Microsoft remains committed to making OpenTelemetry the foundation of modern observability on Azure. Today, we’re excited to take the next step on that journey with a major release of the Application Insights SDK 3.x for .NET.

Migrate to OpenTelemetry with a Major Version Bump

With Application Insights SDK 3.x, developers can migrate to OpenTelemetry-based instrumentation with dramatically less effort. Until now, migrating from classic Application Insights SDK to the Azure Monitor OpenTelemetry Distro required a clean install and code updates.

With this release, most customers can adopt OpenTelemetry simply by upgrading their SDK version. The new SDK automatically routes your classic Application Insights Track* APIs calls through a new mapping layer that emits OpenTelemetry signals under the hood.

Why This Matters

By upgrading, you gain:

✔ Vendor‑neutral OpenTelemetry APIs going forward
You can immediately begin writing new code using OpenTelemetry APIs, ensuring future portability and alignment with industry standards.

✔ Access to the full OpenTelemetry ecosystem
You can now easily plug in community instrumentation libraries and exporters. For example, collecting Redis Cache dependency data—previously not supported with Application Insights 2.x—becomes straightforward.

✔ Multi‑exporter support
Export to Azure Monitor and another system (e.g., a SIEM or backend of your choice) simultaneously if your scenario requires it.

What Still Requires Attention: Initializers and Processors

One area where automatic migration is not possible is telemetry processors and telemetry initializers. These Application Insights extensibility points were extremely flexible, allowing custom property injection, filtering, or deletion logic.

OpenTelemetry supports similar behavior, but through more structured concepts such as span processors. See here for a full list of breaking changes.

On a positive note, these OpenTelemetry components generally deliver better performance and clearer behavior. Our documentation assists with migration, and we plan to release an MCP with guardrails to assist LLM in accurate coding.

Keeping the essence of Azure Monitor Application Insights

While OpenTelemetry encourages the use of the OpenTelemetry-Collector, we remain committed to preserving the simplicity that customers love about Azure Monitor Application Insights. The Azure Monitor OpenTelemetry Distro is all that’s required to get started. It’s just a single NuGet package and you configure it with a Connection String. Telemetry flows in minutes.

No Collector is required unless you explicitly want one. We are able to achieve this with extensive built‑in sampling to manage cost and a trace‑preservation algorithm, so you see complete traces. This keeps the “just works” spirit of Azure Monitor Application Insights intact, while aligning with OpenTelemetry standards.

Feedback

If you encounter issues during the upgrade, please open a support ticket—we want the migration to be smooth. If you’d like to share feedback or engage directly with the product team, email us at otel@microsoft.com. This is not an official support channel, but we read every email and appreciate hearing feedback directly from you!

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Topics covered in this episode:

• Command Book App
• uvx.sh: Install Python tools without uv or Python
• Ending 15 years of subprocess polling
• monty: A minimal, secure Python interpreter written in Rust for use by AI
• Extras
• Joke

Watch on YouTube

About the show

Sponsored by us! Support our work through:

• Our courses at Talk Python Training
• The Complete pytest Course
• Patreon Supporters Connect with the hosts
• Michael: @mkennedy@fosstodon.org / @mkennedy.codes (bsky)
• Brian: @brianokken@fosstodon.org / @brianokken.bsky.social
• Show: @pythonbytes@fosstodon.org / @pythonbytes.fm (bsky) Join us on YouTube at pythonbytes.fm/live to be part of the audience. Usually Monday at 10am PT. Older video versions available there too. Finally, if you want an artisanal, hand-crafted digest of every week of the show notes in email form? Add your name and email to our friends of the show list, we'll never share it.

