Office 365 Weekly Digest | May 19 – 25, 2019

Article
05/28/2019

Welcome to the May 19 - 25, 2019 edition of the Office 365 Weekly Digest.

Twenty six features were added to the Office 365 Roadmap last week, with the vast majority for OneDrive, with others for PowerPoint Online, Outlook on the web, and Yammer sprinkled in. A rather notable feature for OneDrive is support for Files On-Demand for Windows Server 2019, targeted for release in June 2019.

No brand new events were added this week, just additional sessions for existing series. The spotlight event for this week is the "Simplifying your data privacy and compliance journey" Customer Immersion Experience on Thursday, May 30, 2019 from 12pm - 2pm Pacific.

With SharePoint Conference 2019 held last week, most of the blog posts are focused on the news and numerous announcements shared during the conference. There is also information on a new, optimized Microsoft 365 setup experience, the May 2019 feature updates for Workplace Analytics, Step 9 in the Top 10 actions to secure your environment, and a post on why one should use Office on the web.

Wrapping up the post are noteworthy items including a Microsoft IT Showcase IT Expert Roundtable webinar on migrating to live events in Microsoft 365, the latest updates to OneNote on Android, general availability of Identity Secure Score, and details on three key updates to Azure Active Directory provisioning.

OFFICE 365 ROADMAP

Below are the items added to the Office 365 Roadmap last week…

Feature ID	App / Service	Title	Description	Status	Added	Estimated Release
27015	Outlook iOS	New Files Experience in Outlook iOS	An improved files experience in Outlook mobile for sending attachments and accessing files.	In development	05/24/2019	May CY2019
27020	OneDrive	OneDrive for Business: File Requests	OneDrive users can request files from others by sending an upload-only link.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
27027	OneDrive	OneDrive for Business: VDI update	Support for Files On-Demand for server 2019	In development	05/24/2019	June CY2019
33412	OneDrive	Differential sync for all file types in OneDrive for Business	OneDrive will synchronize large files significantly faster and considerably reduce network utilization for all file types	In development	05/24/2019	May CY2019
49083	OneDrive	OneDrive Mobile:Updated Recent View	Improved recent files experience in ODB mobile app that you can see in all Office end points including Scans & PDFs. (It will also help you navigate between PDfs in an easier manner)	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
49084	OneDrive	Updated UI for PDF annotations	With PDFs, either as a native PDF file uploaded into OneDrive or when you scan an item like a whiteboard, receipt or business card, you can annotate the PDF to circle items or add notes for you and others. We are updating the user interface when you go to add your annotations, to give you more options and for it to be friendlier to use.	In development	05/24/2019	May CY2019
49085	OneDrive iOS	Updated design (align w/ Mobile Coherence)- iOS	Refresh look and feel of OD iOS app to align more closely to other Office apps	In development	05/24/2019	June CY2019
49095	OneDrive	OneDrive for Business: Save for later	Save for Later will allow you to bookmark files and folders from your OneDrive, files shared to you and those in Shared Libraries to a "Saved for Later" list that you'll be able to easily access	In development	05/24/2019	Q1 CY2020
49421	OneDrive OneNote	OneNote migration with KFM	Until now, the OneDrive sync client has not supported OneNote files. And we feedback shows that it's critical to migrate OneNote files as any other - thus we're introducing the ability for the OneDrive sync client to help migrate desktop OneNote files when leveraging Know Folder Move (KFM) to move your primary desktop folders (Documents, Pictures and Desktop) to the cloud.	In development	05/24/2019	Q1 CY2020
49510	OneDrive	"Popular Around Me" files	The "Shared With Me " view will now surface personalized recommendations based on your working relationships to help you find relevant and trending information faster and discover content you might not have been aware of.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
49516	OneDrive	360° images previewer support	OneDrive supports previewers of over 320+ file types - and now add to that 360° images. Once your 360° images are uploaded into OneDrive, you get a rich, interactive preview of the images without leaving OneDrive, and without requiring additional software or apps.	In development	05/24/2019	June CY2019
51381	Yammer	Office App Launcher in Yammer	We're updating the Office App Launcher and Header in Yammer. This is being done to provide consistency with Yammer and other Office apps and also show any customizations you have within Yammer as well.	In development	05/24/2019	June CY2019
51537	PowerPoint Online	Direct links to individual PowerPoint slide (web only)	Get a link to individual slide to share with recipients.	In development	05/24/2019	June CY2019
51538	Office 365	Updates to @mentions email notifications	Whenever someone @mentions you in an Office file you receive an email notifying you about the same. With this update the body of the email will now include the text of the comment as well making it easier to understand the context of the mention.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
51551	Outlook Web	Outlook on the web - inline translation	Inline Translation detects the language in incoming email messages and offers to translate them into your mailbox's language.	In development	05/24/2019	June CY2019
51552	Teams	Microsoft Team - Read Receipts in private chats	Increase communication transparency with Teams. Do you often wonder if your teammates saw your message? Read receipts in private chats allow senders to know when a message was read by the recipients.	In development	05/24/2019	June CY2019
51587	Teams	Retention for Microsoft Teams hybrid users	Hybrid or on-prem users for Microsoft Teams who have a mailbox in the cloud can set 30days retention policies for Teams content.	In development	05/24/2019	May CY2019
51623	Microsoft 365	Microsoft 365 Admin Setup Page	The new setup experience—which is being rolled out over several weeks—saves you time and helps you get the most out of your apps and services. Based on products you've purchased, features you've configured, and your admin role, we curate tasks and related information from across the entire Microsoft 365 stack and surface it in a single location—the Setup page—so you see only what's relevant to you.	Rolling out	05/24/2019	May CY2019
51723	Teams EDU	Teams Education - Gradebook	Now teachers can view and grade all assignments for a class directly from the channel Assignments tab. The new gradebook is a straightforward way to organize and track each class' assignments. In addition, the gradebook enables teachers to see a single student's progress across all their assignments.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
51726	Teams EDU	Microsoft Education - Weekly Parent Email Digest	On a weekly basis, Teams sends emails to parents on assignments and their statuses.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
51729	Teams EDU	Microsoft Teams Education - Class Avatars & Stickers	You can now choose from a wider selection of class avatars for your class team, and students and teachers can have their pick with the latest stickers.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
51730	Teams EDU	Microsoft Teams Education - GradeSync	With Grade Sync, save time and record assignment grades all in one platform – grades automatically get pushed to your Student Information System.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
51731	Teams EDU	Microsoft Teams Education - Turnitin Integration	Turnitin's originality score and Feedback Studio will be integrated into the Assignment workflow in Teams.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
51732	Teams EDU	Microsoft Teams Education - MakeCode Assignments	Teams Assignments now saves MakeCode work and allows students to turn in for review.	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019
51733	Teams EDU	Microsoft Teams Education - Mobile Grading	Teachers can now grade Teams Assignments on mobile (iOS, Android).	In development	05/24/2019	Q4 CY2019

