Justin Bird 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿
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justinjbird.com
Justin Bird 🏴󠁧󠁢󠁷󠁬󠁳󠁿
@justinjbird.com
430 followers 340 following 650 posts
The digital projection of my mental self.

Organises @retrodata.live and @dataweekender.com runs a @codeclub.bsky.social, director of @swiftanalytics.uk.

swfta.uk/justin
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justinjbird.com
Damn that's cold...the "what's new in Synapse Analytics" link directs to Microsoft Fabric 😆
The next steps section of the FAQ page of Synapse Analytics has a link that says "What's New in Azure Synapse Analytics" The page that returned is "What's new in Microsoft Fabric?"
November 6, 2025 at 6:13 PM
justinjbird.com
One of the features Apple has added to the OS lately which I'm super appreciative of is the ability to totally override icon styles...
A screenshot showing the horribly garish new icons for Outlook and Teams, but both are blue with simple shading.
October 21, 2025 at 11:46 AM
justinjbird.com
The enshittification of the interweb
Shitty Wales Online....one of the shittiest experiences on the internet already...now has a cookie pop up that requires you to consent to das and data sharing, or pay £2.99 a month for your privacy. So I'll go read somewhere else kthanxbye
October 9, 2025 at 9:44 PM
justinjbird.com
Starting in one hour!

@brianbonk.bsky.social joins us to discuss working with #RealTimeIntelligence in #PowerBI. As #MicrosoftFabric continues to grow, more developers are working with this tech. Learn practical tools that you can apply today.

Join us! www.meetup.com/datawales/ev...
October 1, 2025 at 4:00 PM
justinjbird.com
📅 Wed 2025-10-01

Tomorrow! @brianbonk.bsky.social joins us to discuss working with #RealTimeIntelligence in #PowerBI. As #MicrosoftFabric continues to grow, more developers are working with this tech. Learn practical tools that you can apply today.

Join us! www.meetup.com/datawales/ev...
September 30, 2025 at 12:00 PM
justinjbird.com
Bought it. I did enjoy it. A wonderful celebration of Douglas Adams. Some awesome back stories and reflections on his view of the world and how that has panned out.

I was reminded of this from The Restaurant at the End of the Universe, and yeah…
The major problem—one of the major problems, for there are several—one of the many major problems with governing people is that of whom you get to do it; or rather of who manages to get people to let them do it to them. To summarize: it is a well-known fact that those people who must want to rule people are, ipso facto, those least suited to do it. To summarize the summary: anyone who is capable of getting themselves made President should on no account be allowed to do the job.
September 28, 2025 at 10:03 AM
justinjbird.com
Noted 🫡
Here I am in a quarry in South Wales with Maple a golden poochon checking my feed instead of the view so now I’m going away. A timely nudge from Cathrine
September 26, 2025 at 9:38 AM
justinjbird.com
I'm trying to register a W11 VM to my tenant and log in with my work account. I registered the device through a local account. When signing in with my work account it hangs registering Windows Hello. I have given password and done MFA but now it just sits here, anyone come across / resolved this...?
A screenshot of my Windows 11 VM with the Windows Hello panel just sat doing nothing.
September 22, 2025 at 11:39 AM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! "Defining What's Normal" - Aaron Cutshall covers #database #normalization principles, performance impact, and when it's OK to break the rules at #RetroData! 📐

