Artificial Intelligence is not a future or distant concept; it is here and now, and being used by many companies of various sizes and industries. The foundational theory for AI was actually developed several decades ago, but recent advancements in big data, computing power, cloud, and algorithms have made it affordable and widespread today. With AI and Machine Learning, computers are now able to start reasoning, understanding, and interacting in ways that were never possible before.
Microsoft has created a predefined set of AI models available for companies of all sizes to start with called Cognitive Services, and best of all, they require little to no knowledge of data science. In this course, you will learn how to infuse your apps—on an architectural level—with the intelligence that Cognitive Services provide. We will cover what Cognitive Services are and how to use the various solutions they provide, including Vision, Speech, Language, Decision, and Web Search.
Learning Objectives
- Understand the functionality provided by Azure Cognitive Services
- Learn how to incorporate these services into your apps
Intended Audience
- People who want to learn more about Azure Cognitive Services
Prerequisites
- Knowledge of Azure
- Knowledge of at least one programming language
- Experience using REST APIs
Hello and welcome to Designing Azure Cognitive Services Solutions. My name's Emilio Melo and I'm a Cloud Solutions Architect at Cloud Advantage with a focus on data and AI solutions. I was lucky enough to have worked on some major companies in the IT industry, including Microsoft, IBM, NetApp, and Trivago.
So who is this course for? This course is meant for developers and architects that would like to know more about Cognitive Services in general, and how to embed them in their applications. The focus of this course is to cover on an architectural level, without digging too deep on code or implementation, what are Cognitive Services and how to use the various solutions it provides on vision, speech, language, decision, and web search.
The prerequisites are actually surprisingly low, as the starting point for this course is on the beginner level. That being said, it would be useful if you had some Azure experience, at least in terms such as subscriptions and resource groups, some data science knowledge, although we will cover the basics of during the first module. And some developer experience, about terms such as REST API or SDKs.
A couple of last notes before we get started. If in any moment you need help, feel free to send an email to support@cloudacademy.com and they will be glad to assist you. Also, we'd love to get your feedback about this course, so please give it a rating when you're finished. With that out of the way, let's start defining what cognitive services are.
Emilio Melo has been involved in IT projects in over 15 countries, with roles ranging across support, consultancy, teaching, project and department management, and sales—mostly focused on Microsoft software. After 15 years of on-premises experience in infrastructure, data, and collaboration, he became fascinated by Cloud technologies and the incredible transformation potential it brings. His passion outside work is to travel and discover the wonderful things this world has to offer.