Publish company-wide tasks
Although this new feature is built into the recently released Tasks for Teams App it takes the management and publishing of tasks to the company hierarchy level. What do we mean by this? Tasks in Teams is built around Planner which is designed for individual team or department task management. But what if there is a need to publish tasks across the whole company or across multiple departments and then track the completion of those tasks centrally? For example:
Well, with the new company-wide task publishing capability you can now achieve this. First you need to define within M365 your company’s hierarchy of teams including where applicable, department and then functional level teams, all of which map to the real-world company structure. Once the hierarchy is defined, you can then publish tasks to a large set of teams in accordance with the hierarchy. For example, if your company is part of a group consisting of multiple companies, and each company is broken down into divisions, and you personally are a member of a corporate team for Company A, then you could publish tasks to one or more teams within the Company A hierarchy, but not to any teams of sister Companies B or C. To publish to all individual company teams, you would need to be a member of a group level team that sits at the top of the tree. This is a great addition to the current task management capabilities of Teams and Planner. Teams Offline message capability If you find yourself offline and want to respond to conversations or post new updates, then previously you were notified that the message would not post and you would need to go back to the message(s) when you were next online and try again. With this update, Teams will queue the messages and automatically send them when you are next online, similar to the way Outlook behaves with emails. New history view Navigating back to a previous channel's tabs or files in Teams requires you to use the back button or search. When this new update rolls out, hovering over the back button will bring up a history view, enabling you to go straight to a recently accessed tab or file. SharePoint Support for "thousand" separator This small formatting change for “number” type columns in SharePoint Lists and Libraries allows you to control the display of a “thousand” separator, alongside the ability to control the number of decimal points. This can help improve the display of large numbers in your views for example, 10000.00 becomes 10,000.00. For existing number columns you will need to edit the column definition to select the new option. Column settings in grid view If you are a regular user of the SharePoint List grid view, then you will know that one of the annoying limitations is that once you select grid view, you cannot change the layout of the view or hide unnecessary columns. You need to exit grid view, amend the underlying view and then re-enable grid view. This enhancement will provide the same view formatting capabilities when in grid view. Governance and Adoption The M365 Admin Centre contains a number of useful reports that help designated administrators stay on top of the governance and adoption of M365. These reports enable you to answer questions such as:
Microsoft is adding more reports to the suite as summarised below: SharePoint site usage report This report is being enhanced to provide more visibility on how information is being shared across your company or externally. This will enable designated admins or information governors to obtain counts of files and folder shared anonymously with external participants for example and then be able to drill into this information. New usage report for Microsoft Teams This new report enables you to gain insights in to how Teams is being adopted across the company, such as the trend for using channel conversations, how has the number of active channel users grown, or how many Teams are Active vs Dormant, and is this changing overtime.
Company-wide task publishing feature
MC234234 Category Tasks Planner Teams Microsoft is introducing task publishing and reporting features within the Tasks app in Teams. This allows a company to define the tasks that need to be completed across their frontline locations, choose which locations need to complete those tasks, and track the progress of the work. Frontline managers and workers can use the desktop or mobile Tasks in Teams experience to see the tasks they need to complete, all in one place. Task publishing lets companies create tasks centrally at the corporate level and publish those tasks to different frontline locations like stores, factories, and clinics. You can publish to all teams or choose specific locations based on customisable characteristics like size or layout. For example, leadership for a nationwide retailer can create tasks for the reopening of their stores, send that list to only the affected store locations, and then track progress against the tasks at those locations. Managers on those store teams can easily assign tasks to individual employees. Meanwhile, the frontline workers at those store locations will see a simple list of the tasks assigned to them whether they log in backstage or use a personal or company-issued mobile device. More from Microsoft https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoftteams/manage-tasks-app#task-publishing https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoftteams/set-up-your-team-hierarchy
Microsoft Teams will queue sent messages when offline
MC235369 Category Teams A new offline experience for Microsoft Teams for the web and desktop helps users be productive even without a network connection. Currently, should a user attempt to send or edit Teams messages while offline, Teams labels those messages as a failure. Once the device is reconnected, Teams prompts users to retry or delete the messages. In phase one of this update, Teams messages that are sent while a user is offline will be queued on the local device. Teams will automatically send the messages when the device resolves connectivity issues within 24 hours. However, if the message remains in an unsent state for more than 24 hours, the message will fail and Teams will prompt the user to resend or delete the message.
