Microsoft October 2023 Update Digest
Microsoft October 2023 Update Digest by Penthara Technologies

Microsoft October 2023 Update Digest

1. Teams

A. Forward Messages in Teams Chat

Microsoft Teams users will soon be able to send chat messages from one chat to another. Messages can be forwarded to 1:1 chats, group chats, and meeting chats.

This feature will also allow the sender to add additional content to the message to provide context and clarity to the recipient. This feature will be rolling out across Microsoft Teams Desktop, Web, and Mobile.

When this will happen:

Rollout will begin in late November 2023 and is expected to be complete by mid-February 2024.

  • Targeted release: Rollout will occur in late November 2023
  • Standard release: Rollout will occur in mid-January 2024
  • GCC, GCCH, and DoD: Rollout will begin in late January 2024 and be complete by mid-February 2024

How this will affect your organization:

The entry point for the forward message feature will be in the overflow menu

Figure 1. Forward Messages in Teams Chats


Upon clicking this button, the forward message compose dialog will populate the screen.

Figure 2. Forward Messages in Teams Chats

In the compose dialog, users will have the option to select from the people picker menu who the message will be forwarded to. A message can be forwarded to an existing group chat, a new group chat, a meeting chat, or a 1:1 chat. Currently, users will only be able to forward one message to one chat at a time.?

Figure 3 Forward Messages in Teams Chats

In the compose dialog, the user can also add an additional message to accompany the forwarded message to provide content.

Figure 4 Forward Messages in Teams Chats

Once the message has been forwarded, the chat will bubble up to the top of the user’s chat list, and the message will appear in the chat in the format shown below.

Figure 5 Forward Messages in Teams Chats

What you need to do to prepare:

It is recommended that you notify your users about this new capability to forward messages and update your training and documentation as appropriate.


B. Analytics Insights for Virtual Appointments in Microsoft Teams

Tenant admins, now, can see updated virtual appointment analytics with new insights in Teams to help drive business outcomes, including -

  • Average lobby wait times for scheduled vs. on-demand appointments
  • Percentage of appointments completed after the scheduled end time
  • Percentage of appointments with a late start.

When this will happen:

Targeted Release: This will begin rolling out in early November and is expected to be completed by mid-November.

Standard Release: This will begin rolling out mid-November and is expected to be completed by late November.

How this will affect your organization:

Tenant Admins will be able to see insights into their organization's usage of Virtual Appointments tied to Bookings calendars. The insights will be visible in the Analytics tab inside the Virtual Appointments application in Teams.

What you need to do to prepare:

There is no pre-work needed. Simply navigate to the Analytics tab to start seeing the insights. The current reports and controls continue to be available.


C. New Feature in Teams Admin Center to Communicate with Third-Party App Publishers via Teams

Microsoft Teams admins will soon be able to initiate private group chats with a limited set of third-party Teams app publishers via a new Click-to-Chat (C2C) feature being added to the Teams Admin Center (TAC).

When this will happen:

Standard Release: Rollout will begin in late November and will be completed by late December 2023.

How this will affect your organization:

As part of this feature, Teams admins will be able to quickly communicate directly with app publishers to assess whether an app will meet their business including questions regarding data compliance, pricing, and deployment. If an app publisher supports this feature, admins will discover a C2C button in the app card in the manage apps tab of TAC (screenshot below).

Note: if an admin has disabled external communications in their tenant, C2C will also be disabled. While the C2C button will appear, attempts to initiate a chat will result in a dialog providing an email address to which the admin can submit their questions outside of Teams.

Figure 6. New Feature in Teams Admin Center to Communicate with Third-Party App Publishers via Teams


Figure 7. New Feature in Teams Admin Center to Communicate with Third-Party App Publishers via Teams

What you need to do to prepare:

No action if external communications are already enabled. If you have disabled external communications in your Teams tenant, consider whether to enable ISVs that support this feature.?


D. Automatically view up to 9 videos (3x3) in Teams meetings in Chrome and Edge

Microsoft Teams Meetings currently supports a maximum of 4 videos (2x2) on the screen by default (i.e., Gallery view) on web browsers. With this update, users will be able to automatically see up to 9 videos (3x3) on Chrome and Edge on their screen by default without an explicit action.

