Google Workspace Updates

Google Workspace Updates Weekly Recap - December 1, 2023

Friday, December 1, 2023

3 New updatesUnless otherwise indicated, the features below are available to all Google Workspace customers, and are fully launched or in the process of rolling out. Rollouts should take no more than 15 business days to complete if launching to both Rapid and Scheduled Release at the same time. If not, each stage of rollout should take no more than 15 business days to complete.
New ways to use the Google Sheets app on iOS devices You can now copy charts from the Google Sheets app on all iOS devices and paste them externally as images or within the same spreadsheet as a duplicate chart. In addition, you can modify text formatting using the contextual toolbar in Sheets when a keyboard is attached to iOS tablets. | Rolling out to Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains now. | Available to all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts. | Learn more about adding & editing a chart or graph and editing & formatting a spreadsheet.

New ways to use the Google Sheets app on iOS devices

Adding ‘Admin managed apps’ category to Google Workspace MarketplaceWe’re excited to announce a new featured app category in the Marketplace: Admin managed. These Enterprise apps can be installed only by a Google Workspace administrator for their organization. | Available now to all Google Workspace customers. | Learn more about Featured app categories.

Bulk select in Gmail on Android and iOS devices We’re introducing a feature that enables you to bulk select a batch of messages in the email threadlist with one tap using the Gmail app on Android and iOS devices. After clicking the select all icon, a batch of messages will be selected, enabling you to easily perform email actions such as deleting multiple messages or marking them as “read”. | This feature is available now on Android devices and is rolling out now to Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains on iOS devices. | Available to all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts.

Bulk select in Gmail on Android and iOS devices

Previous announcements

The announcements below were published on the Workspace Updates blog earlier this week. Please refer to the original blog posts for complete details.

Create shareable video presentations in Google Slides We’re introducing slides recordings, a new Google Slides feature that lets you easily record yourself presenting, and then share the presentation with others to view when it works for them. | Available to Google Workspace Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Starter, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Essentials Plus, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus and Education Plus only. | Learn more about slides recordings.
The next evolution of automated data entry in Google Sheets Enhanced Smart Fill in Google Sheets is available for customers with the Duet AI for Google Workspace Enterprise add-on. | Learn more about enhanced smart fill.
Expanding message bubbles in Google Chat to iOS devices In September, we introduced message bubbles in Google Chat on web and Android, enabling users to more easily differentiate incoming versus outgoing messages in the Chat message stream. This week, we’re excited to announce the expansion of message bubbles to iOS devices. | Learn more about message bubbles.
Updates to the Google Drive scanner on Android & iOS devices We’re introducing additional enhancements to the Drive scanner on Android devices, which now powers the Google Pixel camera and includes improvements to the scanner experience when capturing content. We’re also expanding the Google Drive scanner and title suggestion feature to iOS devices. | Learn more about Drive scanner.
Introducing a new homepage view in Google Drive We’ve added a new streamlined homepage for Drive called Home that makes it easier and faster for you to find files that matter most. | Learn more about Drive home.
Introducing a new mobile experience for Google Chat We recently announced a streamlined user experience in Google Chat to help you find what you need much faster, including new features like home and mentions. Starting today, we’re excited to introduce a new bottom navigation bar within the Chat app on Android & iOS devices to help you easily access these features on mobile. | Learn more about the Chat mobile experience.
Google Vault now supports Google Calendar Google Vault now supports Calendar, which means customers can take new actions around Calendar data. | Available to Google Workspace Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Essentials Plus, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Standard, Education Plus customers or customers with the Vault add-on license only. | Learn more about Vault supporting Calendar.
More insights to help admins troubleshoot Google Meet hardware issues In 2022, we introduced several improvements for managing Google Meet hardware devices. These improvements included surfacing additional information about device issues, such as a description of the issue, when the issue was detected, and more. Now, we’re taking these improvements one step further by providing admins with even more data points. | Learn more about Google Meet hardware issues.
Monitor insider risk of Google Workspace data with Chronicle Admins can now more seamlessly integrate their Google Workspace data with Chronicle (Google’s cloud-native Security Operations platform), to quickly detect, investigate and take action on risky activity and threats. | Available to Google Workspace Enterprise Standard and Enterprise Plus customers only. | Learn more about Chronicle.
Google Classroom now supports roster import from SIS partnersEducators can now easily import students from their student information system (SIS) to Google Classroom using OneRoster. This integration saves educators time and helps make class setup much quicker. | Available to Education Plus and the Teaching and Learning Upgrade only. | Learn more about roster import.

