Monday 9:00 AM - 5:00 PM · Room 344

Database Administration for the Non Database Administrator

In this all day session on Microsoft SQL Server we will be learning about how Microsoft SQL Server works, both in Azure and on-premises, and what needs to be done to keep it up and running smoothly when you don't have a full-time database administrator on staff to help you keep it running.

In this session, we will cover a variety of topics, including backups, upgrade paths, indexing, database maintenance, database corruption, patching, virtualization, disk configurations, high availability, database security, database mail, anti-viruses, scheduled jobs, and much, much more.

From a product perspective, we'll examine SQL Server in an Azure VM, Azure SQL DB, and Azure SQL DB Managed Instance, as well as the on-prem options, including SQL Server on-premises options, including Azure Arc hosted deployments.

After taking this full-day session on SQL Server you'll be prepared to take the information that we go over and get back to the office, get the SQL Server's patched and properly configured so that they run without giving you problems for years to come.

Monday 9:00 AM - 5:00 PM · Room 348

Introduction to Microsoft Fabric for the Data Professional

Join us for a full day of exploration into Microsoft Fabric, the revolutionary Software as a Service (SaaS) product that’s changing the game in Business Intelligence and Modern Analytics. For the last 3 years, Microsoft has been building this groundbreaking technology, which offers the ability to ingest and link to existing data without duplication. With Azure Synapse Data Engineering, Data Factory, Data Science, Data Warehousing, Realtime Analytics, and Power BI all at your fingertips, the possibilities are endless. In this pre-conference event, we’ll guide you through a full build scenario, showing you how to link existing data, and utilize OneLake. Join us and discover the power of Microsoft Fabric!

Tuesday 1:30 PM - 5:00 PM · Room 340-341

Maximize efficiency in your data-driven projects by leveraging AI and Copilot technologies.

In the Total Economic Impact™ of Microsoft Fabric study, the composite organization based on data from four companies using Fabric showed an increase in data engineer and data scientist productivity of up to 50%, plus a 15% increase in business analyst productivity.

In this workshop, we will explore the transformative potential of various copilots, AI services within Microsoft Fabric. It covers live demos and hands on experience on Microsoft Fabric Copilots, AI Skills, Fabric integration with AI and GenAI services.

Participants will thoroughly explore the Copilot maturity framework and learn strategies to overcome adoption challenges, enabling customers to maximize the benefits of Copilots.

Wednesday 8:30 AM - 9:40 AM · Room 320-321

Azure 101

Microsoft Azure is a daunting thing to look at and think about. In this session, we'll look at the basics of Azure, what the options are for setting up an Azure account; as well as look at how regions are broken down. We'll take a look at the differences between Infrastructure as a Service, Platform as a Service, and Software as a Service as well as the High Availability and Disaster Recovery options that are available to do with these services. We'll finish the session off by looking at some options for Virtual Machines within Azure as well as the SQL Server offerings that are available on the platform.

Wednesday 8:30 AM - 9:40 AM · Room 344

Microsoft Fabric: Lessons from Year 1

As of November 2023, Microsoft made the announcement that Microsoft Fabric was Generally Available. In the time since, many organizations jumped into the exciting world of this emerging technology.

Any fabric, technical or not, needs to be well maintained to retain its initial quality and usefulness. In the same way, your approach to implementing Microsoft Fabric could either set yourself up for a successful, long-term implementation, or one that needs a rebuild in 1-2 years.

In this session, I'll walk through features of Fabric that have lived up to the hyped labels and work as prescribed. I'll also provide demos challenges I've faced with the product and how I've worked through them. Finally, I'll recommend routine activities that should be performed on any Fabric environment to keep it nice and clean.

(If this wasn't enough Fabric references and you need more, check out this session for even more puns!)