UPCOMING EVENTS

Make the switch from Skype for Business to Microsoft Teams: End User Guidance

Designed specifically for Skype for Business end users, this course offers everything you need to help make the transition to Microsoft Teams. We'll focus on the core communication capabilities you use today, chat and meetings, as well as provide an orientation to additional collaboration functionality Teams has to offer. The session is also available on demand at https://aka.ms/fromskypetoteamsondemand.

Getting Started with Microsoft Teams

This 60-minute session introduces you to the key activities needed to get started with Microsoft Teams today. From setting your profile, to running a meeting, users will leave this session with the foundation needed to use Teams with confidence. The session is also available on demand at https://aka.ms/teamsgettingstartedondemand.

Microsoft Teams Tips and Tricks (Part 1)

Designed for those who are already familiar with Microsoft Teams, our Tips and Tricks sessions offer insights, best practices and advanced functionality to help optimize how Teams can work for you. Each session will also include a few real-world examples of how customers are using Microsoft Teams today. Part 1 is focused on tips for conversations and meetings. Many of our interactions start as a simple chat. Learn how you can take those conversations to the next level, including: (1) Formatting messages to help increase response rates, (2) Managing conversations to easily track and follow-up, (3) Organizing conversations, keeping important and active chats front-and-center, (4) Expanding conversations into a full meeting experience, and more. Prefer to watch this session on your own time or simply want a refresher after attending the live training? Access the consolidated on-demand version of Tips and Tricks here: https://aka.ms/teamstipsandtricksondemand.