Completed rollouts

The features below completed their rollouts to Rapid Release domains, Scheduled Release domains, or both. Please refer to the original blog posts for additional details.

Rapid Release Domains:

Scheduled Release Domains:

Rapid and Scheduled Release Domains:

For a recap of announcements in the past six months, check out What’s new in Google Workspace (recent releases).

Google Classroom now supports roster import from SIS partners

Thursday, November 30, 2023

What’s changingEducators can now easily import students from their student information system (SIS) to Google Classroom using OneRoster. This integration saves educators time and helps make class setup much quicker.

Getting started

Admins: This feature is available for domains connected to an SIS partner–Aspen, Infinite Campus or Skyward. To enable the feature, go to http://classroom.google.com/admin. Visit the Help Center to learn more about connecting your Classroom to your SIS.
End users: If OneRoster is connected by your admin, you can import students by going to the People tab > “Invite Students” > “Import from SIS”. Visit the Help Center to learn more about using Classroom with your SIS.

Rollout pace

Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on November 28, 2023 (with expected completion in January 2024)

Availability

Available to Education Plus and the Teaching and Learning Upgrade

Resources

Monitor insider risk of Google Workspace data with Chronicle

Wednesday, November 29, 2023

What’s changing Admins can now more seamlessly integrate their Google Workspace data with Chronicle (Google’s cloud-native Security Operations platform), to quickly detect, investigate and take action on risky activity and threats. Admins can now leverage reduced time spent syncing data from Workspace to Chronicle, as well as Chronicle’s curated preconfigured out-of-the-box detections.

Who’s impacted

Admins

Why it matters

As an admin, you can already use the Alert Center to view notifications and take action on potentially issues within your domain. Now you can take this a step further by using Chronicle, leveraging its rich risk management capabilities and recommendations:

Chronicle can help detect and investigate potential threats at every level of sophistication by monitoring your data in real time.
Data insights are available at your fingertips, with rich context and visualization alongside industry best recommendations, helping you make better decisions faster.
Further, you can deploy Chronicle’s out-of-the-box use cases, helping to cut down on time spent building rules and playbooks.
You can also build and automate repeatable playbooks with full-fledged security orchestration, automation and response capabilities (SOAR).

Getting started

Admins: Visit the Help Center to learn more about exporting logs to Chronicle to monitor insider risk. Please reach out to your sales representative for more information on pricing.
End users: There is no end user impact or action required.

Rollout pace

Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: Gradual (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on November 29, 2023

Availability

Available to Google Workspace Enterprise Standard and Enterprise Plus customers

Resources

More insights to help admins troubleshoot Google Meet hardware issues

Wednesday, November 29, 2023

What’s changing

In 2022, we introduced several improvements for managing Google Meet hardware devices. These improvements included surfacing additional information about device issues, such as a description of the issue, when the issue was detected, and more. Today, we’re taking these improvements one step further by providing admins with even more data points. Specifically, admins will now be able to see the following types of usage data:

Issues: device health problems that are detected and persist over time. This is existing functionality and will continue to include the following issue types:

Device offline
Missing microphone
Missing speaker
Missing camera
Missing controller
Missing display
Missing default microphone
Missing default speaker
Missing default camera
Missing default whiteboard camera

Activities: records of how a hardware device is being used at any given time, including:

Meet call
Zoom call
Webex call
Bring-your-own-device mode [or computer connected]
Local present
Whiteboard camera present
Peripheral firmware update

Events: any notable point-in-time occurrence that can be useful for admins looking to troubleshoot issues, including:

Operating system update
Feedback filed
Restart

Who’s impacted

Admins

Why it matters

The health and functionality of your Meet hardware fleet is critical for connection and collaboration. As such, it’s important that admins have the information and context they need to troubleshoot issues across their fleet. With these additional data points, admins will have even greater insight and context into issues, allowing them to troubleshoot and resolve them faster.

Additional details

Google Meet Hardware devices that do not run ChromeOS (such as Poly X30, X50, X70) will only support activity data for Meet calls at this time.

Getting started

Admins: You can navigate to this page from Admin Console > Google Meet hardware > Devices > [Device name] > Device history. Visit the Help Center to learn more about understanding device usage in your organization.
End users: There is no end user impact or action required.