Wednesday 8:30 AM - 9:40 AM · Room 345-346

Real-Time Intelligence: Turning Streaming Data into Smart Decisions

In today’s fast-paced world, making smart, data-driven decisions in real time is essential for maintaining efficiency and quality in business operations. Join us to explore Microsoft Fabric Real-Time Intelligence and discover how to seamlessly ingest, analyze, and act on real-time data. Learn how to:

1. Ingest real-time data from multiple sources into Fabric
2. Run lightning-fast queries for instant insights
3. Monitor key metrics with intuitive, real-time dashboards
4. Set up automated alerts and detect anomalies for proactive issue resolution
5. Leverage Copilot in Real-Time Intelligence to query data using natural language

Wednesday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 320-321

Fabric Data Factory: What's New and Roadmap

In this session, you will learn the exciting product innovations and roadmap for Fabric Data Factory. You will learn how Fabric Data Factory provides industry-leading data movement, transformation and orchestration capabilities. You will learn how AI-powered development experiences will enable you to be more productive and effectively build data integration solutions.

Wednesday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 340-341

Generate self-service governance dashboard using Microsoft Fabric and Purview

1. Data Ingestion & Integration Utilize Microsoft Fabric’s OneLake to unify governance data from Purview, M365, and third-party data sources. Implement Synapse Data Engineering to transform governance metadata into structured insights.
2. Governance Metrics & Compliance Monitoring Define key governance KPIs, including: * Data Quality Scores (accuracy, completeness, consistency). * Compliance Status (GDPR, HIPAA, industry-specific regulations). * Data Lineage & Sensitivity Labels (metadata classification). * User Access & Data Usage Trends.
3. Self-Service Dashboard with Purview Integrate Purview with Fabric for real-time metadata visualization. Design interactive dashboards in Power BI with drill-down capabilities for governance teams. Enable role-based access control for different user personas (CIO, Data Stewards, Compliance Officers).

Wednesday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 348

Getting started with SQL database in Fabric

Microsoft Fabric, the unified data platform, now includes an operational database solution and it is SQL! Come learn all the fundamentals of how this solution is the same and different from other SQL deployment options. We will also show you the value of using SQL in the Fabric ecosystem including developer experiences, automation, monitoring, and integration for AI applications.

Wednesday 2:00 PM - 3:10 PM · Room 344

PowerBI, DirectQuery and SQL Server. It is a good choice?

You will learn best practices, tips and tricks on how to successfully use SQL databases (OnPremise,IaaS, PaaS,SQL Managed Instance) with PowerBI on production environments.

How improve the performance, using for example, Read-Scale, HyperScale or Synapse, partitioning, ColumnStoreIndexes, Indexed views, etc..

How to monitor and diagnostic your database and find out issues with Query Data Store. These learnings are fruit of Microsoft CSS support cases, and customer field engagements.

Wednesday 2:00 PM - 3:10 PM · Room 348

Transform your business with integrated solutions using SQL database in Microsoft Fabric

The promise of SQL Database in Fabric is that it is simple, autonomous, and optimized for AI - but what does that mean for you and your organization? In this session we will explore how various personas can benefit from a deeply integrated operational database in Fabric. Discover how customers are using SQL Database in Microsoft Fabric today, and how Fabric databases can help you build innovative solutions in the age of AI, faster and easier than ever.

Wednesday 4:00 PM - 5:00 PM · Room 348

Visualization Magic in the Age of Numbers & Science

Power BI is a great sandbox environment for report design. However, knowing how to leverage visuals and features in a way that adds additional value can be challenging. New visualizations and features can be created a number of ways including: layering visuals, customizing visual formatting, and/or utilizing DAX measures. The session will include a series of visualization and reporting techniques that you'll be able to leverage in your company's reports to take them to the next level.

Thursday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 343

Become a project management samurai with Azure DevOps as your katana sword

Okey, so you have taken on the responsibility as a project manager or scrum master, and you want to plan your project, the tasks and the project team capacity. Should you do it like you usually do in excel, or do you want to try a cool tool, like Azure DevOps?

