Published 25 September 24

1. Microsoft SharePoint: Customise your individual sites and experiences with fonts and themes

What’s new?

A friendly reminder that SharePoint site owners be able to create their unique branding with customised fonts and themes. Note if your site is associated to the hub, your theme will still be inherited from the hub site.

The Change the look experience will contain branding created in the SharePoint Brand Center (or can still be created with Microsoft PowerShell) for your organisation as well as your own local site branding. These will continue to be previewed and applied via the Change the Look experience for your sites and experiences.

Why is this important?

Gone are the days where you need to install a custom theme via PowerShell. With this update, site theme and font customisations are now out-of-the-box functionality! Note site owners will be able to create, rename, and delete themes and font packages (where available in a tenant). This will not impact the themes and font packages provided from the organisation or from Microsoft. Learn more about SharePoint site branding.

When is it coming?

Worldwide rollout commences from mid-October 2024.

2. Microsoft SharePoint: System generated emails from workflows and alerts will now show SharePoint Online as the sender display name

SharePoint Online system-generated emails from workflows and alerts will now display “SharePoint Online” as the sender name.

Why is this important?

To align system generated emails with best practices, SharePoint Online workflow and alert emails will be displayed as “SharePoint Online”. Note there will be no change to the underlying sending email address, no-reply@sharepointonline.com. If your users have Outlook rules or other processes surrounding the email display name only, those will need to be updated accordingly. Existing policies and rules utilising the email address will not be affected. Furthermore, if you are calling the “SendEmail” API or calling SharePoint workflow or alert services via CSOM or REST API’s those emails will follow the new display convention as well.

When is it coming?

Worldwide rollout has already commenced is expected to be complete by late November 2024.

3. Microsoft Syntex: pay-as-you-go service includes simple document processing prebuilt model

What’s new?

Coming soon to the Microsoft Syntex pay-as-you-go service is a new prebuilt model that uses Optical Character Recognition (OCR) and AI to detect the primary language of the file, key-value pairs, tables, selection marks, and barcodes. As with other Syntex models, it can be configured to extract this information to specified library columns. Users will be able to easily configure and apply a model to detect import elements of information in the document, including the primary language of the file text and barcodes.

Why is this important?

Unlike other prebuilt models with fixed schemas, this model will be able to identify keys that others might miss, providing a valuable alternative to custom model labelling and training. The simple document processing model will also support barcodes and language detection. The model will offer a flexible, pretrained solution for extracting information from basic structured documents, including information such as key-value pairs, selection marks, named entities, and barcodes. Learn more about the Microsoft Syntex pay-as-you-go service. Alternatively, read how you can use a prebuilt model to extract information from simple documents in Microsoft Syntex.

When is it coming?

Worldwide rollout commences mid-November with expected completion by late November 2024.

4. Entra ID: Expansion of WhatsApp as an MFA one-time passcode delivery channel

What’s new?

After a successful testing experience in India and Indonesia, Microsoft Entra will recommence leveraging WhatsApp as an alternate channel to deliver multifactor authentication (MFA) one-time passcodes (OTPs) to users in India, Indonesia, and additional countries listed before.

Why is this important?

With WhatsApp as a key messaging tool, Microsoft has recognised its significance as an alternate channel for MFA passcodes. Only users that are enabled to receive MFA text messages as an authentication method and already have WhatsApp on their phone will get this experience. If a user with WhatsApp on their device is unreachable or doesn’t have internet connectivity, they will quickly fall back to the regular SMS channel. In addition, users receiving OTPs via WhatsApp for the first time will be notified of the change in behavior via SMS text message. The sender agent in WhatsApp where users will see the OTPs will be branded as Microsoft with a verified checkmark. Learn more about phone authentication and how to disable this new feature in your organisation.

When is it coming?

Worldwide rollout commences early November with expected completion by late November 2024.

5. Microsoft Purview | Data Lifecycle Management: Separate Copilot retention policies from Teams chats

Microsoft is separating Copilot retention policies from Teams chats, allowing admins to create distinct retention policies for Copilot interactions. Before this rollout, Microsoft Teams chat and Microsoft 365 Copilot interactions are available together to be included or excluded in the Microsoft Purview Data Lifecycle Management policy in the Purview Compliance Center.