When this will happen:

Targeted Release: It will be rolled out in early December and is expected to be completed by mid-December.

Standard Release: It will be rolling out in mid-January and is expected to be completed by late January.

How this will affect your organization:

Users joining meetings from Chrome and Edge browsers will be able to see more videos of other participants.

What you need to do to prepare:

You may need to update the documentation for your Chrome/Edge users to mention the existence of this improvement.


2. Outlook

A. Control Inbox and Calendar Sharing Options in Outlook for user

Outlook on the Web and the new Outlook for Windows provides users with the ability to share mail and calendar with other users at different permission levels. Starting in November 2023, tenant admins will be able to turn off the ability for users to share inbox and calendar folders by utilizing the new Office Cloud Policy Service “Turn off folder sharing.”

When will this happen:

The rollout for this feature will begin in early November 2023 and is expected to be completed by late November 2023.

How this affects your organization:

  • This feature matches the existing capabilities available in Outlook for Windows (Win32).
  • When this policy is turned on, users will be able to block future sharing of inbox and calendar folders in OWA.
  • Existing users that have been granted permissions to the inbox and calendar will not be affected.
  • If admins wish to continue to allow users to delegate their inboxes and calendars, no action is necessary.?
  • This capability is only active when the policy is turned on.?

What you can do to prepare:

You may consider updating your training and documentation as appropriate.

For more information on applying Cloud policy, please visit:?Overview of Cloud Policy

For more information on sharing policies in Exchange Online, please visit:?Sharing Policies in Exchange Online


B. Release of Preserve Declined Meetings in November

Next month Microsoft will release a new feature called Preserve Declined Meetings (PDM) to keep declined meetings on the calendar, instead of deleting them like today. Once you turn it on, your declined meetings will no longer disappear but remain on your calendar so you can easily recollect related info/docs, find associated chats, or even take actions like updating your previous response (RSVP) and forwarding it to someone else; all while keeping your agenda free in that time slot.

When this will happen:

Standard Release: It will be rolling out in mid-November and is expected to be completed by late November.

How this will affect your organization:

With the rollout, users on Outlook on the web and on new Outlook for Window will see a new tip which will guide them to the settings page (Calendar > Events and invitations > Save declined events) where they can enable the feature by checking the "Show declined events on my calendar" checkbox. With PDM enabled, users can start declining meetings and they will automatically be preserved.

Please note that meetings declined from the classic Outlook for Windows will not be preserved, but meetings declined from all other Outlook clients (new Outlook for Windows, Outlook on the web. Outlook for Mac, Outlook for Android, Outlook for iOS) will be preserved. Once preserved, declined meetings are viewable on any calendar surface, including the classic Outlook for Windows, Teams, and third-party apps.

Figure 8. Release of Preserve Declined Meetings in November
Figure 9. Release of Preserve Declined Meetings in November.png
Figure 10. Release of Preserve Declined Meetings in November.png
Figure 11. Release of Preserve Declined Meetings in November.png

What you need to do to prepare:

There is nothing you need to do to prepare for this change. But in case you need to disable PDM availability for your entire tenant, you can do so (after the WW release) by running get/set CalendarSettings commands. The tenant setting will override individual user settings. To disable PDM for your tenant, do the following as a tenant admin:

1. Connect to Exchange Online PowerShell | Microsoft Learn

2. Use get command to read the current PDM tenant setting (e.g. Get-CalendarSettings lt;tenant-namegt;)

3. Use set command to disable PDM for the entire tenant (e.g. Set-CalendarSettings <tenant-name> -EnablePreserveDeclinedMeetings $false)


3. Power Automate

A. Microsoft Power Automate - Information about new Power Platform URLs used by Power Automate

Startingnbsp;Wednesday, November 22, 2023, Microsoft Power Automate will start to rely on a new cloud service dependency called Power Platform API. The Power Automate experiences will leverage this new API internally, as will more Power Platform experiences over time.

How does this affect me?