Microsoft Teams Tips and Tricks (Part 2)

Designed for those who are already familiar with Microsoft Teams, our Tips and Tricks sessions offer insights, best practices and advanced functionality to help optimize how Teams can work for you. Each session will also include a few real-world examples of how customers are using Microsoft Teams today. Organizing your workflow and projects in Teams can really help simplify productivity. Join us for Part 2 of this series, where you'll learn tips including: (1) Implementing effective strategies creating and managing teams and channels, (2) Leveraging best practices for channel-based conversations, (3) Utilizing a personal team to manage your own productivity, (4) Designing your workspace to quickly find relevant content in Teams, and more. Prefer to watch this session on your own time or simply want a refresher after attending the live training? Access the consolidated on-demand version of Tips and Tricks here: https://aka.ms/teamstipsandtricksondemand.

Maximizing Teams Meetings

The average employee spends approximately 30% of their working life in meetings. But meetings in Microsoft Teams are designed to be flexible and enable different types of connections for all the ways that work needs to get done. For users who are familiar with Microsoft Teams but want to better understand and optimize the Teams meeting experience, this session provides guidance into how to create spontaneous and scheduled meetings, leverage the pre, during and post-meeting features, identifying supported devices, and more.

Customer Immersion Experience: Simplifying your data privacy & compliance journey

Join us for a hands-on introduction to Microsoft 365 Compliance features and an opportunity to experience powerful solutions across the data lifecycle of assess, protect and respond. During this 2-hour interactive session, you will explore how to: (1) Understand your compliance from a single pane of glass, (2) Make identity the new perimeter, (3) Discover and govern sensitive data across clouds, devices and apps, (4) Recognize attacks, detect breaches, and recover quickly using automation, and (5) Streamline your operational processes and understand your security posture. Each session is limited to 12 participants, reserve your seat now.

Azure Active Directory Webinars for June

When: Multiple sessions currently scheduled from June 4 - 13, 2019 | Are you looking to deploy Azure Active Directory quickly and easily? We are offering free webinars on key Azure Active Directory deployment topics to help you get up and running. Sessions include Getting Ready for Azure AD, The Basics of Governing your Azure AD and Office 365 Deployment, Securing Your Identities with Azure Multi-Factor Authentication, Choosing the Right Authentication Method for Azure AD, and more. Each 1-hour webinar is designed to support IT Pros in quickly rolling out Azure Active Directory features to their organization. All webinars are free of cost and will include an anonymous Q&A session with our Engineering Team. So, come with your questions! Capacity is limited. Sign up for one or all of the sessions today! Note: There are also some sessions available on-demand.

Microsoft Teams Spring Adoption Series: Measuring and Communicating Success

When: Thursday, May 30, 2019 at 11am PT | This week we'll discuss how to collect and communicate success stories, qualitatively and quantitatively. Qualitative success stories are anecdotal points of feedback from stakeholders, champions, and users. These may be examples of improved collaboration, reduced internal email, faster team member onboarding, and similar stories. Quantitative success examples come from the Office 365 Microsoft Teams usage reports built into the Office 365 Admin portal. This information can show the usage of Microsoft Teams in your company. Communicating real-world examples and quantitative data is critical to reinforcing project success and getting buy-in and additional resources from leadership. In this session we'll walk through several examples of one-page or one-slide summaries you can create, and how to secure the data and examples you'll use to reinforce the message. Join live, or add the event to your calendar. Note: The top-level link has information and links to the recording for previous sessions in this Spring Adoption Series.

10 time saving tips and tricks with Outlook mobile

When: Thursday, June 6, 2019 at 9am PT | Outlook mobile brings together your email, calendar, contacts, documents and more in one fast, fluid experience so you can accomplish the most important tasks in just a few seconds. All backed by enterprise-grade security you can trust. Join the Outlook mobile team for a webinar that will highlight cool tips and tricks that save you time and spark joy. You also get to ask any questions and share feedback with the team directly. In this webinar, you will learn: (1) Why Outlook mobile is the right choice for you, (2) Best practices for getting started, (3) Cool tips and tricks that spark joy and let you accomplish the most important tasks in just a few seconds, and (4) Ask questions or share your feedback directly with the Outlook team. There are also sessions from previous months that can be viewed on demand.

Ask Microsoft Anything (AMA): Microsoft Planner

When: Thursday, June 6, 2019 at 9am PT | We are very excited to announce a Microsoft Planner 'Ask Microsoft Anything' (AMA). An AMA is a live online event similar to a "YamJam" on Yammer or an "Ask Me Anything" on Reddit. This AMA gives you the opportunity to connect with members of the product teams who will be on hand to answer your questions and listen to feedback. Join in the Planner AMA space, or add the event to your calendar. We look forward to seeing you there!

