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12 Lessons to Get Started Building AI Agents

Agent Lightning is an open-source framework developed by Microsoft Research for optimizing and training AI agents using reinforcement learning (RL) and other techniques, supporting integration with any agent framework with minimal code changes.

Model Context Protocol (MCP) server that lets language agents drive real browsers through Playwright’s automation APIs.

Call Center AI is an AI-powered call center solution developed by Microsoft using Azure and OpenAI GPT. It allows sending phone calls from AI agents via API or direct calls to the bot's configured phone number, ideal for insurance, IT support, customer service, and more. Key features include real-time streaming conversations to minimize delays, multi-language and voice tone support, SMS integration, nuanced comprehension with GPT-4o and GPT-4o-mini models, secure handling of sensitive data via RAG best practices, domain-specific understanding, structured claim schemas, automated to-do lists, content filtering, and jailbreak detection. It offers customizable prompts, human fallback, call recording, brand-specific voices, and cloud-native Azure deployment for scalable, low-maintenance automation.

ONNX (Open Neural Network Exchange) is an open ecosystem that provides an open source format for AI models, including deep learning and traditional ML. It defines an extensible computation graph model, built-in operators, and standard data types, focusing on inferencing capabilities. Widely supported across frameworks and hardware, it enables interoperability and accelerates AI innovation.

Open-source deep-learning optimisation library from Microsoft that scales PyTorch training and inference to trillions of parameters with maximum efficiency.

ML for Beginners is a free, open-source curriculum developed by Microsoft, spanning 12 weeks with 26 lessons and 52 quizzes, focusing on classic machine learning using primarily Scikit-learn, avoiding deep learning. It uses a project-based approach with global cultural themes to explore topics like regression, classification, clustering, NLP, and time series forecasting.

Qlib is an open-source, AI-oriented quantitative investment platform from Microsoft that provides a full pipeline for quant research — data processing, feature engineering, model training, backtesting and serving. It supports supervised learning, market-dynamics modeling and reinforcement learning, and integrates tools (e.g., RD-Agent) for automated factor mining and model optimization.

edge-tts is a Python module that enables the use of Microsoft Edge's online text-to-speech service directly from Python code or via command-line tools like edge-tts and edge-playback, without requiring Microsoft Edge, Windows, or an API key.

A free 21-lesson course by Microsoft Cloud Advocates teaching beginners the fundamentals of building Generative AI applications. It covers concepts like Generative AI and LLMs, prompt engineering, chat apps, image generation, security, and more, with Python and TypeScript code samples supporting Azure OpenAI, OpenAI API, and open-source models. Features multi-language support, video intros, extra resources, and a Discord community.

BitNet (bitnet.cpp) is Microsoft's open-source inference framework for 1-bit large language models (LLMs). It provides optimized kernels for fast, lossless inference of 1.58-bit models on CPU (and GPU support added later), delivering substantial speed and energy improvements on ARM and x86. It integrates with Hugging Face models, includes build/run/benchmark tools, and aims to enable running large low-bit models locally (e.g., a 100B BitNet model on a single CPU at human-reading speeds).

Foundry Local is an open-source tool from Microsoft that enables running generative AI models on local devices without an Azure subscription. It supports on-device processing for privacy and security, integrates models via an OpenAI-compatible API, and optimizes performance using ONNX Runtime and hardware acceleration.