Introducing history menu in Microsoft Teams
MC234245 Category Teams Microsoft is introducing a history menu in the Microsoft Teams desktop clients that displays a user's recently visited locations. By hovering over the backward and forward navigation buttons, users will be able to see recently visited locations in Microsoft Teams. The history menu makes it easier to navigate to previous locations, such as nested tabs and documents. 
Support for thousands separator in Number column
MC234416 Category SharePoint Lists Microsoft is providing Microsoft Lists and SharePoint lists owners and members with the ability to add a thousands separator to numbers. When Lists owners and members use the Number column, they can now choose whether or not to add a thousands separator (comma) to any number larger than 999. 
Column settings in Grid view
MC234414 Category SharePoint Lists Microsoft is providing Microsoft Lists and SharePoint lists owners and members with new capabilities in Lists Grid view (previously Quick Edit). The Lists "Grid" view (previously Quick Edit) will now allow users to pin a column to the filter pane, format the column, show/hide columns, and hide their column(s). Before this update, users were required to exit Grid view to accomplish these common tasks. 
SharePoint site usage report
MC234381 Category SharePoint Administration Governance Adoption Microsoft is making some updates to the SharePoint usage report within the Microsoft 365 admin center. In phase one, Microsoft is adding eight new metrics to the SharePoint usage report. In phase two, Microsoft is incorporating two of these new metrics - anonymous link count and company link count - into the definitions for active sites and active files. Thus the number of active sites and active files recorded in the usage report may change. Microsoft will also backfill the report with 180 days of data. When phase one has rolled out to your tenant, you will be able to add these metrics as columns to the report table, and as part of the Microsoft Graph reports API:
For phase two, anonymous link count and company link count will be added to the definition of active site and active files; Microsoft will then recalculate these metrics. They will update the active site chart and active file column in the SharePoint Site usage report to reflect anonymous link count and company link count metrics. They will also backfill the report with 180 days of data.
Usage report: the highlighted areas are where new data may change the counts.
New usage report for Microsoft Teams
MC234414 Category Teams Administration Governance Adoption The new Teams usage activity report shows tenant-level aggregates and per-team level details, providing an overall picture of how your organisation is using teams within Microsoft Teams. 
Author: SO365 Insights
Teams
When talking about SharePoint and Teams, it is a bit like asking the Chicken or the Egg question, and which comes first. As Teams has becomes more prominent, we find that most people start by creating Teams without giving any thought to where the content really should exist. This often results in more Teams than are necessary for communication and collaboration needs, purely to give additional content a home. For this reason, we always start with SharePoint - to map out and implement a client’s content and then, where communication is required around the content, a Team can be created that pulls in relevant content across the SharePoint site libraries and lists when needed. Microsoft is now releasing an enhanced “wizard” for when you create a new Team based on an existing SharePoint site, so that it is easier to perform this action and to integrate content across the site. We think this adds extra validation to our Chicken or Egg approach! To add more credence to the Teams or SharePoint question, this next enhancement will make it easier in Teams to pin SharePoint document libraries to a channel, regardless of which SharePoint site those libraries reside in. So once again, make sure you focus on getting your SharePoint sites correctly identified and designed before going anywhere near Teams. There are three enhancements to the meeting experiences in Teams announced this month: 1. More support for switching between Full Screen and Focused (when you want to just focus on a presentation or screen share). 2. Changing the way participants access meeting chat messages both during and post the meeting. 3. Further integration between Teams and Microsoft Forms making it really simple for a meeting presenter to add a “poll” into the meeting to get participant feedback and then publish the responses to all meeting participants. SharePoint More great changes for SharePoint Lists. If you are a fan of SharePoint Lists (and who isn’t) and use the “Grid View” to perform editing tasks, then you will soon be getting the ability to “undo” and “redo” changes you have made. Without reverting to PowerApps, you currently, you have little control over the layout and format of a SharePoint List Form. Soon however, you will be able to configure each forms header, footer and body sections. Coming soon is the ability to create simple rules based on the contents of a SharePoint list enabling you to set reminders or send notifications. Microsoft is also improving the ability for you to brand your SharePoint sites by providing more flexibility, including a new “minimal” header size to reduce space and bring content such as News closer to the top, together with more control around site logos and the ability to hide the title of the site. OneDrive It is now easy to add shortcuts to folders with important documents, or just those you need to access regularly, from any SharePoint library and for those shortcuts to then appear in your OneDrive app so that they can be easily found. What is also fantastic, is that if you sync OneDrive to your device, then the folders and documents behind the shortcuts are also synced, so that they are always available. This means you do not need to sync the additional libraries where those folders exist. More and more, OneDrive can become your personal information manager where you can create your own view of the corporate world in which you work with quick access to the content you need. Microsoft Planner Although we're not convinced this will be a major “wow”, but a new feature of Planner will be the ability to add different backgrounds to each Plan. Backgrounds will be “recommended” based on the title of the plan - which could be interesting!
