// Accessibility

A countdown app where every countdown is a URL. Create custom countdowns, timers, and world clocks for any occasion with multiple visual themes and instant URL sharing.

Chris continues exploring Copilot Agent Mode and custom instructions by building a memory sequence game for the GitHub CLI extension project in Go. The changelog segment covers GitHub CLI accessibility improvements, Copilot Code Review expanding to all languages, Copilot Autofix updates, and the introduction of Copilot premium requests.

If there's an easy way to achieve something, then I'm all for it! You may have noticed that I've been putting a lot of effort into refactoring my site and open sourcing the original Cloud With Chris theme. I've now released that as the Hugo Creator theme for Hugo. As part of the refactoring process into a reusable theme, I had to make several breaking changes. This meant that I'd need to update the contents of my site. I want to share a quick tip that I discovered to add captions to my images in markdown.

A double episode catching up on two weeks of Azure updates including AKS scale down modes, Cosmos DB Functions v4, and Azure Functions runtime 4.0 with .NET 6, plus GitHub CLI 2.0, Advanced Security secret scanning APIs, and a look at secretless application patterns with managed identities.

Chris covers a wave of Azure service deprecations and retirements scheduled through 2022-2024, the launch of GitHub CLI 2.0 with its new extension model, and npm's TLS 1.0/1.1 deprecation. He highlights an impactful accessibility episode with Kaizota about hearing impairment at tech conferences, discusses GitHub branch protection rules for shifting left on code quality, and shares insights on Azure Front Door Standard and Premium tiers.

Hearing impairment affects an estimated 430 million people worldwide — yet accessibility in public speaking is still an afterthought for most presenters. Kai Saata, a data consultant and cochlear implant user, joins Chris to explain why closed captions matter for audiences with hearing difficulties, how cloud-powered live transcription in tools like Microsoft Teams is changing inclusive communication, and what every speaker can do today to make their content accessible to more people.

Chris opens with a heartfelt tribute to Abel Wang before covering Azure updates including Site Recovery cross-region replication, ExpressRoute expansions, and immutable blob storage. The episode highlights GitHub's 15+ new code scanning integrations with open source security tools, a comparison of Azure Static Web Apps hosting options, and upcoming Cloud with Chris content plans.

Chris plays Sea of Thieves with community members James, Simon, and Dean while delivering Azure updates on Bastion Standard SKU, Application Insights authentication, and Windows 365 from Microsoft Inspire. The episode also covers GitHub blog highlights including GitHub Copilot and Issues forms, plus a discussion on making Cloud with Chris more accessible.

I've recently been on a journey. I've recently come across a number of accessibility issues on cloudwithchris.com. I've been working on making the site more accessible, and I've also been working on making it more inclusive. In this blog post, I'm going to outline some of my findings, the tools that I used to identify those, and how I've worked to fix them. This is an ongoing project, so I'll provide further posts as it makes sense.

Chris marks two months of weekly vlogging with a big career update: leaving FastTrack for Azure to become a Cloud Solution Architect in Microsoft's UK Customer Success Unit, focusing on the Manufacturing & Resources industry. The cloudwithchris.com site is also refreshed with a PodScribe-powered interactive transcript player that highlights spoken words in real time and enables crowd-sourced corrections — a meaningful accessibility improvement. Azure news is substantial this week, headlined by Azure RBAC for Key Vault data plane reaching GA (enabling secret- and certificate-level access control) and Azure Front Door Standard & Premium entering preview with private origin support via Private Link.