Microsoft 365 Admin Monthly Digest

Welcome to the Microsoft 365 IT admin blog, your monthly source of tips, insights, and best practices for managing and optimizing your Microsoft 365 environment. What's new for Microsoft 365 admins: This session covers the latest updates for Microsoft 365 admins with topics ranging from Copilot for Microsoft 365 admin, the cloud. Microsoft unified domain, managing multi-tenant and cross-tenant environments, to network provider data and actionability Getting your enterprise ready for Copilot for Microsoft 365: Hear from experts on preparing an organization for Microsoft 365 Copilot including information protection, compliance, privacy, deployment prerequisites, information access optimization, and extensibility options. How Copilot for Microsoft 365 works: Go behind the scenes to understand the architecture and dataflows behind Microsoft 365 Copilot including retrieval augmented generation techniques, app commanding, and options to securely connect to external data. Organizations seeking a solution that is always supported are recommended to consider transitioning to Microsoft 365 E3 that comes with not only the Microsoft 365 Apps, but also capabilities like foundational security, streamlined endpoint management, and enhanced productivity and collaboration features. Csv file to power high-value capabilities and new scenarios across Microsoft Viva and Microsoft 365, such as Viva Amplify reporting and more personalized experiences in Viva and Microsoft 365. As always, stay current with the latest updates on the Microsoft 365 admin center from the Microsoft 365 roadmap and the message center. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3R0IHyw Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Copilot in Microsoft 365

Today, we're excited to share more about some of our supportability work with Microsoft 365 Copilot. Copilot for Microsoft 365 has been in use by tens of thousands of enterprise customers as part of our Early Access Program for several months and our support teams have been there every step of the way assisting IT Admins with their questions. A small group of senior engineers in our Microsoft 365 Commercial Support Team have been working closely with the Copilot product engineering teams since the early stages of development, well before the first customer ever onboarded, to learn the service and build readiness and training assets for our global support teams. Today, I'm excited to welcome three of these engineers to share their knowledge, insights, and guidance on getting ready for Copilot for Microsoft 365and ways IT Admins can be most effective in deploying, managing, and supporting Copilot with users in their organizations. Brian: Welcome Jason, Rob, and Parth! It's great to have your Copilot expertise here and I know you've been working with Copilot for Office apps, Outlook, and Microsoft Teams for quite a while. We have a Tech Community blog that steps through how to prepare your organization for Microsoft 365 Copilot: How to prepare for Microsoft 365 Copilot - Microsoft Community Hub. In terms of language support, here are the languages currently supported by Copilot for Microsoft 365 for prompts and responses: Chinese, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese, Portuguese, Spanish. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3uEkXbS Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

SharePoint Roadmap Update

A new SharePoint start experience was also introduced for creating personal pages, so there's less overhead in getting started with SharePoint. New Stream Webpart: Video is some of the most important content to highlight within a SharePoint page, and the new Stream video webpart lets you easily highlight a single video, or a set of videos. With this new functionality customers will have the choice of applying existing SharePoint themes or a custom theme to their Connections experience as well as the SharePoint home site hosting the Connections experience. Customers rely on SharePoint to provide site and page templating, UX-layer parts and plug-ins using the SharePoint Framework, and data access via Microsoft Graph. In July we announced the new SharePoint Web UI kit focused on giving designers expert tools to customize SharePoint to meet any design challenge. Between the SharePoint Framework and the new Web UI toolkit, SharePoint is a stronger platform to build on than ever before. We're pleased to announce the public preview of SharePoint Embedded - a new approach to building content-centric apps powered by SharePoint that can go beyond traditional Microsoft 365 user experiences. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3QVEUT3 Source: Microsoft Tech Community SharePoint Blog

