This workshop will introduce you to Machine Learning and AI services and tools in Azure. The session will cover Azure Machine Learning, Azure Synapse Analytics, Spark using Azure Databricks, describe other alternatives for machine learning (HDInsight, SQL Server Machine Learning services, etc.), Cognitive Services, Azure Bots and Power Virtual Agents, providing for hands-on experience as well.

Machine learning is a data science technique that allows computers to use existing data to forecast future behaviour, outcomes, and trends. By using machine learning, computers learn without being explicitly programmed. Forecasts or predictions from machine learning can make apps and devices smarter. For example, when you shop online, machine learning helps recommend other products you might want based on what you've bought. Or when your credit card is swiped, machine learning compares the transaction to a database of transactions and helps detect fraud. And when your robot vacuum cleaner vacuums a room, machine learning helps it decide whether the job is done.

Azure Machine Learning, Azure Synapse Analytics and Spark using Azure Databricks are cloud services that you can use to train, deploy, automate, and manage machine learning models, all at the broad scale that the cloud provides.

Azure Cognitive Services are APIs/SDKs/services available to help developers build intelligent applications without the need for AI or data science skills/knowledge. Azure Cognitive Services enable developers to easily add cognitive features such as emotion and video detection; facial, speech, and vision recognition; and speech and language understanding – into their applications. The goal of Azure Cognitive Services is to help developers create applications that can see, hear, speak, understand, and even begin to reason. Azure Bots and Microsoft 365 Power Virtual Agents use these cognitive services integrated with the Bot Framework to provide a conversational experience that tries to resemble human interaction. Bot can be deployed in channels such as Teams, Slack, Skype, Facebook, Alexa, IoT, or any other you can imagine.

Attendees that want to try the examples during the workshop need to have:
* Laptop;
* Have an Azure subscription (e.g. set up a free trial at https://azure.com/free , use an Azure Pass free trial, or use a paid subscription);
* Your preferred development IDE (e.g. Visual Studio 2019 Community Edition or Visual Studio Code) already installed, to access online webservices;
* Excel (2013 or more recent).
Note: For cognitive services C# examples will be covered, but equivalent examples exist in other programming languages.

Contents:
1. Introduction to Machine Learning (generic - from scratch, no pre-requisite needed);
2. Introduction to Azure Machine Learning technologies: Azure Machine Learning, Azure Synapse Analytics, Spark with Azure Databricks, HDInsight, SQL Server ML Services with R or Python, etc.;
3. Introduction to Azure Cognitive Services;
4. Introduction to Azure Bots, Power Virtual Agents and the Bot Framework.

#Azure #AzureML #MachineLearning #SynapseAnalytics #Databricks #CognitiveServices #AzureBot #PowerVirtualAgents #BotFramework