Michael #1: Command Book App

• New app from Michael
• Command Book App is a native macOS app for developers, data scientists, AI enthusiasts and more.
• This is a tool I've been using lately to help build Talk Python, Python Bytes, Talk Python Training, and many more applications.
• It's a bit like advanced terminal commands or complex shell aliases, but hosted outside of your terminal. This leaves the terminal there for interactive commands, exploration, short actions.
• Command Book manages commands like "tail this log while I'm developing the app", "Run the dev web server with true auto-reload", and even "Run MongoDB in Docker with exactly the settings I need"
• I'd love it if you gave it a look, shared it with your team, and send me feedback.
• Has a free version and paid version.
• Build with Swift and Swift UI
• Check it out at https://commandbookapp.com

Brian #2: uvx.sh: Install Python tools without uv or Python

• Tim Hopper

Michael #3: Ending 15 years of subprocess polling

• by Giampaolo Rodola
• The standard library's subprocess module has relied on a busy-loop polling approach since the timeout parameter was added to Popen.wait() in Python 3.3, around 15 years ago
• The problem with busy-polling
  • CPU wake-ups: even with exponential backoff (starting at 0.1ms, capping at 40ms), the system constantly wakes up to check process status, wasting CPU cycles and draining batteries.
  • Latency: there's always a gap between when a process actually terminates and when you detect it.
  • Scalability: monitoring many processes simultaneously magnifies all of the above.
  • + L1/L2 CPU cache invalidations
• It’s interesting to note that waiting via poll() (or kqueue()) puts the process into the exact same sleeping state as a plain time.sleep() call. From the kernel's perspective, both are interruptible sleeps.
• Here is the merged PR for this change.

Brian #4: monty: A minimal, secure Python interpreter written in Rust for use by AI

• Samuel Colvin and others at Pydantic
• Still experimental
• “Monty avoids the cost, latency, complexity and general faff of using a full container based sandbox for running LLM generated code. “
• “Instead, it lets you safely run Python code written by an LLM embedded in your agent, with startup times measured in single digit microseconds not hundreds of milliseconds.”

Extras

Brian:

• Expertise is the art of ignoring - Kevin Renskers
  • You don’t need to master the language. You need to master your slice.
  • Learning everything up front is wasted effort.
  • Experience changes what you pay attention to.
• I hate fish - Rands (Michael Lopp)
  • Really about productivity systems
  • And a nice process for dealing with email

Michael:

• Talk Python now has a CLI
• New essay: It's not vibe coding - Agentic engineering
• GitHub is having a day
• Python 3.14.3 and 3.13.12 are available
• Wall Street just lost $285 billion because of 13 markdown files

Joke: Silence, current side project!

Download audio: https://pythonbytes.fm/episodes/download/469/commands-out-of-the-terminal.mp3

Hello Windows Insiders, today we are releasing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26220.7755 (KB5077201) to the Beta Channel. Changes in Beta Channel builds and updates are documented in two buckets: new features, and improvements (including notable fixes) that are being gradually rolled out for Insiders who have turned on the toggle to get the latest updates as they are available (via Settings > Windows Update*) and then new features, and improvements (including notable fixes) rolling out to everyone in the Beta Channel. For more information, see the Reminders section at the bottom of this blog post.

New features gradually being rolled out with toggle on*

[Emoji 16.0]

We’re starting to roll Emoji 16.0 back to Insiders. The Emoji 16.0 release introduces a small but thoughtfully curated set of new emojis—one from each major category—designed to resonate across cultures and contexts.  With this build, you will see these new emoji available in the emoji panel. [caption id="attachment_178600" align="alignnone" width="609"] New Emoji 16.0 emoji from left to right: Face with Bags Under Eyes, Fingerprint, Root Vegetable, Leafless Tree, Harp, Shovel, and Splatter.[/caption] Feedback: Share your thoughts in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Input and Language > Emoji panel.

[Camera Settings]

We are adding the option to directly control pan and tilt for supported cameras in the Settings app. These new controls appear in the camera settings page (Settings > Devices & drivers > Cameras) under the "Basic settings" of your selected camera. [caption id="attachment_178599" align="alignnone" width="1633"] UI showing new pan and tilt controls for supported cameras in Settings.[/caption] Feedback: Share your thoughts in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Devices and Drivers > Device Camera or Webcams.

Changes and Improvements gradually being rolled out with toggle on*

[General]

• Improved the visual experience and performance for several scenarios including at the bottom of the screen when the taskbar is set to autohide, desktop icons unexpected flashing (and decreased performance interacting with your PC), and Windows Security pop up for credentials.

