New Pluralsight Course - Office 365 APIs - Overview, Authentication and the Discovery Service

Announcing the availability of my first in a series of courses I am publishing to the Pluralsight catalog on the the Microsoft Office 365 APIs.

For more information about the course, you can checkout the page on my site: Office 365 APIs - Overview, Authentication and the Discovery Service

Pluralsight

This is the first in a series of courses I am publishing to the Pluralsight catalog on the the Microsoft Office 365 APIs. The Office 365 APIs are a collection of multiple endpoints for different types of data within the Office 365 platform. These endpoints include Contacts, Calendar, Mail and Files (for OneDrive). When working with these different API endpoints, there are some common characteristics and requirements that you should be familiar with… and that is what this first course is all about. You can think of this course being the pre-requisite for all my other Office 365 API courses.

This first course, Office 365 APIs - Overview, Authentication and the Discovery Service, covers the common things you should know going into the Office 365 APIs. For example you’ll learn about the relationship between Office 365 and Microsoft Entra ID for the authentication story as well as how to create Microsoft Entra ID apps and authenticate using either the raw HTTP requests or using the APIs Microsoft provides. On the topic of authentication, you’ll see how OAuth 2.0 & OpenID Connect factor into the story as well as how to leverage both user+app and app-only permissions. Finally you will see how to call the Discovery Service to see what services the current user has rights to.

Want to stay informed when Microsoft makes updates to the Office 365 APIs? What about changes to any of my Office 365 API courses? How about getting notified when I release an update or a new Office 365 API related course? Signup to my mailing list to stay up to date. I won’t spam you or sell your email address… it’s just informational and only when there are warranted updates. You can unsubscribe anytime you like.

In addition, you will build an ASP.NET MVC web application that will have all the authentication code in it so you don’t have to recreate this for every single .NET based demo that I’ll show in the other courses.

Module 1: Course Introduction and Overview

In this first brief module of the course you will learn what the course is all about and the learning objectives that you will accomplish by the end of the course. After starting out with an introduction to the course you will see how this course fits into my other Office 365 API courses. Finally, because the Office 365 are promised to be updated frequently, you will see where you can learn how to get the most updated information between course updates.

Module 2: Introduction, Developer Tools & Documentation

This module will first start out explaining the high-level concepts of the Office 365 APIs and common characteristics between different endpoints. Then a brief overview of some fundamental technologies that the APIs are built on such as REST, OData & Microsoft Entra ID. This module will also explain the different tools and platforms available in creating custom applications that use the Office 365 APIs from the REST APIs, native SDKs for Windows, iOS, Android and tools available for multi-device options such as Xamrain and Cordova.

Module 3: Applications in Microsoft Entra ID and Office 365

This module will cover the relationship of users and apps between Microsoft Entra ID and Office 365, explaining how Office 365 relies on Microsoft Entra ID for the hosting of all users for authentication as well as for apps. It will show how to create apps in Microsoft Entra ID using the Azure Management Portal web interface as well as how to do this using the wizard in Visual Studio included in the Office 365 API tools. This model will also contain a discussion on comparing & contrasting SharePoint app model vs. the Microsoft Entra ID module for apps. Finally, the concept of single vs. multi tenant apps will be explained.

Module 4: Authentication with Microsoft Entra ID and Office 365

A fundamental concept that developers must understand in working with the Office 365 APIs is creating how authentication works with Microsoft Entra ID. In this module the viewer will learn how to obtain an access token that will be used to authenticate and consume the Office 365 APIs. They will also learn about the different types of permissions in Office 365 and how to configure them in Microsoft Entra ID. Finally, the viewer will also learn about the different technologies available that they can use to authenticate and the code used to authenticate.

Module 5: Create an Office 365 API Starter Project

In this module you will create an ASP.NET MVC web application and Microsoft Entra ID application. Then you will customize the web application to hook the OWIN authentication process into the ASP.NET MVC pipeline for user authentication. When complete, you will have project that you can use as the starting point for all future Office 365 API projects.

Module 6: Office 365 API’s Discovery Service

Because Office 365 APIs support a multi-tenant environment, the endpoints can change not only between tenants but also between users. To help with this Microsoft created the Office 365 Discovery Service which will return a list of all the endpoints the user has access to as well as the specific URI used to access it.

Andrew Connell
Developer & Chief Course Artisan, Voitanos LLC. | Microsoft MVP
Written by Andrew Connell

Andrew Connell is a web & cloud developer with a focus on Microsoft Azure & Microsoft 365. He’s received Microsoft’s MVP award every year since 2005 and has helped thousands of developers through the various courses he’s authored & taught. Andrew’s the founder of Voitanos and is dedicated to helping you be the best Microsoft 365 web & cloud developer. He lives with his wife & two kids in Florida.

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