Add Microsoft Teams to your SharePoint team site
MC227312 Category Teams SharePoint When associating the Teams app with an existing SharePoint group, access a new wizard which make it easy for a group owner to select the lists, libraries, or pages to incorporate into Teams as tabs. Make the selection, then click the Add Teams button. 
Once in Teams, it is easy for group members to collaborate around existing SharePoint content. Users can select a list they had been just working on in SharePoint and then engage team members in chat alongside the list, directly in Teams.
Use SharePoint tab to add pages, lists or document libraries to a channel in Teams
MC227278 Category Teams SharePoint Microsoft has improved the SharePoint tab experience to now allow pinning of document libraries, by selecting from the backing team site, or by providing a link to any other document library to which the user has access. Also added is a new "Recommended" section in the SharePoint tab to help users easily find the most relevant content from their site to pin in their channels. Once available, Teams users will be able to pin their SharePoint content; pages, news, lists and document libraries using the SharePoint tab. 
More from Microsoft
Add a SharePoint page, list, or document library as a tab in Teams - Office Support (microsoft.com)
Full screen support in new Teams meeting experience
MC226680 Category Teams Microsoft is bringing Full Screen support back in the new meeting experience for Teams desktop applications. The feature is accessible via meeting controls under More options (…) > Full screen. On Mac OS, you can also access it by using the native “Full screen” control on the top left corner of the meeting window.
To focus attention on content that is shared during a meeting, use Focus mode, accessible via More options (…) > Focus mode. In Focus mode, content uses the entire meeting window. By removing other Teams elements from the window, this mode makes it easier to focus on content.
Updates to meeting chat membership in Teams
MC226407 Category Teams Microsoft is updating a meeting participant's access to meeting chat. These changes will manage a users access to a meeting chat based on how they were invited to the meeting. Once this has rolled out, the changes will apply to new meetings. These changes will not be applied to previously scheduled meetings. A participants access to meeting chat will be dependent on how they were invited to the meeting: Single meeting
Recurring - Single instance of a meeting series
Forms polls in Microsoft Teams meetings
MC225995 Category Teams Forms Any meeting presenter can add the Forms app as a tab in the Teams meeting. Before the meeting, the presenter can create draft polls. During the meeting, the presenter can create and launch polls that any attendee can view and answer. All attendees will be able to see the results in real time, and respondents can respond to a poll after the meeting if the poll has not been closed.
Attendee view of Teams meeting poll that has been launched.
After the meeting, meeting presenters can evaluate responses in the meeting tab, export responses to an Excel workbook, or review responses on the web in the Forms app.
Microsoft Lists undo and redo commands
MC226055 Category SharePoint Microsoft Lists With the release of undo and redo capabilities, users who edit their lists when in grid view will be able to retract any unwanted changes or bring back previously entered information. Two changes are part of this feature rollout. First, users will now be able see Undo and Redo commands as they modify lists, whether they are working on the list in SharePoint, the Lists app in Microsoft 365, or the Lists app in Microsoft Teams. 
Second, users will be able to use the following keyboard shortcuts to perform undo and redo operations while editing from grid view.