Azure DevOps has a lot of cool features, not only relevant for your Azure environment. In this session we will take a look at the “Boards” feature and how you can use that for project management, project team capacity planning and project progress reporting.

Let’s dive into Azure DevOps!

Thursday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 344

Microsoft Fabric and Azure Health Data Services

Bringing together diverse health data sources is essential for delivering healthcare solutions. Microsoft Fabric and Azure Health Data Services make it possible to integrate, manage, and analyze this data within a single platform to support patient care, claims processing, provider targeting, and more.

First, we'll explore the challenges in accessing and harmonizing various healthcare data types, highlighting how gaps in information can limit effective claims management, provider targeting, and timely interventions.

Next, we'll dive into how Fabric's advanced analytics capabilities enable the import and transformation of complex health datasets, including claims data and social determinants of health (SDOH).

Finally, we'll cover Azure Health Data Services' tools for securely exporting and managing health data, enhancing patient outreach, and supporting analytics for provider performance and network optimization. We'll see how combining Fabric's analytics with these services supports proactive care management, efficient claims handling, and strategic provider targeting.

Attendees will leave with a clear plan to use Microsoft Fabric and Azure Health Data Services for comprehensive healthcare data integration and analytics, enabling better patient care, improved claims processing, and effective provider engagement.

Thursday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 347

Hold my beer; I know how to fix this with Copilot!

Many proof-of-concept AI applications fail to reach production because industries do not find value in copilot-like applications. Companies seek clarity and focus, not an overwhelming barrage of chat applications bombarding decision-makers with countless suggestions or summarizations. This session will help you connect the dots in the AI puzzle using Microsoft technologies, including the new open-source database, DocumentDB. We will examine vector stores, the RAG pattern, and multi-agent frameworks and learn how to implement these technologies in applications. By the end of this session, you will have all the practical information necessary to integrate AI features into your projects.

Thursday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 348

10 Free SQL Databases: Your Playground for AI, Advanced Analytics, and Next-Gen Applications!

The Azure SQL free database offer is bigger than ever—now providing 10 free databases per subscription for life! This means unlimited opportunities to build, analyze, and innovate without worrying about costs.

In this session, you'll explore how to:

1. Unlock AI-driven insights by running ML models, anomaly detection, and intelligent recommendations directly in SQL 2.Power real-time analytics by processing and visualizing data streams for predictive forecasting and decision-making 3.Automate workflows and optimize data pipelines with SQL-based automation and event-driven processing 4.Enhance BI reporting and dashboarding with seamless integrations into Power BI and other analytics tools 5.Develop enterprise-grade applications, including AI-powered customer insights, fraud detection, financial forecasting, IoT telemetry, and marketing personalization 6.Set up multi-database environments for development, experimentation, and CI/CD pipelines—all without affecting production

Whether you're a developer, data scientist, or analytics enthusiast, this session will show you how to harness the full power of SQL for AI and analytics—with zero cost and limitless possibilities.

Join us and take your data-driven applications to the next level!

Thursday 12:40 PM - 1:50 PM · Room 320-321

Choosing the Right Data Store--An Overview of Azure Data Platform Choices

There are several different data platform solutions for use within your application. Selecting the right option can make the difference between a well-performing application and a poorly performing one; not to mention the cost aspect of choosing the wrong solution.

In this session we'll look at the options of Azure SQL Database, Azure SQL Database Managed Instance, and Cosmos DB to see when these are all going to be the correct option, and when these aren't going to be the right option; both from a price and performance perspective.