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 19, 2025 at 4:58 PM
justinjbird.com
Someone has lost their mind [insert Jeff Goldblum something something you didn’t ask whether you should]…
Every distinct set of icons in a menu bar are wrapped in their own pane of glass and just what is the point
September 19, 2025 at 8:01 AM
justinjbird.com
And EVERY window I open, I’m finding the prominence of this draws my attention away from the actual window because it is in glass on a flat plane in most windows. Why did we need this?
A screenshot of preferences. The fundamental thing I’m showing is the the back and forward icons are in glass and consequently are pronounced because of the shading and colour choices
September 19, 2025 at 7:56 AM
justinjbird.com
Upgraded to Tahoe and the new glass thing is…uhhh…weird? I do like some of the styling, the edging of icons is nice but the new standard colour for folders is horrible. I don’t know why I need all apps to respond to underlying colours and who signed this off?!?!
A screenshot of a finder window, the sidebar has the new “glass” layout which means that it is isolated from the rest of the window in a “glass” rectangle with rounded corners but the status bar is still a constant bar on the underside of the finder window and so there is a this ghastly overlap where the sidebar just runs over the top of the sidebar.
September 19, 2025 at 7:46 AM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! Why does #SQLServer use some indexes but not others? @sqlballs.com dives into indexing internals and SQL Server's C++ architecture to make your queries faster at #RetroData ⚡

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 19, 2025 at 7:33 AM
justinjbird.com
Friday feed cleanser.

My daughter went to Uni last weekend with a bunch of photos, and this was one of them.

Maple at about 3 months old. Consumed by a reasonably small doughnut toy.
Maple is now a now poochon but much darker at this age. Her nose is sunk inside a pink iced doughnut toy.
September 19, 2025 at 7:10 AM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! #DataModeling 101 with Markus! Learn core concepts through Microsoft Data Platform - from normalised schemas to #StarSchemas across #SQLServer, #PowerBI & Azure at #RetroData ⭐

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 18, 2025 at 4:58 PM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! Choosing the right #database for your project? Susan Vanderford walks through relational, document, key-value stores & more - helping you make the right call at #RetroData 🗄️

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 18, 2025 at 7:33 AM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! Stop just dumping data in your lake! Mathias Halkjaer shows how proper data structure planning can dramatically enhance security, partitioning & performance at #RetroData 🏗️

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 17, 2025 at 4:58 PM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! #RowLevelSecurity in #PowerBI demystified! Leslie Welch's Monty Python-inspired workshop covers RLS from setup to enterprise challenges at #RetroData 🛡️

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 17, 2025 at 7:33 AM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! "Accidental Data Lies" - Juliana Smith exposes how innocent charts can mislead! Learn to create visuals that tell the truth and earn trust at #RetroData 📊

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 16, 2025 at 4:58 PM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! #SQL execution plans feeling daunting? @hugokornelis.bsky.social breaks down where to start reading them when your queries are running slow at #RetroData. Perfect for SQL troubleshooting! 🔍

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 16, 2025 at 7:33 AM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! Building a €100 #DataWarehouse with Azure? Yes, really! @koenv.bsky.social shows how small companies can build dirt-cheap analytics with #AzureDataFactory, #SQLDB & #PowerBI at #RetroData 💰

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 15, 2025 at 4:58 PM
justinjbird.com
This weekend! Don't miss Indira Bandari's "Lessons from the Trenches: Real-World #ETL/#ELT Horror Stories" at #RetroData! Learn from common pipeline pitfalls and battle-tested solutions that actually work 💪

Register: www.meetup.com/retro-data/e...
September 15, 2025 at 7:33 AM
justinjbird.com
You get these options, it's not fine grained but you do have some choice. If that isn't enough you could explore BetterDisplay github.com/waydabber/Be... I haven't used it in anger so can't say if it solves your problem but know that it offers quite a bit of detail!
September 14, 2025 at 8:51 PM
justinjbird.com
Last chance! Microsoft are offering a 50% discount on data exams if you join the Fabric community by 15/09:

- PL-300: Power BI Data Analyst
- DP-600: Fabric Analytics Engineer
- DP-700: Fabric Data Engineer
- DP-900: Azure Data Fundamentals

More details: buff.ly/MAt4rjy
September 14, 2025 at 11:10 AM
justinjbird.com
When you know your SEO needs a bit of work cc @gethynellis.bsky.social
A screenshot from google images, "Gethyn Ellis" is in the search bar and fourth hit is a picture of me, the link is from Twitter but says "Gethyn Ellis" underneath.
September 9, 2025 at 11:56 AM