Configuring list or library forms for Microsoft Lists and SharePoint
MC227452 Category SharePoint Microsoft Lists With this update, anyone who can create and manage views in a list can configure the list or library form with header, footer, and body sections for both Microsoft Lists and SharePoint. Once available, list and library users with appropriate permissions will be able to configure an associated form to include a custom header, footer, and body with one or more sections. The form configuration doesn’t change the data in the list item or file; it changes only how the form is displayed to those who browse the list or library. More from Microsoft Configure the list form | Microsoft Docs
List rules make it easy to set up notifications of changes
MC227447 Category SharePoint Microsoft Lists With this update, SharePoint users with edit permissions on a list can create simple if / then rules, based on changes to list information, to set reminders and send notifications. Users with edit permissions on the list can create and manage rules. Users with read-only permissions can’t create or manage rules. Once the feature is available to your users, they’ll be able to create a rule by selecting Automate and then Create a rule in the list command bar near the top of the page. These notifications emails will be sent from Microsoft 365 to one or more users in your organization, as shown below. 
Once rolled out, the feature will be available to all list users in Microsoft Lists and SharePoint. Users will be able to create a maximum of 15 rules per list.
SharePoint site header updates
MC227307 Category SharePoint Microsoft is expanding the SharePoint branding options that make it easier to customise your site, including new header configurations for modern sites.
These updates will not impact existing sites and or any current site customisations.
You might want to notify your SharePoint site owners about this new capability and update your training and documentation as appropriate.
Add to OneDrive is generally available
Category OneDrive Files are the building blocks of our work— helping us collaborate with others to construct the end results. Research documents, data spreadsheets, sales reports, presentations, product videos and other content-rich files are the components that hold up our final deliverable. "Where can I find that file?" It’s a question we’ve all asked our colleagues, our teams, and, most often, ourselves countless times but not anymore. Microsoft has now announced that the previously disclosed Add to OneDrive feature is now generally available. Now, instead of figuring out who sent us that file or remembering the original location of the shared content, we can swiftly get back to the files we need, directly within our OneDrive. Add to OneDrive makes it easy to add a shortcut to the shared folders directly to our OneDrive. Shared folders include content that others have shared with us through their OneDrive, which surfaces in the "Shared with me" view or content that is a part of a shared library in Microsoft Teams or SharePoint. 
Add to OneDrive makes it easy to add a shortcut to the shared folders directly to our OneDrive
With Add to OneDrive, not only can we bring all our shared content into one place, but we can also work with the shared content with the same power and flexibility as if they are files we own. This means we can easily sync and access these folders from anywhere on any device; securely share and co-author files in the added folder; and stay up to date with @mentions, activity, and notifications. Added folders respect all existing policies, compliance, and security settings, too.
Added folders can be synced to your device for anytime anywhere access.
Introducing smart backgrounds for Planner
MC227304 Category Planner Users will be able to add a relevant and unique background image to a Planner plan from a list of recommendations. This new Planner feature allows users to view smart image recommendations and add a relevant and unique background image to each plan, Powered by Designer. The image recommendations are based on the title of the plan. 
Author: SO365 Insights
 This month there are some great new features being introduced across Microsoft 365 to help make your life easier and your time more productive. We've highlighted a few of the new features in SharePoint, such as dynamically linking webparts, the new "sticky column" in the Quick Edit view, and the new ability to easily share lists and list items. There are also new features in Forms, Teams and OneDrive, and a new and easier way to use Planner templates. We should also mention the ability to now use your own backgrounds in Teams meetings (although we think you may have discovered this feature yourself and are already using it to its full potential in your video calls). Suggested replies in the Teams mobile app MC215163 Category Teams What is this all about? If you use the Teams app on your mobile, then you will soon have the ability to quickly tap a suggested reply when someone posts a chat or message to you to save having to open the keyboard and type a reply. How does this affect me? When suggested replies are available in your tenant, you will be able to quickly reply to a given message by tapping on a suggested reply that Teams has generated based on the context of the message.  What do I need to do to prepare for this change? Nothing, this feature is rolling out during July. Force all of your meetings to default to Online Teams meetings MC213856 Category Outlook Teams What is this all about? If you use Outlook on the web you will soon be able to configure Outlook to setup all your meetings as "online meetings" if you use Teams as your online meeting provider. How does this affect me? When this feature is enabled, you can update your Outlook settings so all meetings created through Outlook on the web and Outlook for iOS and Android will be created as online meetings and will contain the appropriate Teams information for joining the meeting. This feature is not compatible with third-party online meeting providers.
What do I need to do to prepare for this change? When available in July, you should go to Outlook on the Web settings and decide on the best default experience for you. See the last option in the image below. 