Reminders for Windows Insiders in the Beta Channel

• Updates are based on Windows 11, version 25H2 via an enablement package (Build 26220.7755).
• Many features are rolled out using Controlled Feature Rollout technology, starting with a subset of Insiders and ramping up over time as we monitor feedback to see how they land before pushing them out to everyone in this channel.
• For Windows Insiders who want to be the first to get features gradually rolled out to you, you can turn ON the toggle to get the latest updates as they are available via Settings > Windows Update*. Over time, we will increase the rollouts of features to everyone with the toggle turned on. Should you keep this toggle off, new features will gradually be rolled out to your PC over time once they are ready.
• Features and experiences included in these builds may never get released as we try out different concepts and get feedback. Features may change over time, be removed, or replaced and never get released beyond Windows Insiders. Some of these features and experiences could show up in future Windows releases when they’re ready.
• Some features in active development we preview with Windows Insiders may not be fully localized and localization will happen over time as features are finalized. As you see issues with localization in your language, please report those issues to us via Feedback Hub.
• Check out Flight Hub for a complete look at what build is in which Insider channel.

Thanks, Windows Insider Program Team

Hello Windows Insiders, today we are releasing Windows 11 Insider Preview Build 26300.7760 (KB5077202) to the Dev Channel. Changes in Dev Channel builds and updates are documented in two buckets: new features, and improvements (including notable fixes) that are being gradually rolled out for Insiders who have turned on the toggle to get the latest updates as they are available (via Settings > Windows Update*) and then new features, and improvements (including notable fixes) rolling out to everyone in the Dev Channel. For more information, see the Reminders section at the bottom of this blog post.

New features gradually being rolled out with toggle on*

[Emoji 16.0]

We’re starting to roll Emoji 16.0 back to Insiders. The Emoji 16.0 release introduces a small but thoughtfully curated set of new emojis—one from each major category—designed to resonate across cultures and contexts. With this build, you will see these new emoji available in the emoji panel. [caption id="attachment_178600" align="alignnone" width="609"] New Emoji 16.0 emoji from left to right: Face with Bags Under Eyes, Fingerprint, Root Vegetable, Leafless Tree, Harp, Shovel, and Splatter.[/caption] Feedback: Share your thoughts in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Input and Language > Emoji panel.

[Camera Settings]

We are adding the option to directly control pan and tilt for supported cameras in the Settings app. These new controls appear in the camera settings page (Settings > Devices & drivers > Cameras) under the "Basic settings" of your selected camera. [caption id="attachment_178599" align="alignnone" width="1633"] UI showing new pan and tilt controls for supported cameras in Settings.[/caption] Feedback: Share your thoughts in Feedback Hub (WIN + F) under Devices and Drivers > Device Camera or Webcams.

Changes and Improvements gradually being rolled out with toggle on*

[General]

• Improved the visual experience and performance for several scenarios including at the bottom of the screen when the taskbar is set to autohide, desktop icons unexpected flashing (and decreased performance interacting with your PC), and Windows Security pop up for credentials.

Reminders for Windows Insiders in the Dev Channel

• Updates are based on Windows 11, version 25H2 via an enablement package (Build 26300.7760).
• Many features are rolled out using Controlled Feature Rollout technology, starting with a subset of Insiders and ramping up over time as we monitor feedback to see how they land before pushing them out to everyone in this channel.
• The desktop watermark shown at the lower right corner of the desktop is normal for Windows Insider pre-release builds.
• For Windows Insiders who want to be the first to get features gradually rolled out to you, you can turn ON the toggle to get the latest updates as they are available via Settings > Windows Update*. Over time, we will increase the rollouts of features to everyone with the toggle turned on. Should you keep this toggle off, new features will gradually be rolled out to your PC over time once they are ready.
• Features and experiences included in these builds may never get released as we try out different concepts and get feedback. Features may change over time, be removed, or replaced and never get released beyond Windows Insiders. Some of these features and experiences could show up in future Windows releases when they’re ready.
• Some features in active development we preview with Windows Insiders may not be fully localized and localization will happen over time as features are finalized. As you see issues with localization in your language, please report those issues to us via Feedback Hub.
• Check out Flight Hub for a complete look at what build is in which Insider channel.

Thanks, Windows Insider Program Team

The post Ralph Wiggum Explained: Stop Telling AI What You Want — Tell It What Blocks You appeared first on Uno Platform.