Unlocking OneDrive's Potential: Pro Tips for IT Administrators

Whether you need to get up and running quickly with OneDrive, or you're an experienced OneDrive admin, we've gathered a list of quick tips to help you streamline management, ensure your users and data are secure, and provide the best possible user experience. OneDrive helps you define secure virtual perimeters for sharing content, educate people about your policies for secure collaboration, and monitor how people share to discover and address gaps. See OneDrive file usage and activity at a glance In the Microsoft 365 Reports dashboard, you can drill into your users' OneDrive activity to get more information. The OneDrive card on the dashboard gives you a high-level view of the value you are getting from OneDrive in terms of the total number of files and storage used across your organization. OneDrive activity reports give you a high-level view of OneDrive usage in your organization. OneDrive audit logs provide information and shared files in your organization. Lastly, we invite you to join our OneDrive customer office hours where you can ask questions and engage directly with the OneDrive product and engineering team. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3sRY18t Source: Microsoft Tech Community OneDrive Blog

SharePoint Add-In retirement in Microsoft 365

As part of this evolution of Microsoft 365 solutions we will be retiring the SharePoint Add-In extensibility model and believe Microsoft 365 customers will be better served by modern SharePoint extensibility models. SharePoint hosted Add-Ins primarily bring UX elements to the site the Add-In was installed into and the app web that was created for the Add-In. A common use case is showing SharePoint Add-In web parts on pages of the host web, using SharePoint Framework based web parts is the recommended alternative here. Provider hosted SharePoint Add-Ins run outside of SharePoint and typically have their own UX. They use Azure ACS as auth layer to enable calling back into the host web where the SharePoint Add-In was installed. The auth model for these will be based on Microsoft Entra ID. If there are requirements to integrate in the SharePoint UX then SharePoint Framework can be used as calling into external application APIs can be done from SharePoint Framework solutions. The retirement of SharePoint Add-Ins applies to Project Online as well, any SharePoint Add-In used in Project Online will follow the same retirement path as SharePoint Add-Ins used in SharePoint Online. To understand if your organization is using SharePoint Add-Ins or begin planning migration to SharePoint Framework based solutions or alternatives, we recommend that customers run the Microsoft 365 Assessment tool to scan their tenants for SharePoint Add-In usage. SharePoint hosted Add-Ins can be replaced by SharePoint Framework web parts, for the provider hosted Add-Ins any software as a service application platform in combination with Microsoft Entra ID for auth can be used as alternative development model. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3sTQmGF Source: Microsoft Tech Community SharePoint Blog

Azure ACS retirement in Microsoft 365

As part of this evolution of Microsoft 365 solutions we will be retiring the use of Azure ACS for SharePoint Online auth needs and believe Microsoft 365 customers will be better served by modern auth offered via Microsoft Entra ID. Azure ACS will stop working for new tenants as of November 1st, 2024 and it will stop working for existing tenants and will be fully retired as of April 2nd, 2026. To learn more about the provider hosted Add-In use case please check out the respective retirement articles, granting applications access to SharePoint Online will need to be transitioned to Microsoft Entra ID. Azure ACS usage by SharePoint Server. Project Online is an extension on top of SharePoint Online and Project Online custom developments could also have used Azure ACS. The retirement of Azure ACS applies to Project Online as well, any Azure ACS usage in Project Online will follow the same retirement path as Azure ACS usage in SharePoint Online. To understand if your organization is using Azure ACS or begin planning transition to Microsoft Entra ID, we recommend that customers run the Microsoft 365 Assessment tool to scan their tenants for Azure ACS usage. Identify all used Azure ACS application principals with their key properties such as permission scopes and whether app-only was allowed or not For each identified Azure ACS application principal see a list of all sites that can be accessed via the Azure ACS application principal. Using the Azure ACS Report along with site information, tenant administrators together with developers can plan the transition of Azure ACS to Microsoft Entra ID as authentication model. We recommend tenant admins to turn off the usage of Azure ACS app-only access once they've ensured there is no business relevant Azure ACS usage anymore. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3sRzNuW Source: Microsoft Tech Community SharePoint Blog