Help employees find information by adding bookmarks to Search MC216108 What is this all about? A neat feature of the search engine in Microsoft 365 which is rolling out now, is the ability for you to define bookmarks to key internal / external resources or information. Yes you can use a Quick Links webpart or add items to the Quick Launch menu of a site, and this is fine if the bookmark is localised to a site, but if you need employees to easily find company wide resources no matter where they are, then take a look at adding bookmarks to the internal search engine. How does this affect me? We are all now conditioned to using Search in our day-to-day lives to find information. Yet within our companies we still try and build hierarchical fixed navigation menus and links to "help employees" find things. Navigation is fine to move around your intranet, but if I just need to know where to find a specific company policy, or even the answer to a policy question, then Search would be more effective. For example, a lot of firms have policies for implementing the "Bribery Act" and this maybe through a document called the "Gifts and Benefits Policy". Now I know the policy exists, but cannot remember if it is in the Compliance site or the General Policies site or somewhere else. However, if the link to the policy was defined as a bookmark with key words such as "Gifts, Benefits, Bribery, Policy" etc., then I could just use search and click on the bookmark that is returned to open the policy or be navigated to the page where I can find it. You could use bookmarks for external resources that employees access such as an HR platform. Microsoft search also has many other capabilities for you to customise to make life easier for everyone. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? This change is rolling out now and will be completed by the end of July. If you want to make use of this feature then you will need to be a search administrator. More from Microsoft https://docs.microsoft.com/en-gb/microsoftsearch/manage-bookmarks Auto Digest Email for company news and posts MC215356 Category SharePoint What is this all about? SharePoint provides a simple and effective means to curate and post easily digestible company news to keep everyone informed, especially relevant when a large number of staff are working remotely and far more effective than large wordy emails. However, until now the effectiveness of the news posts relied on staff looking at the news either through the browser or the SharePoint mobile app or someone deciding to manually send a "News Digest" email. This new feature now enables your firm to send automated News Digests via email to notify staff of the recent news posts that they have not read. Using Office 365 intelligence, a curated selection of News posts are shared with staff through an email that comes from SharePoint. This is a great way for staff to catch up on News that they may have otherwise missed. Only published news posts are sent in the digest, and staff will have access to all the news posts that they are sent, so rest assured that staff won't see news that they don't have permission to see. If staff want to opt-out of receiving the Auto-News Digest, they can click the unsubscribe button at the bottom of the email. How does this affect me? You will start to receive a weekly mail from SharePoint Online containing news that you have not yet read based on sites that you are following. If you are not happy with the emails, you can unsubscribe from the email by clicking on the unsubscribe link at the bottom of the email. Navigation is fine to move around your intranet, but if I just need to know where to find a specific company policy, or even the answer to a policy question, then Search would be more effective. For example, a lot of firms have policies for implementing the "Bribery Act" and this maybe through a document called the "Gifts and Benefits Policy". Now I know the policy exists, but cannot remember if it is in the Compliance site or the General Policies site or somewhere else. However, if the link to the policy was defined as a bookmark with key words such as "Gifts, Benefits, Bribery, Policy" etc., then I could just use search and click on the bookmark that is returned to open the policy or be navigated to the page where I can find it. You could use bookmarks for external resources that employees access such as an HR platform. Microsoft search also has many other capabilities for you to customise to make life easier for everyone. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? This change is rolling out now and will be completed by the end of July. If you want to make use of this feature then you will need to be a search administrator.  Sample News Digest  User controlled Unsubscribe What do I need to do to prepare for this change? This change is rolling out now and will be completed by end July / early August. To benefit from this, you need to follow the sites from which you are interested in receiving news. Custom background in Microsoft Teams make video meetings more fun, comfortable and personal Category Teams What is this all about? When you join a Teams meeting by video, you can choose to use a background so other meeting participants cannot see the room or location you are in. The available backgrounds are set by Microsoft. Now, you will be able to upload your own custom background and use that. How does this affect me? You can now decide to upload your own background or select from an online collection that Microsoft has provided. Check out the link below for more information. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? This change is rolling out now. You might want to consider if this feature should be enabled for all participants or to control the use of custom backgrounds vs those supplied, or to turn off the capability altogether. Background effects can be controlled via the Teams admin centre. More from Microsoft https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/microsoft-365/blog/2020/06/12/custom-backgrounds-microsoft-teams-video-meetings-fun-comfortable-personal/ New Employee Survey Microsoft Forms template Category Forms Teams What is this all about? Microsoft Forms is a powerful tool for quickly creating internal and external surveys that can be accessed via Teams, SharePoint or just a link. During this time many companies are working remotely and need to collect information from their employee base while planning for their eventual return to the office. Microsoft has received feedback that Teams users are looking for an app that enables them to push "employee pulse" surveys to their employees on a regular basis. Based on this feedback, Microsoft have designed several templates for common scenarios to help teams create and share surveys in their Teams channels. How does this affect me? When the new templates are available, you will be able to customise them to your needs and make then available to your teams. A nice new feature is that you will be able to set an automated recurrence so that the "employee pulse" surveys can be automatically issued on a set recurring frequency. The three templates that will be available for you to use are:
What do I need to do to prepare for this change? Microsoft is rolling this change out to all customers during July. When available decide if these are useful to your business and if needed, customise the out-of-the-box forms. More from Microsoft https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/microsoft-forms-blog/what-s-new-in-microsoft-forms-integrations-may-june-2020/ba-p/1472356 Upload even larger files to OneDrive and SharePoint MC217136 Category OneDrive SharePoint What is this all about? Currently the maximum file size you can upload to OneDrive and SharePoint is 15GB. Yes this is a large file, but for some companies, such as those in the media or graphic design sector, this limit could create issues which prevented the full adoption of Microsoft 365. How does this affect me? Microsoft is increasing the Max File Size from 15GB to 100GB for a single file. This change applies to OneDrive for Business and SharePoint Online. For best performance, Microsoft recommend uploading very large files using the OneDrive Desktop sync client. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? You will no longer receive errors when trying to upload a file larger than 15GB, but less than 100GB. This will enable productivity, storage, and protection on large files in your organisation. This change is rolling out now. More from Microsoft https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/invalid-file-names-and-file-types-in-onedrive-and-sharepoint-64883a5d-228e-48f5-b3d2-eb39e07630fa?ui New capabilities to share SharePoint lists and individual list items MC217146 Category SharePoint What is this all about? Microsoft is currently making a number of significant changes (which we've previously highlighted in this series) to make SharePoint lists more useful to organisations. However, whereas it is now very easy and consistent to share documents, sharing lists or individual list items was either complicated or not supported. Microsoft is now addressing the sharing of lists and list items to make it a consistent experience. How does this affect me? This update brings the same "document" Grant Access experience to modern Lists. You will now see a Share command when viewing a list, even when you don’t have any list item selected. The Share button for a list will open the Grant Access dialog.  Site owners will be able to grant other users access to the list and are able to specify whether to give View-only, Edit, or Full Control permissions to the list. Other users (e.g. site members and visitors) cannot directly grant other users access to the list, but they can use the dialog to send an approval request to site owners if the site is set up to allow access requests (enabled by default). If the site does not allow access requests then non-owners will get a message letting them know they do not have permissions to share. This update also brings sharing links to list items. When you select a list item and click Share, you will see the same Send Link sharing dialog that exists today but new options will be available. Specifically, the “People in your organisation with the link” and “Anyone with the link” options will be available based on the policy that your organisation has configured.  All of the sharing policies you’ve configured for documents and files will apply to list items. For example, if you have set “People in your organisation with the link” as the default link type then that will also apply to list items. Similarly, if you’ve disabled or restricted Anyone links then those will also be disabled or restricted when users are sharing list items. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? This change is rolling out now. You should review the current sharing options in your SharePoint sites that contain lists, and decide on the list and document sharing capability that you as a site owner, want to give to other members and visitors to your site. You might consider updating your user documentation and training materials. More from Microsoft https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/office/share-lists-and-list-items-in-sharepoint-3af7efa5-c7fd-4239-b704-7dc3a3f8e508?ui=en-us&rs=en-gb&ad=gb Microsoft Teams - improvements in meetings experience for Mac users MC216823 Category Teams What is this all about? Participants joining your Teams meeting via the Safari browser on a Mac had a different experience to those using Chrome or Edge. Mainly the ability to use audio conferencing capabilities via the browser was disabled forcing them to join audio via a telephone or download and install Chrome. Microsoft are releasing improvements to the browser-based meetings experience for those who join Teams meetings with Safari browsers on Mac. How does this affect me? As a Mac user, you will no longer be required to use Audio Conferencing to dial into the meeting for audio needs, but rather, can use your Mac device to speak and listen. As already supported, you can continue to view meeting content being shared in their browser. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? The change is rolling out now. If you are a Mac user then you will benefit from the new Safari capabilities when joining other Teams meetings. If you host Teams meetings and your participants use a Mac, then the experience for them will be more seamless and they will no longer need to join the audio via a seperate conference number. Copy Planners between Teams and Groups Category Planner Teams What is this all about? If you use Microsoft Planner then sometimes you want to have a template plan that you can use in new Teams. Maybe a default project plan that should be used for all new clients. Although this capability exists, it was extremely inflexible in how you could use the feature. With this change, Microsoft is making it much easier to copy and re-use existing plans. How does this affect me? Consider if you would benefit from creating a template Plan or whether you need to copy a plan that has been previously created and then use the copy as the basis of a new plan in your Team. You might even want to create and make available a number of different template plans that your colleagues can use. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? Nothing, this change is rolling out now. Follow the link below to find out how you can copy and re-use plans More from Microsoft https://techcommunity.microsoft.com/t5/planner-blog/expanding-the-copy-plan-and-filtering-features-based-on-your/ba-p/1483491 New task management experience available for Outlook on the Web MC217689 Category Outlook What is this all about? Microsoft will soon roll out the new tasks experience in Outlook on the web. The new tasks experience in Outlook is powered by To Do and will help you to plan better and get more done with smart lists like Important and Planned. The list sharing feature will enable you to collaborate with friends, family and colleagues. Your tasks sync across Microsoft 365 and Office 365 so you can also manage your tasks on the go, with the Microsoft To Do Android and iOS mobile applications. How does this affect me? If you use Outlook on the Web instead of the desktop version, you will be able to take advantage of the new features. With this change, Tasks will get all the collaboration and co-editing features of To Do. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? There is nothing you need to do for this update which is rolling out now and should be completed by the end of August. Link SharePoint webparts together with new Dynamic Filtering capabilities MC217382 Category SharePoint What is this all about? You can link two SharePoint list webparts together, so that when you select an item in the first webpart, the second is automatically filtered to show relevant information. This is Dynamic Filtering. How does this affect me? Dynamic Filtering will enable you to build richer user experiences without having to revert to PowerApps. For example, perhaps you want to show a list of projects on the home page of your project site and when the use selects a project they see a filtered list of tasks for that project. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? Nothing, Dynamic Filtering is rolling out now and should be completed by the end of July. More from Microsoft https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/office/dynamic-list-filtering-eed5f92e-1716-45d5-9a94-59decb930e42 SharePoint lists and libraries - sticky column in Quick Edit MC217379 Category SharePoint What is this all about? As you scroll horizontally across a list or document library in Quick Edit, the far left column will soon remain in place just like it does in Excel. How does this affect me? This interface change will make it easier for you to navigate and edit very wide lists.  What do I need to do to prepare for this change? Nothing, this change is rolling out now and should be completed by the end of September. Add shortcuts to shared folders in your OneDrive MC217339 Category OneDrive What is this all about? You will soon be able to add shortcuts to shared folders in OneDrive and SharePoint shared libraries, and access those shortcuts from your OneDrive. How does this affect me? You will be able to add a shortcut to any folders or libraries shared with you from OneDrive or from SharePoint.  After you add a shortcut, it will appear in your OneDrive as a folder with a link icon at the OneDrive root. Owner information will be visible in the Sharing column to differentiate it from your own content. You will be able to access these shortcuts in OneDrive on the web, the OneDrive sync app, the OneDrive Android app, and Microsoft Teams. Support for additional products, such as the OneDrive iOS app, will be available in the next few months. When syncing OneDrive, these shortcuts will automatically appear in OneDrive across all devices. These shortcuts will respect all policy, compliance, and permission settings from the source. If you lose access to a shortcut, you will see an “Access Denied” error when you next navigate into that shortcut and will be prompted to remove it. What do I need to do to prepare for this change? Nothing, this feature is rolling out shortly. More from Microsoft https://support.microsoft.com/en-gb/office/add-shortcuts-to-shared-folders-in-onedrive-for-work-or-school-d66b1347-99b7-4470-9360-ffc048d35a33?ui=en-US&rs=en-GB&ad=GB Author: SO365 Insights |
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