Microsoft Teams Spring Adoption Series: Ongoing Adoption - Tips and Best Practices

When: Friday, June 7, 2019 at 11am PT | As your user base becomes more comfortable with teams, they'll start to explore functionality beyond basic Chat and Collaboration. "Where should I put my files in Office 365" will become a recurring question as they use Teams, SharePoint and OneDrive. When more Teams come online, best practices like Favoriting a Team, Following a Channel, and using the Activity Feed will help users get the most out of Teams. Your core Project Team should begin to transition from initial enablement to service management and monitoring for service changes and usage issues. Being able to rely/leverage your Champions community for ongoing "best practices" sessions, tips, and communications. Join live, or add the event to your calendar. Note: The top-level link has information and links to the recording for previous sessions in this Spring Adoption Series.

Upgrade 101: Managing your upgrade from Skype for Business to Microsoft Teams (Part 1)

As an existing Skype for Business customer, we understand that upgrading to a new technology can be confusing and are committed to supporting you on your journey to Microsoft Teams. Through our two upgrade classes, you will find everything you need to plan and implement your upgrade. Part 1 is focused on upgrade planning and user readiness. Targeting project stakeholders with accountability for Skype for Business to Teams upgrade success and user readiness/change managers, this session serves as the foundation for your upgrade planning, including: (1) An overview of our proven, upgrade success framework, (2) Real-world customer examples, (3) Insights into facilitating user readiness and upgrade acceptance, and (4) Orientation to key upgrade guidance resources.

Microsoft IT: Speaking of Security - Privacy Compliance

When: Thursday, June 20, 2019 at 10am PT | During this webinar, the speakers will discuss the Microsoft security teams approach to privacy compliance. We'll address how we approached the topic and new requirements from GDPR. We'll answer your questions and talk about governance, compliance, and transparency, including all of the elements necessary to build a privacy program. Finally, we'll share some of the key things we learned on our journey. There are other sessions now available on demand at the Speaking of Security webinar series site.

BLOG ROUNDUP

New SharePoint home sites headline Microsoft 365 innovations for the intelligent workplace

At the 2019 SharePoint Conference, we showcased recent and upcoming innovations in SharePoint and across Microsoft 365—including SharePoint home sites, a dynamic, engaging, and personalized employee experience for your organization. These innovations power the intelligent workplace, where teams can collaborate and streamline workflows, organizations can engage employees and communicate effectively, and individuals can be more creative and productive with experiences and insights powered by artificial intelligence (AI). The world-class applications in Microsoft 365—including SharePoint, OneDrive, Microsoft Teams, Yammer, Microsoft Stream, PowerApps, and Microsoft Flow—enable digital transformation for more than 500,000 customer organizations and 180 million commercial active users. This post highlights our innovations across the following areas: (1) The intelligent intranet featuring SharePoint home sites, (2) Innovations in Yammer and Microsoft Stream for employee engagement and communications, (3) Intelligent file experiences, sharing, and controls with OneDrive, and (4) Turbocharging Microsoft 365 performance, security, intelligence, and innovation.

Optimize Microsoft 365 with the new setup experience

Get the most out of the services you purchased and ensure your users are secure and productive with a new, proactive approach to onboarding and configuration. The Microsoft 365 setup experience was designed for modern IT teams, whether you're a small business or a large enterprise. The new setup experience—which is being rolled out over several weeks—saves you time and helps you get the most out of your apps and services. Based on products you've purchased, features you've configured, and your admin role, we curate tasks and related information from across Microsoft 365 and surface it in a central location—the Setup page—so you get only the information that's relevant to you.

Workplace Analytics - May 2019: Feature updates

The Workplace Analytics team is excited to announce our feature updates for May 2019. The Workplace Analytics team has expanded language support for those who work with meeting exclusion rules. Japanese, Chinese, Arabic, Vietnamese, and many other languages – 52 in all – are now supported. The Admin settings page in Workplace Analytics has been redesigned to separate system default settings and privacy settings into two separate pages. The Workplace Analytics team has made two helpful changes to the query filter panel in Person, Person-to-Group, and Group-to-Group queries.

Top 10 actions to secure your environment: Step 9 - Protect your OS

The "Top 10 actions to secure your environment" series outlines fundamental steps you can take with your investment in Microsoft 365 security solutions. In Step 9, we provide resources to help you configure Microsoft Defender Advanced Threat Protection (Microsoft Defender ATP) to defend your Windows, macOS, Linux, iOS and Android devices from advanced threats. In an advanced threat, hackers and cybercriminals infiltrate your network through compromised users or vulnerable endpoints and can stay undetected for weeks—or even months—while they attempt to exfiltrate data and move laterally to gain more privileges. Microsoft Defender ATP helps you detect these threats early and take action immediately.

