https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev Deep-dive operational blueprints, architecture decision records, and FinOps guides from Raphael Gab-Momoh, 5x Microsoft MVP. en-us https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/azure-postgresql-ai-rag-applications https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/azure-postgresql-ai-rag-applications Mon, 31 Aug 2026 23:00:00 GMT A granular walkthrough of turning Azure Database for PostgreSQL into an AI application backend — pgvector embeddings, semantic search, in-database Azure OpenAI calls, a full RAG pipeline, and a simple generative agent. Azure Database for PostgreSQL pgvector RAG Azure OpenAI AI https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/azure-postgresql-migration-and-high-availability https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/azure-postgresql-migration-and-high-availability Mon, 31 Aug 2026 23:00:00 GMT A granular DBA-level walkthrough — migrating a database with minimal downtime, configuring zone-redundant high availability, tuning query performance, and locking down identity and network access. Azure Database for PostgreSQL Migration High Availability Database Administration PostgreSQL https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/azure-container-apps-cicd-and-scaling https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/azure-container-apps-cicd-and-scaling Mon, 31 Aug 2026 23:00:00 GMT A granular build: a secure, identity-based connection to Azure Container Registry, KEDA-based autoscaling rules, continuous deployment via Azure Pipelines, and safe revision management for zero-downtime rollouts. Azure Container Apps Azure Container Registry Azure Pipelines CI/CD DevOps https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/containerize-deploy-multlingua-azure-container-apps https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/containerize-deploy-multlingua-azure-container-apps Mon, 31 Aug 2026 23:00:00 GMT A real migration, not a toy example — MultiLangua's Firebase Hosting deployment only serves static files, so its AI chat backend never actually runs in production. Containerizing it for Azure Container Apps is what makes the full app work end to end. Azure Container Apps Docker CI/CD GitHub Actions Migration https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/orin-containerize-azure-app-service-vm https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/orin-containerize-azure-app-service-vm Mon, 31 Aug 2026 23:00:00 GMT The same Express + Vite app, deployed two different ways — Azure App Service and a plain Azure VM — to see exactly what a managed PaaS product is buying you over doing it by hand, then automated end to end with GitHub Actions. Azure App Service Azure VM Docker CI/CD GitHub Actions https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/myrix-azure-hub-spoke-networking-monitoring https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/myrix-azure-hub-spoke-networking-monitoring Mon, 31 Aug 2026 23:00:00 GMT A containerized Flutter game deployed to a plain Azure VM with no public IP at all — reached only through a hub-spoke VNet, peered networks, Azure Bastion for management, and a Standard Load Balancer whose health probe is the actual first line of monitoring. Azure Networking VNet Peering Azure Bastion Load Balancer Azure Monitor https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/supabase-vs-mongodb-vs-firebase-real-comparison https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/supabase-vs-mongodb-vs-firebase-real-comparison Mon, 31 Aug 2026 23:00:00 GMT The same minimal notes app — signup, create a note, list notes — built three times against three real backends. One needed zero backend code. One needed a hand-written auth server. One rejected a write with a real 403 and exposed a genuine tooling limitation along the way. Supabase MongoDB Firebase Backend as a Service https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/zero-trust-azure-networking https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/zero-trust-azure-networking Fri, 31 Jul 2026 23:00:00 GMT A deep dive into perimeter-less networking, micro-segmentation, and central hub-and-spoke security enforcement. Zero Trust Azure Firewall Security VNet Private Link https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/automate-azure-load-testing-github-actions https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/automate-azure-load-testing-github-actions Fri, 31 Jul 2026 23:00:00 GMT Wiring Azure Load Testing into a GitHub Actions pipeline so every pull request gets an automated, pass/fail-gated performance test — based on the pattern in Microsoft's Automate Azure Load Testing Applied Skills path. Azure Load Testing GitHub Actions CI/CD Performance Engineering Azure https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/azure-cloud-security-and-monitoring-fundamentals https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/azure-cloud-security-and-monitoring-fundamentals Fri, 31 Jul 2026 23:00:00 GMT A granular, hands-on walkthrough of the four pillars a security engineer sets up first in Azure — workload protection with Defender for Cloud, key management with Key Vault, network filtering with Azure Firewall, and centralized monitoring with a Log Analytics workspace. Microsoft Defender for Cloud Azure Key Vault Azure Firewall Azure Monitor Security https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/finops-kubernetes-azure-aks-optimization https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/finops-kubernetes-azure-aks-optimization Tue, 30 Jun 2026 23:00:00 GMT Practical strategies to slash compute spend by 40% on AKS clusters using spot node pools, KEDA auto-scalers, and Azure Data Lake Gen2 tiering. FinOps AKS Kubernetes Data Lake Gen2 Azure https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/finops-azure-idle-resource-cleanup https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/finops-azure-idle-resource-cleanup Tue, 30 Jun 2026 23:00:00 GMT A practical guide to using Azure Resource Graph, Azure Policy, Azure Advisor, Cost Management, and automation to identify unused resources, reduce cloud waste, and establish sustainable FinOps governance. FinOps Governance Resource Graph Azure Policy https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/alibaba-cloud-for-african-developers https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/alibaba-cloud-for-african-developers Tue, 30 Jun 2026 23:00:00 GMT How a small African startup can build a first production platform without over-engineering — a realistic reference architecture, and an honest account of which components