Microsoft has made plenty of changes to the Microsoft Teams ecosystem throughout January 2023.
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The company has added integration to Meta’s Workplace platform, set up Teams Webinars customisable, improved notifications for Teams Rooms, and more.
Here are all the changes that Microsoft made to the Teams platform in January.
Teams Meetings
Microsoft has allowed users to view video recordings and attendance reports inside LMS. The company has stated that the Microsoft Teams Meeting LTI app has enabled the availability of these artifacts inside LMS. The feature will be available for all the LMSs incorporating the Teams Meeting LTI app.
Teams users can now use navigation controls below the Video Gallery when more videos can be shown on the meeting stage. The rules will allow users to see other videos of the attendees.
The Teams Meeting toolbar has been upgraded to include dedicated buttons for raising hands and switching between view modes to allow navigating meetings easier.
With the new Workplace Live app integration, Teams users can stream Meetings or Webinars directly to Meta Workplace. Microsoft states that this allows attendees to watch live meetings and webinars within their Workplace groups or catch up on demand by watching a recording on Workspace. Users wanting to take advantage of the feature need to add the Workplace Live app to their Teams Meeting or Webinar, sign in with their Workplace account, and select the Workplace Event they’d like to live stream.
Teams Webinars
Microsoft has enhanced the webinar experience with customisable options when setting up the event. When a user selects the webinar template, there will be a new structure and expanded opportunities to customise registration details and settings to ensure they are specific to each event. Users will able to configure webinars with the following capabilities:
Setup
- Details: Users can designate co-organisers to support orchestrating and delivering the event.
- Presenter bios: Each speaker’s professional headshot, company, title, LinkedIn profile, social media accounts, brief biography, and more can now be highlighted.
- Theming: Events can now be branded with a banner, logo, and relevant colour scheme that can be displayed on the event’s registration page and webinar communications.
Registration
- Configuration: Users can set registration capacity limits for up to 1,000 attendees. Expanded custom questions can also be added to gather information about prospective attendees, including a dedicated question to upload terms and conditions and enable consent from attendees as they register.
- Attendee status: Organisers can view relevant details for attendee status, including who has registered for the webinar and who has cancelled their registration.
Reports
- Attendee reporting: Users can easily access existing reporting and analytics in one location to view the data on attendee participation.
Teams Calling
Federated group calling makes it easy to start a group Teams call from a chat with federated colleagues outside a user’s organisation, including video and screen sharing. This can be done via an internet connection without any PSTN usage charges.
Teams Rooms and Devices
Teams Rooms on Windows can start a Microsoft Whiteboard in Teams meetings using the one-touch in-meeting share content function from meeting room consoles. When the Whiteboard is created from the room, it is attributed to the meeting organiser, who can manage access to it.
In-room users can use meeting room consoles to show or hide chat on the front-of-room display alongside meeting participants and content in Gallery, Large Gallery, or Together Mode. It is available to users via the View Switcher on meeting room consoles, and IT admins can configure whether to hide meeting chat entirely for a room.
Microsoft has enhanced the in-meeting notifications for Teams Rooms on Windows to create close alignment with the familiar Teams desktop experience. Critical notices requiring user action will continue to be available with information notifications on the front of the room screen.
Teams Certified Devices
In January, Microsoft granted Teams certification to the Poly CCX350 so that its customers can have a desk phone which can be fully integrated with Microsoft Teams. The device is designed for environments such as warehouses, manufacturing, and other locations where appliances need to be durable.
Teams Chat and Collaboration
Teams users can now view the entire chat conversation thread after clocking on search message results. It means that users can get the full context of the conversations related to the search result, regardless of the age of the messages.
Teams Management
Developers can access message events to edit or delete event updates on messages in user: bot chats.
Users can upload files to their approval request via the Power Automate portal. The portal will now show within the Teams’ view details window of an approval request.
Admins can now use Intune to determine the type of content a user can see in a notification via their mobile lock screen.
Teams Frontline Workers
Frontline workers who use shared devices can now use Outlook and Power Apps on Android alongside Teams. Microsoft has made it easier for frontline workers to authenticate by automatically signing users in and out of all the apps that have enabled this feature.
Teams Government
Microsoft has also released several features to its customers in the US Government Community Cloud (GCC), US Government Community Cloud High (GCC-High), and the United States Department of Defense (DoD).
Teams calendar now includes scheduling form pop-outs for GCC-High and DoD so it can be seen while creating a new meeting. An existing meeting can also be popped out by clicking on the icon on the scheduling form. Microsoft states that future updates will also add the ability to pop out the complete calendar app as a new window.
DoD users can now express themselves during meetings using emojis that appear to all participants. The feature is designed to make meetings more inclusive, engaging, and fun.
Microsoft now gives the ability in DoD to disable and enable videos for all attendees before or during a Teams meeting.
Users can now automatically view up to 48 views during a Teams meeting for GCC-High and DoD by default.
Meeting organisers and presenters for DoD can now manage the audio capabilities for meeting attendees. Organisers can enable or disable the ability for attendees to use their microphones before the meeting. The options can also be modified during the session.