Troubleshooting the Cloud Policy service

Many customers have switched from Group Policy as a means for managing policies for Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise on Windows devices, to the Cloud Policy service which allows administrators to configure policies for a large number of Microsoft 365 apps and services, including full support for Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise on Windows as well as the other platforms, from a single administration experience. If an application calls the Windows API, the policy will be included as some of the Office apps running on Windows support that policy. Part 1 for troubleshooting Cloud Policy service was written when the Cloud Policy service only supported Microsoft 365 Apps for enterprise running on Windows. While this information is still useful for that scenario, especially for the information regarding how Cloud Policy uses the registry, you may want to call the check-in APIs directly so you can review the responses that are being provided to the applications that call the service. Important: Policy configurations in the Cloud Policy service are targeted to users using group membership. Multiple policy configurations can be targeted to multiple groups and conflicting policy settings are managed by the priority values, so make sure you have reviewed the user's group memberships before troubleshooting. The Cloud Policy service uses a cache on the service side to improve performance for multiple calls for the same user from multiple applications. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3RdGTna Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Upcoming November 2023 Microsoft 365 Champion Community Call

‎Nov 20 2023 11:08 AM. Join our next community call on November 28 will be a recap on all the exciting announcements from Microsoft Ignite 2023. We will be starting the call at 5 minutes past the hour for both of our sessions, and it will still end at the top of the hour. Reminder: this is our last community call of this calendar year. We will take a break in December and see everyone back online in January! Happy holidays to those who celebrate and may you all get lots of rest and have a wonderful new year! -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3G6VKcr Source: Microsoft Tech Community Driving Adoption Blog

Manage your customers with Microsoft 365 Lighthouse

We are excited to introduce a new feature in Microsoft 365 Lighthouse that lets you quickly and securely access other Microsoft admin portals for each of your customers. One of the challenges of managing multiple customers is that Managed Service Providers often need to use different admin portals, such as the Microsoft 365 admin center, the Azure portal, Microsoft Intune, or Exchange, to name a few. This means Lighthouse users can leverage our security and management scenarios and then seamlessly jump to another Microsoft admin portal when necessary, without having to re-enter credentials or re-select the customer. A screenshot showing the Microsoft 365 Lighthouse tenant page and the selection of Microsoft admin portals that can be accessed for each customer tenant. Using Lighthouse as your launchpad makes managing multiple customers faster than ever before, saving you money while helping you keep your customers' tenants secure, healthy, and productive. The Lighthouse admin center links use the granular delegated admin privileges configured for each MSP customer. You can now access links to other Microsoft admin centers throughout Lighthouse using the Tenant filter. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/47gQlvl Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Business Blog

What's New for Copilot and Microsoft 365 admins

Today we announced the Private Preview of Copilot for Microsoft 365 admin, harnessing the value of generative AI to boost IT admins' productivity by simplifying administration of Microsoft 365 and empowering you to focus on more strategic priorities. Copilot for Microsoft 365 admin helps you perform tasks across different Microsoft 365 services using natural language interactions, contextual guidance, and proactive suggestions. Copilot for Microsoft 365 admin also leverages the power of Copilot to access relevant skills across different admin centers and surfaces, helping admins stay in the flow of work. Investing in new technologies like Copilot for Microsoft 365 requires insights into a range of areas from deployment to impact on all levels of IT. We are bringing such information to you through the surfaces you're already familiar with in the Microsoft 365 admin center, in the new Power BI dashboard and, in future, through Viva Insights. An image of the Microsoft 365 admin center Usage report for Copilot for Microsoft 365 readiness section. An image of the Microsoft 365 admin center Usage report for Copilot for Microsoft 365 usage section. Our Ignite Preview blog for Microsoft 365 admins gives a rundown of our recommended sessions to learn more! As always, stay current with the latest updates Microsoft 365 admin center from the Microsoft 365 roadmap and the message center. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/47yw83R Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

New Copilot & Microsoft Teams innovations for a secure, simple, and smart frontline workplace