These?Power Platform URLs and IP address ranges?are critical to the operation of the Power Platform API, and starting?Wednesday, November 22, 2023, your service may be negatively impacted in the following scenarios:

  • If you use any in-house firewall rules to restrict network traffic to URLs or IP addresses, if unaddressed, this change will lead to service interruptions.
  • If you have employed Azure Active Directory Conditional Access policies targeting the cloud service "Microsoft Flow" or "Microsoft Power Platform API". As client experiences (e.g.?https://make.powerautomate.com) adopt "Power Platform API", Conditional Access policies targeting "Microsoft Flow" will no longer result in the same Conditional Access enforcement.

In the commercial cloud, these are the cloud services being referenced and their corresponding application IDs:

  • "Microsoft Flow" application id: 7df0a125-d3be-4c96-aa54-591f83ff541c
  • "Power Platform API" application id: 8578e004-a5c6-46e7-913e-12f58912df43

Please note, the cloud service dependency change is occurring in all clouds.

What action do I need to take?

Evaluate adding the cloud service Power Platform API to your Conditional Access policies and update the?Power Platform URLs and IP address ranges?in your firewall rules. This cloud service is now available in Azure portal Conditional Access experiences, to add, and remove from policies.


4. Power Platform

A. Power Platform admin center – Classic Designer deprecation notice

Starting on Friday, October 27, 2023, the Classic Designers for model-driven apps, forms, and views are being deprecated and replaced with the Modern Designers. In line with Microsoft’s commitment to modernizing the authoring experience to bring your creativity to life effortlessly, they've been investing heavily in Modern Designers for model-driven apps, forms, and views. This designer offers a way to create and manage your model-driven apps and components to not only provide an improved app authoring experience but also to reach core feature parity with the Classic Designers for deprecation purposes.

Here are some of the benefits to fully adopt the Modern Designers:

  • Enhanced, modernized authoring experience:?The Modern Designers offers a more intuitive and user-friendly interface with a real-time preview, which makes app design and management tasks simpler and more efficient.
  • Accessibility:?The Modern Designers are 100% accessible by design.
  • Exciting upcoming feature roadmap:?This is just the beginning of our roadmap for Modern Designers, including adding copilot features to the Modern Designers world.

How does this affect me?

Starting on Friday, October 27, 2023, in North America, and in other regions the following week, the option to "Switch to Classic" to revert to Classic Designers is no longer available by default. Depending on your geographic location and rollout cadence, this may not impact you immediately, but changes should reach your region within a week.

Please note, that makers who require access to the Classic Designers will need to reach out to their admin. Admins can turn the "Switch to Classic" option back on in the?Power Platform Admin Center?for specific environments.

What action do I need to take?

This message is for awareness and no action is required. For more information on this change, please refer to?Important changes (deprecations) coming in Power Apps and Power Automate.


5. Microsoft Viva

A. Viva Engage | User reactions in eDiscovery is GA

As of October 3rd, 2023, user reactions to messages* in Viva Engage will be ingested for eDiscovery. Hence, any content search done on Viva Engage messages will retrieve all user reactions to those messages in eDiscovery. The solution is now GA to all our customers, in our effort to further strengthen the compliance standards of Viva Engage and deepen the trust of our customers in the product.

When will this happen:

Available now.

Please note the following considerations around the solution:

1. The solution will apply to all reactions posted ‘going forward’. This will apply to:

a. New messages (post October 3rd, 2023) – all reaction activities (including any history of changes in reactions) will be recorded and ingested in eDiscovery.

b. Messages with existing reactions (before October 3rd, 2023) – a new reaction activity (after October 3rd, 2023) on such messages will trigger recording the latest snapshot of existing reactions as well as the new reaction activities for that specific message* along with ingestion in eDiscovery. Please note this will apply to each specific message with a new reaction activity and not the entire conversation thread.

2. All reactions and any changes to them will be logged along with the timestamps of posting them.

3. All ingested reaction data can be exported for GDPR purposes using the existing Viva Engage User Export API.

* A message can be a thread-starter post/question, a comment/answer to the post/question, or a reply to a comment/answer.

What you can do to prepare:

You may consider updating your training and documentation as appropriate.


