10 Noteworthy M365 updates

1. Pin a chat message in Teams chat

Any member of a chat will be able to pin/unpin any specific chat message to the top of the chat header, for all members to see. Users can click on the pinned message to go to the original message in the chat thread.

 2. TEAMS: All members of a Team can now create tags

Team owners, members and guests have different permissions in a Team.

For existing Teams, only owners of the Team can create or change tags, unless they give permission to the members of the team by selecting the option in the MANAGE TEAM settings.
For new teams created, all team members will be able to create and manage tags by default, similar to the defaults for create and edit channels. The team owner will still have the option to override all of these setting by selecting the appropriate option in the MANAGE TEAM settings.

3. Microsoft Stream: Owners of recordings can turn transcriptions on, any user with edit permission can generate transcriptions and closed captions

A user who does not have a transcript but has edit permission on a video (owner of file or file was shared with edit permission) will be able to navigate to Video Settings and use the Transcript and caption setting to generate a transcript in English. Once the transcript has been generated, the user can refresh the page to see the file and turn on Transcript and captions to display the file as either closed captions or a transcript for their video. 

Users will also be able to delete the caption file. 

Any viewer will be able to enable captions during playback via the Closed Captions button. 

Any viewer will be able to view the generated transcript within the transcript pane. 

Caption/transcript files may take a while to generate depending on the length of the video. You can use the Refresh button to check If it has finished yet.

When playing a recording back in OneDrive or SharePoint, owners of recordings can now toggle features, such as transcripts, on and off for all viewers. Audio and video files must be stored in OneDrive and SharePoint. 

Users will see a Video settings button in the upper right-hand corner of any video or audio file stored in OneDrive or SharePoint that they own.

This video settings button expands to a panel where they can turn on/off features such as transcription/captions for all viewers for a particular video.

Note: Only users with edit access (owner of the file) to the video or audio will see video settings and be able to turn features on or off.

4. ONEDRIVE: EASILY FIND YOUR TEAMS FILES

We can now see a “Your Teams” section when we navigate to the “More Places” page within OneDrive. The “Your Teams” section will include all the Teams which you are a member of within Teams and be sorted alphabetically.

5. Microsoft Teams Meetings

Create a richer sound experience when you transmit audio to listeners in a Teams call with high-fidelity mode for increased accessibility and quality of sound. Go to Settings, then Devices and enable to offer high fidelity sound.

6. Microsoft Teams Loop components

Loop components in Teams chat offer a new way to ideate, create, and make decisions together. Send a component — like a table, task list, or paragraph — where everyone in your chat can edit inline and see changes as they’re made.  

Loop components were first launched on Desktop, Mac, Android and iOS and are now rolling out to Web. 

You can start a Loop component in one chat, then share it to another to invite more people to collaborate. Select Copy link in the upper right corner of the component, then paste (Ctrl + V) into the chat you want. No matter where edits are made, the component will always show the latest changes.

7. Microsoft Bookings Forms integration in Teams

The Microsoft Bookings app in Teams will be integrated with Microsoft 365 Forms to support your workflow for virtual visits from start to finish. Bookings page owners can enable collection of pre-visit data for virtual visits by linking Microsoft 365 Forms to appointments in the Bookings app in Teams.
Forms added to an appointment will be included in the email confirmation which goes out to the attendee. 

When Form responses are submitted by the attendee, staff can view the status of submission in the appointment details form within Bookings Teams app. 

This feature is not currently supported through the Bookings web app (only in Teams). Microsoft is working on bringing this capability to web app in our future releases.

8. Immersive Reader Outlook

Immersive Reader in Outlook for the web and Outlook desktop allows you to adjust the text of an email to read in the way that works best for you. Use Read Aloud to hear emails read to you as each word is highlighted, or modify spacing, color and more for a comfortable and easy to process email experience.

9. Condensed Chat in Teams

Customize the number of chat messages you see on the screen. Use the compact setting to fit 50 percent more messages on the screen. Comfortable setting keeps the chat display as it is in Teams today. This is available on Teams desktop apps.

10. Get more done with new features from Assignments

Available for both individual & group assignments, educators can now turn-in and upload documents in the Assignments grading tool on behalf of their students. More info: scroll down to no. 2.