Starting today, Tasks by Planner and To Do app in Teams will be renamed Planner and the new app experience in Teams will be generally available in Spring 2024.The new Planner app in Teams will continue to include our task management features for frontline organizations and will become the new central place for frontline workers to track what needs to be done, delegate tasks to the right workers, and monitor progress all from one platform. At the foundation of a frontline experience, is a secure device and a simple Teams structure deployed for collaboration from day one. Generally available in December, Microsoft has added new capabilities in the Teams Admin Center to deploy frontline dynamic teams at scale for your entire frontline workforce. Through the power of dynamic teams, team membership is automatically managed and always up to date with the right users as people enter, move within, or leave the organization using dynamic groups from Entra ID. This deployment tool streamlines the admin experience to create a Teams structure that maps the frontline workforces' real-world into digital world and makes it easy to set up a consistent channel structure to optimize for strong frontline collaboration on day one. An image showing the new frontline deployment capabilities in the Teams Admin Center. With domain-less sign-in, frontline workers can now sign-in to Teams quicker using only the first part of their username, then enter the password to access Teams on shared and corporate-managed devices. These new capabilities create a secure, simple, and smart workplace for the frontline workforce, so they can spend less time trying to access the right information, people, and processes to do their work and more time on meaningful work like delivering great customer service and operational excellence. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3ujmNig Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Unlock organizational knowledge with Topics in Copilot

Microsoft Viva Topics enables your organization to discover, explore and easily contribute knowledge proactively inside of Microsoft 365 apps such as Outlook, SharePoint and Microsoft Teams. Today we are excited to announce that we are extending Topics functionality into Microsoft Copilot for Microsoft 365. Topics will ground your Copilot experience with knowledge from inside your organization, to bring the best of AI and crowdsourced knowledge & expertise to your flow of work. With Copilot interoperation, Topics uses people and AI to create a powerful knowledge index for your organization that grounds Copilot. Knowledge managers in Topics can be assigned by administrators to manage topics and deliver curated topic cards ensuring the desired expertise and knowledge is available for users. Organizations with Copilot can learn more about Topics here. Bringing Topics into Copilot represents the beginning of how knowledge and expertise is unlocked with the power of AI and people. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/40GHY9P Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Microsoft 365 Backup and Microsoft 365 Backup Storage at Ignite 2023

To address these challenges, we have developed Microsoft 365 Backup-a new storage architecture for backup and data protection inside Microsoft 365. This storage lives inside the Microsoft 365 trust boundary, so you manage the security of your Microsoft 365 data in one place. Microsoft 365 Backup allows us to accelerate large scale backup and recovery times by an order of magnitude. Backup for other Microsoft 365 sources, such as Teams chat and other Microsoft 365 services, and granular file-level recovery are part of our post-GA roadmap. You can get the benefits of Microsoft 365 Backup by adopting a partner's application built on top of our  Backup Storage. By leveraging the Microsoft 365 Backup Storage, partner apps can deliver the same exceptional backup and restore speeds provided by Microsoft assurances - all while keeping that Microsoft 365 data within the trusted Microsoft security and compliance domain. Microsoft 365 Backup uses our new Backup Storage platform to provide protection for Microsoft 365-based data sources. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3GkmExT Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Microsoft Loop's November 2023 Ignite summary for IT Admins

We're pleased to announce that as of November 15, 2023, Microsoft Loop is now generally available! Loop is a multi-player application that's designed to help your teams think, plan and create together. We welcome your questions and feedback in the comments section as we embark on this journey together, and we hope the timelines for anything that looks critical are close enough to give Loop a try today! And if you need to enable or disable these experiences, that's documented too for Loop app and workspaces, Loop components. We have recently updated our full list of supported capabilities, which can be found here: Summary of governance, lifecycle and compliance capabilities for Loop. Like Word, Excel or PowerPoint, Loop experiences create files in SharePoint - in fact, Microsoft Loop is built on top of SharePoint, OneDrive, and Microsoft Syntex repository services, which means Loop content is just like the existing files in your ecosystem. Created in the Loop app > Microsoft Syntex Created outside the Loop app in places that have dedicated shared storage > SharePoint Created outside the Loop app in all other places that don't have tightly associated collaborative storage > OneDrive. If you're looking for the big picture, the full list of all capabilities, refer to: Summary of governance, lifecycle and compliance capabilities for Loop. Up to date and full documentation can be found here: Summary of governance, lifecycle and compliance capabilities for Loop to help you make the best decisions for your organization. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/40Elqqh Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

