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Usual Mix of Missed Dates
As is the norm for Microsoft engineering groups when the end of the company’s fiscal year approaches on June 30, a mad dash happens to complete and ship functionality. This has nothing whatsoever to do with performance reviews and associates bonuses. Instead, it’s all done in the spirit of wanting to make customers happy. Some features don’t make it in the rush to deliver commitments, which is why on July 1 you invariably see Microsoft issue a bunch of updates to previous new feature notifications published in the Microsoft 365 message center. 2021 is no different and the table below lists some of the more interesting delays.
| Message Center Number | Notification Title | Delay |
| MC250796 | Create tasks from Teams chats or channel posts | GCC rollout delayed (no date given) |
| MC256837 | Sharing links for Microsoft Lists | Delayed from late June to end of July |
| MC260564 | Live transcription (Teams) | Early July. Automatic transcription for recorded meetings delayed to August. |
| MC265759 | Defender for Office 365: Secure by default for Exchange transport rules | Rollout delayed from start to end of August. |
| MC249623 | OneDrive Sync client update for Mac | Rollout delayed from mid-June to mid-July. |
| MC264090 | Outlook Extension for Edge (recommendation) | Rollout late July for targeted release; early August for standard. |
| MC258623 | Roaming bandwidth control for Teams | Rollout delayed to the end of July. |
| MC261352 | Updated Stream web video player | Targeted release delayed from mid-June to early July. |
| MC256473 | Defender for Office 365: Advanced delivery for Phishing Simulations | Rollout begins at the start of July. |
| MC256277 | Advanced eDiscovery auto-scaling of legal holds for large scales | Rollout delayed from mid-June to mid-July. |
| MC257689 | Customize property of Yammer Communities app in Teams | Delayed to “completion in July.” |
| MC258425 | Rich Yammer preview links in Teams chats | Rolling out delayed from June to early August. |
| MC251564 | Organizers can lock Teams meetings | Deployment delayed from mid-June to mid-July. |
| MC248428 | New OWA calendar board view | Standard release deployment delayed from late June to mid-July. |
| MC252056 | Office App for Desktop improvements | Deployment delayed from late-June to late-July. |
Retirements in July
Two retirements for Office 365 components loom on the horizon for July:
- Skype for Business Online retires on July 31, 2021 (MC266078). If an organization needs to extend support in their tenant, they can ask Microsoft for an extension. No guarantee exists that Microsoft will agree, so it’s best for organizations to move on and transition to Teams.
- Site mailboxes, the unloved and unwanted child of SharePoint and Exchange, get the chop on July 15, 2021 (MC266256). If you haven’t moved data from these mailboxes to somewhere better (with a long-term future), you’ll lose the content.
New Graph Insights Control
In May, Microsoft replaced the privacy settings previously in the Delve app with Graph-based controls. The controls introduced at the time were:
- The isEnabledInOrganization setting to control if a tenant allows Item Insights (for example, information about the documents a user has recently worked on).
- The disabledForGroup setting to specify the GUID of an Azure AD group whose members are excluded from Item Insights. This setting only applies when a tenant allows Insights.
On July 1, Microsoft published MC266073 to remind everyone that the new Item Insights controls are now active. They also introduced a new personal-level setting in the Settings & Privacy section of the MyAccount page (Figure 1) to allow users to exclude themselves from Item Insights. The setting is only available when an organization enables Item Insights, and the user account isn’t a member of the group specified in the disabledForGroup control. Users who don’t want to share information about what they’ve been working on should set the slider to Off.
Setting the privacy control at a personal level does not add the user account to the membership of the Azure AD group specified in disabledForGroup.
Another Year, More Changes
We’re only a few days into Microsoft’s FY22 year. Already it looks as if lots will change. We’ll be busy tracking that change and updating the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook (2022 edition). Make sure you stay abreast of important developments in your Office 365 tenant by subscribing to Office 365 for IT Pros.