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Michael McCarthy

Michael is veteran software engineer and cloud computing aficionado. After starting his career as a Java software engineer, he evolved into a consultant, focusing first on enterprise content management and later on AWS. He is currently an AWS Cloud Practitioner and AWS Solutions Architect Associate, although he has held many more certifications in the past.

Zoom Bulk Meeting Scheduler Script

Recently I was working with a higher education client that was interested in an easier way to create Zoom meetings in bulk. I leveraged an existing project and made some very simple changes. The existing project was https://github.com/rnag/zoom-api-helper. A Excel spreadsheet with the Zoom meeting data is needed. It looks like this: Group Name Zoom Username Topic Meeting Date Meeting Time Duration Hr Duration Min Meeting URL Meeting ID Passcode… Read More »Zoom Bulk Meeting Scheduler Script

5 Challenges with Cloud Computing

Cloud computing is a whole different IT model than on premises. Even if you have a software defined data center (SDDC), you will run into challenges with cloud computing. Here are just a few of the big challenges that you may run into with cloud computing. Over Provisioning One of the strategies we learned when provisioning servers in the data center was to over provision. You needed the server to… Read More »5 Challenges with Cloud Computing

Writing an SCP in AWS: An Introduction

Preventive guardrails are a key component of cloud governance. (Cloud governance is the process of defining and creating policies to control costs, minimize security risks, and improve efficiency.) In AWS, preventive guardrails are SCPs (Service Control Policies). Eventually you may need a preventive guardrail in AWS that is not already available. In this case, writing an SCP is an option. Beware, SCPs do have logical limitations on what you can… Read More »Writing an SCP in AWS: An Introduction

Keeping Clients Happy at Tribloom

This week we will be talking about something a little different than usual, how do we keep clients happy at Tribloom. First and foremost, we do a great job. This is just the beginning though. A long time ago I heard some advice: people want do do business with people that they know, trust, and like. Thus, that is what we will discuss in more detail. Getting to Know You… Read More »Keeping Clients Happy at Tribloom

AWS Backup: A Tool for Central Backup Management

You probably already know that backing up your systems is an important part of responsible IT management. Specifically, it can help your safeguard against malware, ransomware, disasters, and intrusion. Any mission critical system needs a backup plan. Certainly, a backup may be your only way to recover from one of the previously mentioned, or any other potential disaster. You may not be aware that AWS provides a service called AWS… Read More »AWS Backup: A Tool for Central Backup Management

How to use AWS Systems Manager for Remediation

Remediating non-compliant AWS resources is a key component of cloud governance. One of the goals of cloud governance is creating policies to control costs and minimize security risks. Automated remediation is the best way to enforce policies, or guardrails. AWS Systems Manager is one tool that AWS provides to automatically remediate non-compliant resources. What is AWS Systems Manager? AWS Systems Manager, formerly called Amazon Simple Systems Manager or SSM, is… Read More »How to use AWS Systems Manager for Remediation

AWS Control Tower

AWS Control Tower: A Tool for Cloud Governance

What is AWS Control Tower? AWS Control Tower is a service that provides for cloud governance for a multi-account AWS environment. (Cloud Governance is the process of defining and creating policies to control costs, minimize security risks, and improve efficiency.) It does this by orchestrating several other AWS services, including AWS Organizations, AWS Service Catalog, and AWS IAM Identity Center (successor to AWS Single Sign-On). Control Tower accomplishes this primarily… Read More »AWS Control Tower: A Tool for Cloud Governance

Serverless Computing

Serverless Computing, What is it and Why Should You Use it

What is Serverless Computing? In the most general sense, serverless computing is an execution model where the cloud provider manages and maintains the servers for you. Technically, it isn’t serverless computing, but to you the user, you don’t have to worry about or deal with any servers. Since you don’t have to manage the servers, there are no infrastructure management tasks, operating system maintenance, application upgrades, or capacity provisioning. Why… Read More »Serverless Computing, What is it and Why Should You Use it

Cloud Security

Cloud Governance and Cloud Security using AWS Config

Cloud Governance is the process of defining and creating policies to control costs, minimize security risks, and improve efficiency. On AWS, cloud security often starts with preventive and detective guardrails. We will be discussing cloud security using AWS Config here, otherwise known as detective guardrails. What is AWS Config? AWS Config is a service that records configuration changes to your AWS resources. This includes recording how resources are connected to… Read More »Cloud Governance and Cloud Security using AWS Config

Linitations of Preventative Guardrails

Limitations of Preventive Guardrails in AWS

Cloud Governance is the process of defining and creating policies to control costs, minimize security risks, and improve efficiency. One tool for securing AWS is preventative guardrails. Preventive guardrails in AWS are accomplished using AWS Service Control Policies (SCPs). There are limitations of preventive guardrails that limit you from implementing certain rules. We will explore some of those here and describe why they cannot be accomplished. Types of Rules that… Read More »Limitations of Preventive Guardrails in AWS

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