Why you should use Office for the web

Our engineering teams are focused on ensuring the web is a first-rate platform for Office and the best experience it can be. We have been investing heavily in recent years to make Office on the web better, faster, and smarter. We have released dozens of new features over the past year including things like, simplified ribbon, @mentions and co-authoring, and IDEAS for Excel and PowerPoint. We have an aggressive roadmap for the web and will continue this pace of innovation for the foreseeable future. Performance and reliability for the web have improved dramatically with page load times getting better by more than 60%. The web is at the forefront of Office innovation. The web is instrumental in providing the real-time feedback and machine learning necessary to make our AI and collaboration features excel, so you will often see may of our newest innovations appearing on the web first. If you haven't used Office on the web or if it has been a while since you checked out, you should give it a try. It is super easy to get started – just go to Office.com and sign in with your work, school, or personal Microsoft account. There you can find all the apps available to you and access all your documents stored on OneDrive or SharePoint. Every version of Office 365 gives you access to Office on the web, however there is also a free version for consumers that makes it easy to work with anyone. The web makes it so you don't need to worry about whether another has Office of which version they're using – just save a file on your OneDrive, send them the link, and then they can view, edit, and work in the document with you at the same time.

NOTEWORTHY

Azure AD: Identity Data for European Customers

We are excited to announce that for customers who provide an address in Europe, Azure AD now keeps all personally identifiable identity (PII) attributes within datacenters in Europe. Last year, we made changes in Azure AD to keep most identity data for European customers within Europe. We have now expanded on this capability to include all PII data. For details on what types of data we store and where, read Identity data storage for European customers in Azure AD. For information on where your identity data is stored, read Where is your data located?

Microsoft IT Showcase: IT Expert Roundtable - Migrating to live events in Microsoft 365 from Skype Meeting Broadcast

Format: Video (53 mins) | During this webinar, experts at Microsoft Core Services Engineering and Operations (CSEO) answered audience questions about how we migrated to the live events capability in Microsoft 365. They shared candid insights and best practices around the new video and interactive discussion capabilities available in Microsoft Teams, Yammer and Microsoft Stream, including planning, technical considerations and communications that were needed to ensure an optimal experience for both event producers and Microsoft employees.

Do more with OneNote for Android

In case you missed them, we've put together a list of features that have been added to OneNote for Android over the last few months. These new features include: (1) Palm rejection support for more natural and accurate inking, (2) Insert file attachments and PDFs from your Android device, (3) Sticky Notes integration and sync across devices, and (4) Improvements to search and search results. These features are all currently available so feel free to try them out and let us know what you think!

Identity Secure Score is now generally available!

Getting security right and protecting your identities can be hard. Knowing what guidance you should follow, the actions you should take, and even knowing what products you should use is often complex and difficult to navigate. That's why at Ignite last year, we announced the public preview of Identity Secure Score to help you improve your identity security posture. We're excited to announce that Identity Secure Score is now generally available! Identity Secure Score provides organizations with increased visibility and control over their security posture by discovering opportunities that will help to improve security across your organization. These opportunities are surfaced as recommendations, which are coupled with the guidance and the workflows necessary to help security administrators implement each recommendation. The more improvements you make, the more your identity security posture improves—increasing your identity secure score!

Build a strong identity foundation with Azure AD provisioning

Azure AD allows customers to bring identities from on-premises systems through Active Directory, as well as cloud HR systems (like Workday), and automatically provision/deprovision the identities to SaaS applications, unlocking joiner-mover-leaver scenarios. Provisioning enables organizations to have a single identity for a user across all applications and helps unlock productivity, security, and usability for your organization. The Azure AD provisioning team is constantly listening to your feedback on how to make Azure AD provisioning better. We want to share three key updates to Azure AD provisioning that we rolled out in the last few weeks—based on your input, including: (1) Provisioning from Workday now supports username writeback, (2) Automatically provision to Dynamic Signal, Keeper Password Manager & Digital Vault, and Comeet Recruiting Software, and (3) Manage groups from the cloud and improved usability with the new version of Azure AD Connect.

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Office 365 Weekly Digest | May 19 – 25, 2019

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