B. Viva Connections: Apply brand colors across all Connections endpoints using themes

Soon you’ll be able to further customize the Connections experience by applying the themes available in SharePoint to reflect organizational brand colors across desktop, tablet, and mobile.

If you can edit the Connections experience, you have two ways to use this new feature:

  • Current process: Editors can change the color theme by using the 'Change the look' panel under site settings for their home site. The same color theme will also apply to their Viva Connections experience on Teams desktop, tablet, and mobile.
  • New process: Editors can go to the top right corner of the Connections desktop app and open the overflow menu. There, they will find a new option called 'Change the look'. This option lets them choose a color theme that will impact both the Connections theme and the home site theme.

Note:?This feature will be released along with or after the tenant has received the?refreshed landing experience for Viva Connections desktop.?

When this will happen:

It will be rolled out this feature to targeted release customers by mid-November 2023.

This is expected to become generally available to all customers by the end of February 2024.

How this will affect your organization:

Once the feature is released to your tenant, you will notice the following changes to your Viva Connections experience:

  • The home site color theme will reflect?automatically?in the Connections desktop, tablet & mobile experiences, with a few exceptions noted below.
  • If you have never selected a theme for your home site, the default SharePoint theme will still reflect across the home site and the Connections experience.
  • If you are using a Connections experience without a home site, there will be no visual difference, however after the release of this feature you will have the option to change the color theme.
  • If you have been using an?accent color under app customization feature?in the Teams admin center for theming for the Connections mobile experience, once the feature is rolled out,?the accent color won’t apply to the Connections experience, however, it will continue applying to the Teams chrome surrounding the Connections experience, e.g. the app icon outline color on the Teams chrome will be sourced from the accent color setting.

Figure 12. Viva Connections: Apply brand colors across all Connections endpoints using themes

There are a few exceptions where the selected theme will not apply:

  • If an end user has selected dark mode on their mobile or tablet device, the theme colors won’t be applied to their Connections experience. The dashboard and other Connections components will render in dark mode with the default color.
  • Dark themes (has the property isInverted=True), won’t be applied to the mobile experience. If the dark theme is selected, mobile will continue showing Connections with the user’s selected mode (light or dark) and the default colors.

Microsoft is continuously listening to your feedback and will send a separate communication once these exceptions are removed.

What you need to do to prepare:

It’s recommended that you share information regarding this upcoming feature and the following steps with your team managing home site and Connections experiences.

6. Microsoft Purview

A. Microsoft Purview | Endpoint DLP – Support for New Predicates

With this new feature for Microsoft Purview Data Loss Prevention, Microsoft is introducing support for four new conditions that you can use in your policies for endpoint devices.

When this will happen:

Preview: It will be rolled out in mid-October and completed by late October.

How this will affect your organization:

With this capability, your Microsoft Purview Data Loss Prevention (DLP) policies will be able to detect documents that are unscannable, partially scannable, greater than a specific file size, and if the document name matches configured patterns on Windows endpoint devices. With this capability, you will be able to prevent your users from accessing unscannable files on the endpoint and trying an egress action such as copying to a USB, copying to a clipboard, or copying it to another network share, etc.

The four new predicates are:

a. Document Size equals or is greater than: Detects documents is greater than or equal to the specified value.

b. Document Name matches patterns: Detects documents where the file name matches specific patterns.

c. Document couldn’t be scanned: Applies to documents when their content wasn't scanned. Examples include password protected files, files for which text extraction failed, files that exceed file size limit.

d. Document couldn’t complete scanning: Applies to documents when their content was scanned, however the entire document was not scanned. Examples include files for which extracted text exceeded the limits/thresholds.

As part of your DLP Policy definition, you can leverage these conditions across supported/applicable workloads. For example, you can extend the above mentioned four conditions which are already available in DLP for Exchange and scope it to Endpoint/Devices as part of your policies and rules, thereby enhancing your protection across your digital estate.

Please refer to the supported file types on endpoint, for which these predicates will provide protection.

https://learn.microsoft.com/en-us/purview/endpoint-dlp-learn-about#file-types

What you need to do to prepare:

Get started with Data Loss Prevention in the?Microsoft Purview compliance portal.


B. Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Customized retention policies for Audit (Premium) and 10-year Retention Add-On

Microsoft is rolling out support through the user interface to auto-identify the OneDrive for Business sites associated with an Inactive mailbox when adding Custodians in an eDiscovery (Premium) case.

When this will happen:

Rollout will happen starting mid-November and is expected to complete by late November 2023.

How this will affect your organization:

When a user having the roles and permissions to add Custodians to a case, adds a user with an inactive mailbox as a custodian, the OneDrive for Business site associated with the inactive mailbox will be auto-selected to be added as a data source to the case.This is currently supported through the user interface only.

Figure 13. Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Customized retention policies for Audit (Premium) and 10-year Retention Add-On

What you need to do to prepare:

Notify your users about this new capability in eDiscovery (Premium).

Learn more about Microsoft Purview eDiscovery solutions -?Microsoft Purview (compliance) | Microsoft Docs.


C. Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Ux support to identify the ODB site for an inactive mailbox in eDiscovery (Premium)

Microsoft is rolling out the capability to pick relevant Teams channels (Standard, Private, and Shared) as non-custodial data locations. This will intelligently identify associated custodian/group mailboxes and SharePoint sites related to the channel.

When this will happen:

This is in Public Preview and the General Availability rollout will start in the last week of October and is expected to be complete by mid-November.

How this will affect your organization:

The ability to search for Teams and for select Teams channels to be added as non-custodial data sources will be available under the Data Sources > Add data locations >Teams option.

Figure 14. Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Ux support to identify the ODB site for an inactive mailbox in eDiscovery (Premium)

You can search for and add up to 10 Teams at a time. You can select the Standard, Shared and Private channels under each Team to add as a data source. You can also select which associated locations you want to place on Hold.

Figure 15. Microsoft Purview compliance portal: Ux support to identify the ODB site for an inactive mailbox in eDiscovery (Premium)

eDiscovery users with the permission to add locations in the Data sources page will be able to add mailboxes and sites associated with the Teams channel (including Standard, Shared, and Private channels) as non-custodial data sources and preserve them.

What you need to do to prepare:

Assess if the changes will change your organization’s eDiscovery workflow. If so, update internal documentation. Provide training to all eDiscovery users in your organization and update relevant documentation if needed.?


D. Adaptive Protection in Microsoft Purview: Public preview of multi-policy selection

Coming soon, Adaptive Protection in Microsoft Purview will be rolling out public preview of HR resignation date as a condition for risk level.

When this will happen:

Rollout will begin at the end of November and is expected to be complete by mid-December.

How this will affect your organization:

When the HR connector has been configured, admins with appropriate permissions can now select the HR resignation date as a condition to assign a minor, moderate, or elevated risk level. For example, an admin can configure the elevated risk level to be assigned when an HR resignation date is sent via the HR connector.

What you need to do to prepare:

No action is required for this update. To configure user’s risk level for Adaptive Protection, admins can visit Insider Risk Management > Adaptive Protection (preview) > risk levels for Adaptive Protection.


7. OneDrive for Business

A. Add Individual File Shortcuts in OneDrive Web

You can create a shortcut to files stored in other people's OneDrives and document libraries to be able to easily find it within your OneDrive. These file shortcuts can be moved and renamed without impacting the source content and will show up in OneDrive Android, iOS & sync client endpoints.

When this will happen:

It will be rolled out in early November and is expected to be completed by late November.

How this will affect your organization:

Users will see an?Add Shortcut?command in the command bar and context menu for a file. This command will be available across all OneDrive file lists (Home, My files, Shared, Favorites, etc.) as well as document libraries. It will also be available for document libraries browsed within SharePoint and Teams.?

When a user selects a file and clicks?Add Shortcut, they will see two options for where to add a shortcut:?My files?and?Other locations.?

If the user selects?My files, a .url file will be created within their?My files?list in OneDrive. If they select?Other?locations, a file picker will launch for users to choose a location for their file shortcut within their OneDrive as well as document libraries they have access to.

