offer at Amazon UK. I have been using it for almost three years now, so this article is based on my real world lived experience of this device not a freebie for a reviewer. I have used it far more than my iPad Pro 11 (4th Gen) which was around 5-6 times the price and far too heavy. I have now sold the iPad and kept the Fire Max.
I didn't buy the Amazon case, keyboard or stylus. Instead i opted for an SanDisk 1TB Ultra micro SD card + SD adapter (For Android Smartphones and Tablets (£73 from Amazon), a Shockproof Soft Silicone Scratch-Resistant Flex TPU Bumper Tablet Case Transparent Protective Case (Clear) (£10 from Amazon) and a Matte anti glare screen protector (£7.95 for two from Amazon). The total cost of the tablet and all these accessories was £271.91. At under £20 to protect your tablet from scratches, I'll never understand why people don't bother with cases and screen protectors!
Anyway, lets transform this tablet from being for Amazon media consumption only to wow it can do everything I need. Read on.
TL:DR — It's a keeper. I've had it since July 2023 now and experienced no issues. It is light, far lighter than an iPad, which matters when you're holding it to watch a movie or sports and this plus the vivid display and excellent construction makes it an excellent content consumption device and more!
- Details
Read more: Amazon Fire Max 11 - best value for the money tablet
- Worried about metadata leakage - mdls can help
- Getting started with Power Platform PowerApps CLI
- Use an Apple Magic Mouse on Windows 11 PC
- Use GitHub to deploy your Power Platform app (part 4)
- Publish Power Apps securely via GitHub (part 3)
- Publish Power Apps securely via GitHub (part 2)
- Publish Power Apps securely via GitHub (Part 1)
- Intel based Mac Ventura update needed EFI firmware
- Multiple VMware virtual machines on a Mac Studio
- Is there an equivalent to Quick Look for macOS on Windows?
- Project setup in Jira
- Sprint setup in Jira