Rollout pace

Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on December 6, 2023

Availability

Available to all Google Workspace customers with Google Meet hardware devices

Resources

Google Workspace Admin Help: Understand device usage in your organization

Google Vault now supports Google Calendar

Wednesday, November 29, 2023

What’s changing Google Vault now supports Calendar, which means customers can take the following actions around Calendar data:

Manage retention with default and custom rules.
Search and preview events with a number of filters, such as keyword search across description, title, guests, locations and invite response status which can be used to quickly refine your search.
Search for historical versions of events, which allows Vault Admins to search and export events as they appeared on a specific date.
Export data in multiple formats, including ICS, PST (MSFT format) and CSE-decryptable formats.
Apply holds to prevent purging of data which must be retained for legal purposes.

Selecting Calendar as a service from the Vault user interface

Who’s impacted

Admins

Why it matters

Vault is an information governance and eDiscovery tool for Google Workspace. Now customers’ Calendar events can be retained, held, searched, and exported. This integration makes it easier for customers to comply with regional and legal mandates surrounding Calendar data, all from a central tool.

Vault’s integration with Calendar rounds out support for critical Workspace apps such as Gmail, Drive, Docs, Sheets, Slides, Chat and Meet, providing customers with a consistent experience across all products that are managed within Vault.

Getting started

Admins: Visit the Help Center to learn more about using Vault to search Google Calendar, placing Google Calendar data on hold, and retaining Google Calendar data with Vault.

Rollout pace

Rapid and Scheduled Release domains: Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on November 29, 2023.
Updates for the API rollout will immediately follow the Vault user interface updates.

Availability

Available to Google Workspace Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Essentials Plus, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Standard, Education Plus customers or customers with the Vault add-on license.

Resources

Google Workspace Admin Help: Use Vault to search Google Calendar
Google Workspace Admin Help: Place Google Calendar data on hold
Google Workspace Admin Help: Retain Google Calendar data with Vault

Introducing a new mobile experience for Google Chat

Wednesday, November 29, 2023

What’s changingWe recently announced a streamlined user experience in Google Chat to help you find what you need much faster, including new features like home and mentions. Starting today, we’re excited to introduce a new bottom navigation bar within the Chat app on Android & iOS devices to help you easily access these features on mobile. You will now have easy access to the following views:

Home: helps you stay on top of all conversions in one unified view, with a filter that allows you to drill down to unread messages.
Direct messages: see a compact list of all your 1:1 and group messages, including pinned conversations at the top of the list.
Spaces: see a compact list of all your spaces, including pinned conversations at the top of the list.
Mentions: helps you easily find messages from conversations and spaces where you’ve been mentioned.

Getting started

Admins and end users: No action required. You’ll automatically see these updates on your mobile devices over the next few weeks. Visit the Help Center to learn how to use Google Chat and how to mention someone else in a message.

Rollout pace Android & iOS:

Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on November 29, 2023

Availability

Available to all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts

Resources

Google Help: Learn how to use Google Chat
Google Help: Mention someone else in a message

Introducing a new homepage view in Google Drive

Tuesday, November 28, 2023

What’s changingOver the years, we’ve added features to Google Drive that help you more efficiently find files and folders. In October, we launched a new view in Google Drive that shows all pending access requests, recent comments, and approvals for files to help you quickly see recent activity and take action, all in one place.
Today, we’re excited to introduce the latest series of changes that accelerate user productivity across new views in Drive. A new streamlined homepage for Drive called Home makes it easier and faster for you to find files that matter most. Specifically, you’ll notice:

Personalized file and folder suggestions with machine learning algorithms that can help you get started quickly. These suggestions utilize a variety of signals, such as what files or folders you’ve recently opened, shared or edited, or what documents are attached to upcoming Calendar events.
Filter chips to narrow down your search and find relevant files faster across Drive, making it easy to find suggested files by type, people, modified date or the location.
A more modern design inline with Google Material Design 3 guidelines that helps you navigate across Drive much more efficiently.

Who’s impactedEnd users

Why you’d use it The new Google Drive Home page will make it easier and faster for you to find the files you need and collaborate with others.

Additional details When you go to drive.google.com, instead of landing in ‘My Drive’ you will now be directed to ‘Home.’ If you would like to set your default to ‘My Drive,’ click on the “Change to My Drive” option in the banner on Home:

Getting started

Admins: There is no admin control for this feature.
End users: This feature will be ON by default and can be opted-out by the user. If a user chooses to opt-out, their default page will be My Drive. To opt-out, go to My Drive and click on the “Change to My Drive” option in the banner.