to skip until you actually need them. Alibaba Cloud Engineering Lab Series Community Alibaba Cloud Cost Optimization Developer Advocacy https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/resilient-azure-openai-apps https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/resilient-azure-openai-apps Sun, 31 May 2026 23:00:00 GMT A practical architectural guide to handling TPM/RPM throttling, regional failover, graceful degradation, and private connectivity for production-grade Azure OpenAI applications. Azure OpenAI Architecture Resilience Bicep https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/alibaba-cloud-observability-incident-response https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/alibaba-cloud-observability-incident-response Sun, 31 May 2026 23:00:00 GMT A deliberately broken application, investigated end-to-end: metrics, logs, alerts, root-cause analysis, fix, and verification — an incident-response walkthrough, not a monitoring-tool tutorial. Alibaba Cloud Engineering Lab Series Observability SRE Incident Response Alibaba Cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/disaster-recovery-alibaba-cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/disaster-recovery-alibaba-cloud Thu, 30 Apr 2026 23:00:00 GMT A real disaster-recovery experiment — deliberately failing ECS, a container, and a data object, then measuring actual recovery time against target RTOs rather than assuming a runbook works. Alibaba Cloud Engineering Lab Series Disaster Recovery Reliability Alibaba Cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/devsecops-pipeline-alibaba-cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/devsecops-pipeline-alibaba-cloud Tue, 31 Mar 2026 23:00:00 GMT Security folded into every stage of the delivery pipeline — code scanning, container image scanning, secrets management, and IAM controls — rather than a checklist run once before production. Alibaba Cloud Engineering Lab Series DevSecOps Security CI/CD Alibaba Cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/docker-compose-local-dev-parity https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/docker-compose-local-dev-parity Tue, 31 Mar 2026 23:00:00 GMT An app and a Postgres database, wired together with health-gated startup ordering and a named volume — torn all the way down and brought back up to prove the data actually survives, not just assumed to. Docker Docker Compose PostgreSQL Local Development https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/gitops-on-alibaba-cloud-ack https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/gitops-on-alibaba-cloud-ack Sat, 28 Feb 2026 23:00:00 GMT A full GitOps workflow on ACK with ArgoCD — repo structure, environment separation, automated sync — and a documented account of what happens, and how to recover, when a deployment fails. Alibaba Cloud Engineering Lab Series GitOps ACK Kubernetes Alibaba Cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/docker-rootless-containers-converting-what-breaks https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/docker-rootless-containers-converting-what-breaks Sat, 28 Feb 2026 23:00:00 GMT Adding one USER line to a working Dockerfile is easy. Watching the container crash with a real EACCES error the moment it tries to write a file — and fixing it properly — is what actually teaches you why most images still run as root. Docker Security Rootless Containers Azure Container Instances https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/secure-alibaba-cloud-vpc-architecture https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/secure-alibaba-cloud-vpc-architecture Sat, 31 Jan 2026 23:00:00 GMT A realistic multi-tier network build — public frontend, private backend, database-tier isolation, bastion access, and the troubleshooting session that happens when a route table is wrong. Alibaba Cloud Engineering Lab Series Networking VPC Security Alibaba Cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/buildkit-cache-mounts-benchmark https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/buildkit-cache-mounts-benchmark Sat, 31 Jan 2026 23:00:00 GMT I expected RUN --mount=type=cache to dramatically speed up repeated npm installs. I benchmarked it in a real GitHub Actions workflow instead of assuming, and the honest result was smaller than the hype — here's why, with the actual timing logs. Docker BuildKit CI/CD GitHub Actions https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/alibaba-cloud-ai-infrastructure-ecs-pai https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/alibaba-cloud-ai-infrastructure-ecs-pai Wed, 31 Dec 2025 23:00:00 GMT What it actually takes to move an AI prototype into cloud infrastructure — ECS compute, Platform for AI (PAI) model serving, OSS-backed model artifacts, and the API layer that ties it together. Alibaba Cloud Engineering Lab Series AI Infrastructure PAI ECS Alibaba Cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/docker-multistage-builds-what-gets-thrown-away https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/docker-multistage-builds-what-gets-thrown-away Wed, 31 Dec 2025 23:00:00 GMT The same app, the same dependencies, built two ways — a naive single-stage Dockerfile and a real multi-stage one — measured byte-for-byte to see exactly what a second FROM line throws away. Docker Multi-Stage Builds BuildKit Container Images https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/finops-on-alibaba-cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/finops-on-alibaba-cloud Sun, 30 Nov 2025 23:00:00 GMT Applying FinOps discipline — cost allocation, RI/Savings Plan strategy, and automated waste elimination — to Alibaba Cloud, for engineers extending a multi-cloud cost-optimization practice beyond Azure. FinOps Alibaba Cloud Cost Optimization Governance https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/kubernetes-on-ack https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/kubernetes-on-ack Fri, 31 Oct 2025 23:00:00 GMT A hands-on operational guide to Container Service for Kubernetes (ACK) — cluster provisioning, node pool autoscaling, ingress, and the diagnostic workflow for troubleshooting production incidents. Kubernetes ACK Alibaba Cloud Architecture Troubleshooting https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/terraform-on-alibaba-cloud https://raphaelgmomoh.pages.dev/articles/terraform-on-alibaba-cloud Tue, 30 Sep 2025 23:00:00 GMT A complete Terraform project on Alibaba Cloud — module structure, state management, CI/CD, drift detection, and the boundary where Terraform ends and configuration management begins. Terraform Alibaba Cloud IaC Multi-Cloud Architecture