Thursday 12:40 PM - 1:50 PM · Room 342

Transform Your Business with Real-Time Intelligence: Microsoft Fabric Meets Dynamics 365

Abstract: Imagine your Dynamics 365 data not just as a record-keeping system, but as a live, actionable resource driving real-time decisions across your organization. In this session, we’ll dive deep into how Microsoft Fabric enhances Dynamics 365 with real-time intelligence, enabling you to unlock new opportunities for operational efficiency and innovation. We’ll start by demonstrating how to implement event sourcing to capture and process changes in Dynamics 365 in a real time fashion way, integrating into Microsoft Fabric’s powerful analytics and data integration capabilities. Using real client success stories, you’ll see how these patterns enable instant updates, real-time reporting, and proactive decision-making. You’ll also experience live demos showcasing the full lifecycle of real-time data integration—from capturing events in Dynamics 365 and transforming them in Fabric pipelines, to visualizing actionable insights in Power BI and bringing them back into Dataverse to empower your teams.

In this session you will learn how event sourcing and modern integration patterns bring data to life, through real client success stories and live demos.

What You’ll Learn:

• How to set up real-time data pipelines between Dynamics 365 and Microsoft Fabric.
• Practical event-sourcing patterns for building seamless, scalable integrations.
• Techniques to surface actionable insights back into Dynamics 365 and Dataverse to empower decision-making.
• Best practices for operationalizing real-time intelligence with minimal disruption to your existing architecture.

Why Attend:

You’ll leave this session with a step-by-step understanding of how to create real-time intelligence solutions, backed by practical examples and real-world use cases. Whether you're a data professional, architect, or Dynamics 365 expert, this session will give you actionable tools and insights to take back to your organization.

Post-Session Outcomes:

• Start building your first real-time integration using Microsoft Fabric and Dynamics 365.
• Access resources, templates, and best practices shared during the session to accelerate your implementation.
• Connect with like-minded professionals to collaborate and share ideas.

Call to Action:

Don’t just learn—act! After the session, you’ll be encouraged to apply what you’ve seen, with resources and next steps to kickstart your real-time intelligence journey. Let’s turn your data into a strategic advantage!

Thursday 12:40 PM - 1:50 PM · Room 347

Unleash the Power of SQL Database in Fabric: Innovate Without Limits Using the Free Trial

Curious about SQL Database in Fabric but unsure where to start? This session is your gateway to limitless innovation—completely free. Discover how to leverage the Fabric free trial to explore serverless computing, real-time analytics, and AI-powered insights—all without cost or commitment.

We’ll walk you through hands-on scenarios, best practices, and real-world workflows that showcase the full potential of SQL Database in Fabric. Learn how to automate processes, optimize performance, and seamlessly integrate SQL with other Fabric components to drive efficiency and scale effortlessly.

Whether you're a developer, data engineer, or tech innovator, this session will give you the tools to experiment, build, and unlock new capabilities—risk-free. Don't miss this opportunity to transform your data solutions and bring your ideas to life with zero barriers, zero cost, and endless possibilities.

Thursday 12:40 PM - 1:50 PM · Room 348

Azure SQL DB Hyperscale: The Definitive Modern Database Choice​

Join us at DataCon to explore the Azure SQL Database Hyperscale. We'll discuss its architecture and use cases, highlighting benefits like larger database sizes, faster throughput, and continuous priming. Learn how these advancements boost scalability, speed, and reliability in data management. Stay ahead with the cutting-edge features of Azure SQL Database Hyperscale. We'll dive into real-world use cases and innovations that demonstrate the power of Azure SQL in driving the next generation of databases. Discover how organizations are leveraging Hyperscale for mission-critical applications, and how vector support enhances performance for complex queries and AI workloads. Experience firsthand the transformative impact of Azure SQL Database in various industries and understand why it is the preferred choice for modern data solutions.

Thursday 4:00 PM - 5:10 PM · Room 320-321

Rethinking Databases: Blockchain for Security, Trust, and Transparency

In an era where data breaches, fraud, and lack of transparency plague traditional databases, blockchain emerges as a revolutionary solution for secure and trusted data management. This session explores how blockchain technology is transforming the way we store, access, and verify data—eliminating single points of failure, enhancing security, and ensuring transparency like never before.

I'll dive into the core principles of blockchain that make it a superior alternative to traditional databases, from immutability and cryptographic security to decentralized trust mechanisms. Attendees will gain insights into real-world applications across industries such as finance, healthcare, and supply chain, showcasing how blockchain is redefining data integrity and ownership.

