Ben Reader | 🔌😈
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Ben Reader | 🔌😈
@powers-hell.com
IT Pro | Microsoft MVP | Speaker | Obsessed with automation.
Coffee, Loud dumb music, Powershell, Intune & other cloudy things.
His mistake was using "for" in the name. Everything else seems fine.
November 12, 2025 at 7:08 PM
If you have to ask....
IS IT DNS?
The ultimate DNS troubleshooting tool. Think it might be DNS? It probably is! It's always DNS.
isitdns.com
October 29, 2025 at 6:31 PM
Hell yeah!
October 23, 2025 at 3:17 PM
F**k it, going back to basic(s)
September 13, 2025 at 4:55 PM
Hell yeah brother! Welcome to the cult.
September 1, 2025 at 4:33 PM
Deploy a private key & sshd config to the container to disable interactive Auth and only use key-based auth???
August 29, 2025 at 5:15 PM
For those who don't like clicking links

- expression variables ${{ variables.var }} process at compile, BEFORE runtime
- macro syntax $(var) process at runtime BEFORE tasks
- runtime expressions $[variables.var] also process at runtime BEFORE tasks but are meant for conditional expressions.
August 21, 2025 at 11:12 AM
This is actually just a standard REST call that you can make and can be done in any terminal / VSCode instance as long as you know how to form the request URI
August 21, 2025 at 11:08 AM
Also, whilst troubleshooting complex pipeline templates that compile differently based on variable / parameter values, never forget that the "Download full YAML" option exists. It performs the "compile" step for you, allowing you to debug without actually committing changes or running the pipeline.
August 21, 2025 at 11:07 AM
Yeah it was fine, I was just sitting there wondering what on earth was causing half my tasks to not compile... Didn't use expression variables.. what an idiot!
August 21, 2025 at 11:03 AM