A CTO’s perspective on cloud architecture, AI development, AI-driven DevOps, and building the engineering teams that ship — plus straight advice for fellow tech leaders. By Michael Richardson.https://richardsoncloud.com/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/hello-richardson-cloud/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/hello-richardson-cloud/The blog moved off WordPress to a static site on Azure Static Web Apps — and I rebuilt it the way I think we should all be building now: with AI-driven DevOps.Mon, 13 Jul 2026 00:00:00 GMTWhy Cloudazuredevopsaistatic-web-appsmetahttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-vmss-zonal-expansion/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-vmss-zonal-expansion/Azure's VMSS zonal expansion lets you add availability zones to a live scale set instead of rebuilding it. Here's how it works, the validation gotchas, and what it doesn't fix.Tue, 10 Dec 2024 00:00:00 GMTAzure Architectureazurevirtual-machine-scale-setsavailability-zoneshigh-availabilityazure-architecturehttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-vm-hibernation-same-bill-as-stopped/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-vm-hibernation-same-bill-as-stopped/Hibernating an Azure VM costs exactly what stopping it does. The real trade-off is a bigger OS disk and losing Azure Backup, Spot, and Availability Sets, not the monthly bill.Tue, 06 Aug 2024 00:00:00 GMTAzure Architectureazurevirtual-machinescost-optimizationhibernationazure-virtual-desktophttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-bastion-developer-sku/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-bastion-developer-sku/Azure Bastion Developer gives you no-public-IP RDP/SSH access to one VM for $0/hour. Microsoft made the secure path the free path. Here's what it does, its real limits, and how it compares.Tue, 16 Jul 2024 00:00:00 GMTAzure Networkingazurebastionnetworkingsecuritycost-optimizationhttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/your-default-azure-vm-backup-policy-has-a-blind-spot/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/your-default-azure-vm-backup-policy-has-a-blind-spot/Azure Backup's Standard policy for VMs only runs daily or weekly. Enhanced Policy's crash-consistent restore points fix that, and solve a harder problem: keeping multi-disk snapshots consistent.Tue, 11 Jun 2024 00:00:00 GMTAzure Storageazurebackupdisaster-recoverystorageazure-vmhttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-b-series-burstable-vms-cpu-credits/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-b-series-burstable-vms-cpu-credits/B-series VMs use a CPU credit model instead of guaranteed performance. For bursty workloads, that's roughly half the cost of a general-purpose VM. Here's how the credits actually work.Mon, 05 Feb 2024 00:00:00 GMTAzure Architectureazurevirtual-machinescost-optimizationb-serieshttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/front-door-vs-traffic-manager-vs-cross-region-lb/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/front-door-vs-traffic-manager-vs-cross-region-lb/Azure has three services that all claim to route users to the right region. They're not interchangeable. Here's the actual difference, and how to pick.Tue, 14 Nov 2023 00:00:00 GMTAzure Networkingazurefront-doortraffic-managerload-balancerarchitecturehttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-ddos-protection/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-ddos-protection/Why is our web app down or super slow to load all of a sudden?! Traffic numbers are through the roof! What is going on? Did we go viral? And that is how a denial of service attack looks. An…Wed, 24 May 2023 00:00:00 GMTAzure Networkingazureddossecurityhttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/the-future-of-azure-hybrid/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/the-future-of-azure-hybrid/Azure Hybrid services offer several key benefits and the future services that are coming are even more exciting.Thu, 09 Feb 2023 00:00:00 GMTAzure Hybridazurehybridarcstack-hcihttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-virtual-desktop-keeps-your-data-secure-but-flexible/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/azure-virtual-desktop-keeps-your-data-secure-but-flexible/How to use Azure Virtual Desktop to keep your data secure while still empowering your users and giving them flexibility to work anywhere.Mon, 16 Jan 2023 00:00:00 GMTAzure Virtual Desktopavdsecuritydata-protectionhttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/how-azure-virtual-desktop-transforms-remote-access/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/how-azure-virtual-desktop-transforms-remote-access/Azure Virtual Desktop transforms remote access by enabling a more cloud native approach while enhancing securityThu, 15 Dec 2022 00:00:00 GMTAzure Virtual Desktopavdremote-accesshttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/how-azure-virtual-desktop-enables-zero-trust/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/how-azure-virtual-desktop-enables-zero-trust/Deploying Azure Virtual Desktop enables a zero trust security model for applications that don't natively support strong authentication.Mon, 28 Nov 2022 00:00:00 GMTAzure Virtual Desktopavdsecurityzero-trusthttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/what-is-azure-virtual-desktop/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/what-is-azure-virtual-desktop/An overview of Azure Virtual Desktop and how it can enable your organization to achieve your key IT initiatives.Mon, 28 Nov 2022 00:00:00 GMTAzure Virtual Desktopavdazurehttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/reduce-azure-firewall-costs/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/reduce-azure-firewall-costs/Reduce your Azure Firewall costs by stopping it when you don't need it with a few simple commands that can be easily automated.Wed, 02 Nov 2022 00:00:00 GMTAzure Networkingazurefirewallcostpowershellhttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/new-azure-storage-options/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/new-azure-storage-options/An analysis of the new Azure storage options released around Ignite 2022 including Elastic SAN and premium SSDv2.Fri, 28 Oct 2022 00:00:00 GMTAzure Storageazurestorageignitenewshttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/new-azure-firewall-basic/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/new-azure-firewall-basic/An overview of the new Azure Firewall Basic offering and how it compares with other Azure network security solutions.Mon, 24 Oct 2022 00:00:00 GMTAzure Networkingazurefirewallnewshttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/implement-a-highly-available-azure-vpn/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/implement-a-highly-available-azure-vpn/The documentation I wish I had when went to design and implement a highly available Azure VPN solution with Palo Alto.Wed, 05 Oct 2022 00:00:00 GMTAzure Networkingazurevpnvwanbgphttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/cloud-is-a-model-not-a-place/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/cloud-is-a-model-not-a-place/Cloud is a model of using modern tools and innovative solutions to deliver high value IT services to your business quickly and at scale.Mon, 03 Oct 2022 00:00:00 GMTWhy Cloudcloudstrategymodernizationhttps://richardsoncloud.com/blog/wordpress-on-azure/https://richardsoncloud.com/blog/wordpress-on-azure/Deploying a globally scalable WordPress site on Azure. Cloud native services and marketplace images make this easy to deploy and maintain.Fri, 30 Sep 2022 00:00:00 GMTAzure Architectureazurewordpressapp-service