New! Create videos and images at work with Clipchamp and Designer

Whether you need to explain a process to your teammates, onboard new employees, send an update to clients, or level up your organization's newsletters, now you can turn to Clipchamp to deliver an impactful message through video at work. Clipchamp's simple user interface and rich array of features make it easy to create professional-looking videos at work. Clipchamp has an array of features which make it quick and easy to create and share professional-looking videos in minutes. The videos you export from Clipchamp can be shared through Microsoft Stream, embedded and played in Microsoft Teams, in emails with Outlook, and on Microsoft Viva Engage, making it easy for you to incorporate videos in your work. As part of Microsoft 365, Clipchamp and Designer are easy to find and right where you need them - whether that's through microsoft365.com or through integrations in the apps where you utilize visual content. We're tailoring Clipchamp and Designer to the needs of businesses and organizations. Start using Clipchamp and Designer at work - you'll be amazed by what you can create. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3spD3xG Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Microsoft SharePoint at Microsoft Ignite 2023 The pre-event Guide

To digest all of what's new and how it fits into your now and soon after, join us for Microsoft Ignite 2023 to learn how AI-powered content management in Microsoft 365 enables content intelligence, optimizes critical business processes, improves governance, and prepares your content for Copilot. Below is a subset of content related to SharePoint - each has a little or a lot of SharePoint to spare and share :). We'll keep this guide up to date - before, during, and after. Through these sessions, demos, labs, and more, plan your week at Microsoft Ignite to learn more and engage with our subject matter experts. Keynote sessions at Microsoft Ignite 2023 are designed to provide valuable insights and set the tone for the event. Discover how Microsoft is creating new opportunities across our platforms in this new era of AI. Walkaway with a clear understanding of how Microsoft Copilot will unlock productivity and transform business processes for everyone across functions and industries. They are a terrific way to learn from others, share your insights, and influence the direction of Microsoft products and services. Microsoft Ignite is where technologists from around the globe gain access to experts, modern technology, and networking opportunities with your community. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3FXE56V Source: Microsoft Tech Community SharePoint Blog

Microsoft Community Hub

Microsoft Ignite 2023 is a huge opportunity to join the global community of IT admins who want to know more about how to transform their organizations with Microsoft 365 and with Microsoft Copilot. Ensuring your environment is ready for Microsoft 365 Copilot is critical to providing the best possible user experience for people working across all functions-and to getting the most ROI out of Microsoft 365. In this session, we'll share the options for guided self-service provisioning, classification, reporting, auditing and lifecycle management that will impact Microsoft Teams, Microsoft Viva, Microsoft Loop, and Planner. Join us for our roundtable sessions where our product experts will provide more technical deep dives and discussions on how you can use the Microsoft 365 admin center to ensure you're getting the most out of your Microsoft 365 investment. Brian Jackett, Jen Cockrell, Raju S, and Renima Malhotra will join you to discuss how you can use Microsoft Graph Connectors to index, ground, and govern your organization's Line of Business data with the Microsoft 365 Copilot. We'll also cover the transformative potential of Microsoft 365 Chat, the new hero experience for Microsoft 365 Copilot that goes far beyond simple questions and answers, and examples of specific use cases for how it can save you time. We're hosting a text-based Ask-me-anything event tomorrow at 9am PT in the Microsoft 365 Copilot Community and hope to see you there! As always, you can follow all the latest updates on development and roll out of features through the Microsoft 365 Roadmap website. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/47oIYBH Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

New web parts available in the SharePoint Web UI kit!