Why is this important?

This feature will enable Microsoft Admins to have separate policies for Copilot interactions. Admins will also be able to separate Teams chat from Copilot interactions to create new retention policies for Copilot messages only. Note a Microsoft 365 Copilot license is required to use this feature.

When is it coming?

Public Preview commences mid-November with expected completion by late November 2024. Worldwide general availability commences mid-January with expected completion by late January 2025.

6. Microsoft Viva Engage: update to Communication Compliance announcement

What’s new?

The original announcement saw that Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance will soon allow Viva Engage users to report posts and comments that violate policies. This update is a change to the timeline.

Why is this important?

With this update, Microsoft Viva Engage users will be empowered to report inappropriate or concerning posts and comments violating their organisational policies within Viva Engage Team conversations. These reported posts will then be submitted to a Communication Compliance policy for designated internal investigators with the appropriate role-based access control permissions to review and act if deemed necessary.

Microsoft Purview Communication Compliance provides the tools to help organisations detect business conduct and regulatory compliance violations (e.g. SEC or FINRA), such as sensitive or confidential information, harassing or threatening language, and sharing of adult content. Built with privacy by design, usernames are pseudonymised by default, role-based access controls are built in, investigators are opted in by an admin, and audit logs are in place to help ensure user-level privacy.

To use this feature, please enable Viva Engage conversation reporting. Reported conversations will automatically route to Communication Compliance if a supported license is present in the tenant. Access the Communication Compliance solution in the Microsoft Purview compliance portal. Learn more on how to create and manage communication compliance policies.

When is it coming?

Worldwide rollout commenced in mid-December 2023 and was originally scheduled to be complete by late October 2025. This update announcement confirms an accelerated completion date to late June 2025.

7. Microsoft Teams: Update to Custom emojis and reactions announcements

The original announcement saw that Microsoft Teams users being able to add their own custom emojis and reactions by uploading an image or GIF file. Their uploaded emojis and reactions will be accessible to all users in the tenant alongside the standard Teams emojis and reactions.  

Why is this important? 

This provides fun novelty to everyday Teams users. As a reminder, up to 5,000 custom emojis can be added per tenant. 

When is it coming? 

If you were previously affected by the altered timeline, you should now have access to these customisations within your tenant. 

8. Microsoft Viva Connections: Refreshed Resources section on mobile to align with desktop 

What’s new? 

The Resources section on Microsoft Viva Connections mobile will show content from the recently revamped Resources section on Viva Connections desktop. The Resources section in Viva Connections is comprised of navigational links. If these links are created via in-app editing in Viva Connections, they will propagate to the Resources section in mobile as well. If no links have been added via in-app editing and Global Navigation is configured on the Home site, the Resources section on mobile will continue to show the navigational links from Global Navigation. 

Why is this important? 

This update will finally see a consistent experience between the Viva Connections on the mobile app and desktop app. 

When is it coming? 

Worldwide rollout commenced late August and is expected to be completed by mid-December 2024 (previously mid-November). 

9. Microsoft Teams: Update to Change background while recording on phone announcement

What’s new? 

Users on iOS devices will soon be able to change their background to any image they want or make the background blurry while recording using their Microsoft Teams camera on their iOS device. 

Why is this important? 

With this update, this feature will now be consistent across all mobile devices. 

When is it coming? 

Worldwide rollout commenced early May (previously late March) and is expected to complete by late November 2024 (previously early October). 

10. Microsoft Ignite 2024

Did you attend this year’s Microsoft Ignite either in-person or virtually? What were your top takeaways from the sessions you attended and the people you connected with? If you didn’t have chance to attend, we’ve got you covered! Read our Microsoft Ignite 2024 recap blog.

It’s no secret we are one of the best when it comes to understanding your needs and how the Microsoft platform can reconnect, reinvigorate, and strengthen employee experience. Keen to use your existing digital landscape as a way to engage your employees? Want to discuss how we can work with you to best leverage the upcoming Microsoft technology? Contact us at info@engagesq.com to see how we can help.