Whether you’re a developer, business leader, or tech enthusiast, this session will equip you with the knowledge to understand why blockchain is the future of secure and transparent databases—and how your organization can leverage it for a more trusted digital ecosystem.

Thursday 4:00 PM - 5:10 PM · Room 343

SQL Server 2025: The Enterprise AI ready database

Come learn about the latest information for SQL Server 2025, now in preview. You will learn how to bring AI to your data with AI applications using built-in vector capabilities ground to cloud. In addition, you will learn about new enhancements for developers including JSON, RegEx, REST API, GraphQL, Change Streaming. You will also learn about all the new engine features for security, performance, and availability. You will also see how to integrate your SQL Server 2025 experience using the new SSMS21 and SSMS Copilot.

Friday 9:00 AM - 10:10 AM · Room 320-321

Azure SQL Database Hyperscale elastic pools - a deep-dive

Azure SQL Database offers a very popular deployment option called elastic pools, to help ease the challenges around right-sizing and cost-optimizing resources for a group of databases. In this session, we will dive deep into the latest generation of elastic pools which leverage the Hyperscale cloud-native architecture. Starting with a quick overview of the motivation for using elastic pools, and a quick recap of the Hyperscale tech, we will use demos to show you:

• How Hyperscale elastic pools ("HSEP") implement resource sharing...
• ... while maintaining strong isolation between databases -  What are the performance and capacity limits of each HSEP
• How you can proactively control "noisy neighbor" databases in a HSEP
• How HSEP scales vertically and / or horizontally, and what the impact of such scaling is on your workloads
• How to monitor HSEP effectively using DMVs, Azure Monitor and Database Watcher
• How backups, high availability, and disaster recovery work for databases in a HSEP
• Last but not the least, how HSEP helps in cost optimization - and what you should watch out for as well to manage TCO.

To make best use of this session, some Azure SQL knowledge would help, but it's not necessary. Anyone who plans to run databases in Azure SQL should be aware of elastic pools so that they can benefit from the optimizations they provide. This session will directly help you in understanding how HSEP work and how they may be beneficial to your scenario.

Friday 9:00 AM - 10:10 AM · Room 342

Building a Data Culture

Data is a core part of our lives that influences all parts of business, from how we implement technology, to our establishment of business processes, all the way to individuals themselves. We solve tech and business process problems every day, but do we solve people problems?

How are people problems solved? With company culture. And culture can make or break data projects as easily as tech and process problems.

In this session, we'll talk about a company culture's influence on their ability to be data driven. We will identify common pitfalls that can influence how well your organization will be able to use data. We will also identify ways you can identify, and even measure, the data culture in your organization.

Friday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 320-321

Make your solution sparkle with the medallion architecture

As a data engineer you spend a lot of time transforming data into data models that in turn will be used to provide insights to your organization. As the lines between the technical and business roles become more and more blurred it is even more important to establish a solid data architecture.

In this session we will demystify the medallion architecture and its different layers. We will showcase how you can use it in your solutions like Azure Databricks or Microsoft Fabric as well as digging into the benefits of using a non-technical approach when collaboration between different data roles increases even more.

If you are a data engineer, a data analyst, a business analyst or a business representative consuming analytical data, this session is for you. You will by the end of this session identify how your data flows through the layers of the medallion architecture and what data to use for different use cases.

Friday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 344

Harnessing the Power of Data Mesh: A Deep Dive into the Four Pillars of Modern Data Architecture

Abstract: In today's data-driven world, traditional data management approaches often struggle to keep pace with the growing complexity and scale of enterprise data. Enter Data Mesh, a revolutionary paradigm that redefines how organizations handle data. This session will explore the four foundational pillars of Data Mesh architecture: Domain-Oriented Decentralization, Data as a Product, Self-Serve Data Infrastructure, and Federated Computational Governance.