We're excited to announce that our SharePoint Web UI kit has been updated with some great new additions! This update includes more web parts so you have more options when designing your SharePoint sites and pages. SharePoint web parts you can now design with the Web UI kit. To get started with our updated UI kit, simply download the latest version from the Figma Microsoft Community website: SharePoint Web UI Kit - Figma. This UI kit provides SharePoint users with another tool in their toolbox. This UI kit provides you with page layouts and a selection of web parts to allow you to mockup and share new ideas across organizations and companies. Figma gives you the flexibility of reviewing and sharing your designs without having to spend time and resources creating it in SharePoint. Please tell us what's missing, what doesn't work for you, and where your biggest challenges are by leaving a comment on the Figma SharePoint Web UI kit page or by visiting the SharePoint Community. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/49pvIib Source: Microsoft Tech Community SharePoint Blog

Most widely used SharePoint Framework ISVs from the Store

We are excited to see the continuous growth on the submissions of the SharePoint Framework solutions to the app source and on the usage of the SharePoint store for extending experiences for SharePoint and Microsoft Viva. It enables the same code to be used easily across the Microsoft 365 with this widely adopted tooling which uses industry standard tech with easy and automatic SSO and hosting. Additional capabilities and features for SharePoint Framework solutions in Microsoft 365 as part of the SPFx 1.18 release. Please see following resources around getting started on building extensibility for Microsoft Teams, Microsoft Viva and SharePoint using SharePoint Framework. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/49oCBAi Source: Microsoft Tech Community SharePoint Blog

Refreshing Meeting Details on OneNote on Windows

We are making improvements to Meeting Details in OneNote on Windows to help you quickly capture meeting context so you can focus on what you do best: run meetings effectively and follow up flawlessly. The new Meeting Details is in the same familiar location in the ribbon, now with an improved meeting selection experience. An image showing the initial release of the updated Meeting Details content with the side pane meeting experience. This update is the foundation for us to bring new meeting-related contents to your notebooks and is the first of a series that we are planning to roll out. An image demonstrating Loop collaborative notes for the corresponding meeting and annotations outside the Loop component on the OneNote canvas. This is just the beginning of our journey to bring meeting content from across Microsoft 365 into your OneNote notebooks. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/3MzOg5A Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Microsoft "Bookings with me" launching for GCC users

‎Nov 07 2023 10:17 AM. Bookings with me in Outlook is a web-based personal time management solution that provides a simple and powerful scheduling page with seamless integration with outlook. Bookings with me lets people schedule a meeting or appointment with you through a personal scheduling page that integrates with the free/busy information from your Outlook calendar. We are pleased to announce that it's now available for use by customers in GCC tenants as well. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/45Y8qgo Source: Microsoft Tech Community Microsoft 365 Blog

Microsoft 365 Copilot adoption content now available

Today along with our announcement of the general availability of Microsoft 365 Copilot we've released new content for the adoption of this groundbreaking experience in our hub at adoption. This content represents a step forward in our approach to driving adoption for a natural language interface like our Copilot experiences. With our role selection interface you can go directly to the content that is relevant for you as an Adoption Manager, IT professional, business user, leader or developer. These personal moments, delivered directly the product, are at the heart of our rapid adoption methods for Microsoft 365 Copilot. Our Adoption Workbook details the connection between these rapid adoption methods and classic adoption tactics that are delivered by Adoption Managers such as yourselves, Microsoft Partners and other professional ACM practitioners around the world. Copilot Labs, which is available to licensed users of Microsoft 365 Copilot, provides prompt guidance tailored to the user that is helpful in accelerating the aha moment. Lessons learned from driving adoption at the beginning of the pandemic, early adoption customer feedback and a desire to deliver more meaningful experiences directly to people around the globe drive this innovation. -------------------- Read more at https://bit.ly/45XEwsG Source: Microsoft Tech Community Driving Adoption Blog