The default name of the shortcut will be the name of the source file appended with .url. For example, if you create a shortcut to IndividualFileShortcuts.docx, the name of the shortcut will be IndividualFileShortcuts.docx.url and will be differentiated with an arrow icon overlay.

The file shortcut is simply a pointer to a file. When a user renames, moves, deletes, or shares a file shortcut, this only impacts the shortcut file and has no impact on the source file. A key implication of this behavior is that, if a user shares a shortcut file or moves a shortcut file to a shared location, it does not automatically grant access to the source file and users would need to share the source file directly to allow access. If the source file is renamed after the file shortcut was created, the file shortcut will not reflect the new source file name.

File shortcuts support the same commands as other .url files in OneDrive and SharePoint that were created through?New > Link.

File shortcuts can only be added through OneDrive Web, SharePoint Web, and Teams. File shortcuts can be accessed across OneDrive Web, SharePoint Web, OneDrive iOS & Android, OneDrive Sync Client, and Teams. There is no meaningful distinction in file shortcut access behavior across endpoints.

Figure 16. Add Individual File Shortcuts in OneDrive Web
Figure 17. Add Individual File Shortcuts in OneDrive Web.png

What you need to do to prepare:

You may want to notify your users, update your user training, and prepare your help desk.

For your users:?Add shortcuts to shared folders in OneDrive for work or school

  • Users cannot create a file shortcut to non-file content within their OneDrive (e.g., Lists, Whiteboard, PowerBI dashboards, etc.). However, users can create a file shortcut to Loop components within OneDrive.
  • Users cannot?Favorite?a file shortcut. Our expectation is that customers will?Favorite?the source file instead of a shortcut that points to the source file.
  • When a user shares a file shortcut or moves it to a shared location, it does not share the source file.
  • Users cannot preview file shortcuts since the shortcut file itself has no information to preview.


8. Exchange Online

A. Admins can now disable roaming signatures themselves for Outlook on the web

Microsoft has announced that admins now have a self-serve way to disable roaming signatures themselves for their tenants for Outlook on the web (formerly known as Outlook Web App or OWA) and the new Outlook for Windows. Please note that for Windows, the registry setting to disable roaming signatures will continue to work and is the only way to disable it. For more information, see Outlook roaming signatures.

When this will happen:

It will be rolled out in mid-October 2023 and is expected to be complete by early November 2023.

How this will affect your organization:

This change provides an option for admins to disable roaming signatures themselves. Previously, the only way to disable roaming signatures in Outlook on the web was to open a support ticket and ask to have Outlook roaming signatures disabled in your organization. Going forward, this support ticket process will be discontinued as admins can now disable roaming signatures themselves.

How to disable roaming signature

Set-OrganizationConfig -PostponeRoamingSignaturesUntilLater $true

OR

Set-OrganizationConfig -PostponeRoamingSignaturesUntilLater 1

Details can be found Set-OrganizationConfig documentation page

nbsp;

The PostponeRoamingSignaturesUntilLater parameter controls whether roaming signatures are enabled or disabled in Outlook on the web (formerly known as Outlook Web App or OWA) and the new Outlook for Windows. Valid values are:

  • $true: Roaming signatures are temporarily disabled for Outlook on the web and the new Outlook for Windows. When roaming signatures are disabled, admins can use signature-specific parameters like SignatureHtml, AutoAddSignature, AutoAddSignatureOnReply, etc. on the Set-MailboxMessageConfiguration cmdlet to configure email signatures. For Windows, the registry setting to disable roaming signatures will continue to work. Microsoft is also working on providing API support to roaming signatures in the future so admins and ISVs can get access to setting and defining User roaming signatures, and tenants no longer need to disable roaming signatures. When the new API is available (and after plenty of warning), this new parameter will be deprecated.
  • $false: This is the default value

Thank you,

Subscribe and follow Penthara Technologies for more monthly updates.

Anya Farma

Business Development Rep (BDR) | Loocey

1 年
回复
Anya Farma

Business Development Rep (BDR) | Loocey

1 年
回复

要查看或添加评论,请登录

Penthara Technologies的更多文章

社区洞察

其他会员也浏览了