We'll delve into how Domain-Oriented Decentralization empowers teams to own and manage their data, fostering agility and innovation. Discover the concept of Data as a Product, where data is treated with the same rigor and care as any other product, ensuring quality and usability. Learn about Self-Serve Data Infrastructure, which democratizes data access and tooling, enabling teams to work independently and efficiently. Finally, understand the importance of Federated Computational Governance in maintaining security, compliance, and consistency across decentralized data environments.

Join us to gain insights into implementing Data Mesh in your organization, transforming your data strategy, and unlocking the full potential of your data assets.

Friday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 347

AI and SQL ground to cloud to fabric

New to AI? Come learn the fundamentals of how to get started with AI and Microsoft SQL everywhere it exists: ground to cloud to fabric. This includes SQL Server 2025, Azure SQL, and SQL database in Fabric. SQL is the perfect place to integrate data with AI because of its industry proven security, scalability, and availability. We will show GenAI capabilities like vector search, how to integrate these with your application, and Copilot experiences everywhere SQL exists including GitHub Copilot.

Friday 10:20 AM - 11:30 AM · Room 348

Microsoft Database Docs - Learn about Contributing for your Career

Join content developers from the Microsoft Database Docs content team for an interactive discussion and call to action on modern Microsoft docs. Learn about the Docs publishing process in GitHub, and the best ways to add content and fixes to Docs that are read by the entire customer community. We'll also ask for your feedback on Docs and host Q&A. Learn what contribution to Microsoft Learn can mean for your Microsoft MVP status, your career, or your personal brand.

Friday 12:30 PM - 1:40 PM · Room 347

Build AI Apps Smarter: Optimize SQL Database Costs & Performance in Fabric

Take your AI apps to the next level with cost-smart SQL database optimization in Fabric. This session explores how to maximize performance while minimizing costs by leveraging Fabric's capacity monitoring tools for SQL databases. Learn to track resource usage, identify inefficiencies, and optimize database performance—all without exceeding your budget. Designed for app developers, architects, and innovators, this talk will provide real-world strategies to build scalable, high-performing AI apps powered by intelligent SQL database cost management. Discover how to turn insights into action and supercharge your AI applications with Fabric

Friday 12:30 PM - 1:40 PM · Room 348

Unleashing Modern Data Warehousing: Architecture, Insights & Future Innovations in Fabric Warehouse

Join us for a deep dive into the modern data warehouse! We’ll break down the core principles, use cases, and architectural intricacies. Discover how innovations like Data Virtualization, enhanced Data Modeling experiences, AI-powered insights with Copilot, and more are helping developers and customers unlock the full potential of Fabric Warehouse. This session is packed with live demos, best practices, and an exciting glimpse into the future roadmap of Data Warehousing.

Friday 1:50 PM - 3:00 PM · Room 340-341

Realtime product review data analysis for Retail using Fabric RTI, Purview and Azure Open AI

This session focuses on leveraging Microsoft Fabric's Real-Time Intelligence and Generative AI capabilities to monitor and analyze streaming customer review data in retail. Participants will learn how to:

1. Ingest and process streaming data from customer reviews in real-time.
2. Utilize AI agents to detect anomalies in sentiment trends and unusual patterns.
3. Generate insights using Microsoft Fabric’s Real-Time Intelligence, Co-Pilot Studio, and ML notebooks.

Friday 1:50 PM - 3:00 PM · Room 344

Mirroring in Microsoft Fabric - Overview and Roadmap

Microsoft Fabric accelerates data potential for the era for AI. Mirroring simplifies linking of external databases into Fabric, with full replicas created with just a couple of clicks. Once a database is mirrored, real-time updates will automatically be replicated into OneLake and stored as Delta Parquet, an analytics-ready format that works seamlessly for every analytics workload in Fabric. Join us to gain deeper insights and learn how to get started with Mirroring by bringing data gravity to unlock powerful insights in Fabric.