Rollout pace

Rapid Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on November 28, 2023
Scheduled Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on January 11, 2024

Availability

Available to all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts

Note: The Drive Activity view is available to Google Workspace customers only

Resources

Updates to the Google Drive scanner on Android & iOS devices

Tuesday, November 28, 2023

What’s changingFor years, users have had the ability to scan physical documents, such as a receipt or passport, using the Google Drive app on Android devices. And earlier this year, we added additional functionality to recommend relevant title suggestions for scanned documents by leveraging machine learning.
Today, we’re introducing additional enhancements to the Drive scanner on Android devices, which now powers the Google Pixel camera and includes improvements to the scanner experience when capturing content. Specifically, you’ll notice:

Automatic capture to help you get the best scan quickly
Camera viewfinder that helps you position your document for the highest quality scan
The option to import from your camera roll
A faster way to initialize a scan with a new scanner button

We’re also expanding the Google Drive scanner and title suggestion feature to iOS devices. Now, when using your iOS phone or tablet, you can easily scan and digitally organize physical documents, crop them if needed, and receive relevant title suggestions based on machine learning.

Getting started

Open the Drive app on your Android device > scan a document via the camera icon or scan a document via the Scan button under the “+” icon > assess/adjust the automatic cropping > scan multiple pages in a session (if needed) > apply filters > save to Drive.
Open the Drive app on your iOS device > scan a document via the camera icon or scan a document via the Scan button under the “+” icon > > scan multiple pages in a session (if needed) > click on scan to apply filters or crop as needed > save to Drive.
Note: Title suggestions are only available in the US.
Visit the Help Center to learn more about scanning documents with Google Drive.

Rollout paceiOS:

Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility) starting on November 28, 2023

Android:

This feature is now available

Availability

Available to all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts

Resources

Google Help: Scan documents with Google Drive

Expanding message bubbles in Google Chat to iOS devices

Tuesday, November 28, 2023

What’s changingIn September, we introduced message bubbles in Google Chat on web and Android, enabling users to more easily differentiate incoming versus outgoing messages in the Chat message stream. Today, we’re excited to announce the expansion of message bubbles to iOS devices.
On your phone or tablet:

Each incoming message will have an independent message bubble aligned to one side with a solid color background
Each outgoing message will have an independent message bubble aligned to the other side with a different color background

Expanding message bubbles in Google Chat to iOS devices

Getting started

Admins and end users: No action required. You’ll automatically see these updates in your web and mobile experience over the next several weeks.

Rollout pace

Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility) starting on November 28, 2023

Availability

Available to all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts

Resources

The next evolution of automated data entry in Google Sheets

Tuesday, November 28, 2023

What’s changing Starting today, Enhanced Smart Fill in Google Sheets is available for customers with the Duet AI for Google Workspace Enterprise add-on. This builds upon Smart Fill in Google Sheets, a feature we introduced in 2020 that detects patterns between columns and suggests data for remaining cells using Google’s Knowledge Graph. More recently, we launched Help me organize in Sheets, a Duet AI feature that gives you a running start for creating highly-organized plans and trackers.
As previously announced, offering Enhanced Smart Fill will continue our efforts to help users spend less time on manual data organization and analysis in Sheets. This capability uses AI to detect if there are relationships between cell contents. If a relationship exists, Sheets can make contextual suggestions in the form of remaining values that you can accept. Once you click to accept the suggested values, Sheets will automatically fill them.
Enhanced Smart Fill can recognize and fill patterns like: sentiment classification, combining and generating text, extracting specific text, formatting addresses, structuring phone numbers and emails, condensing text and more. For example, a restaurant could organize their reviews and rating data more easily with Enhanced Smart Fill. Rather than manually typing in data, Sheets can detect a pattern in the existing ratings and reviews content and suggest values for the remaining cells. Simply review the suggestions and accept them in one click using Enhanced Smart Fill.
Enhanced Smart Fill filling in star ratings based on review sentiment

Enhanced Smart Fill filling in star ratings based on review sentiment

Sales teams could also use Enhanced Smart Fill to more easily organize next steps in a sales cycle. Instead of manually extracting next steps from a column of unformatted notes, you can accept suggested next steps that Sheets will provide you based on the account information listed in other columns.

Enhanced Smart Fill suggesting text to extract from a column of populated cells

Or, let’s say you hosted a fundraiser and want to customize thank you notes for donors based on their donation type. Rather than writing the notes one by one, you could quickly see a list of suggested thank you messages that Sheets generates based on the pattern of your first set of messages. Simply click to accept the suggested values so that you can quickly and efficiently thank your donors.

Enhanced Smart Fill suggesting fills to continue a thank you note pattern

Who’s impacted

End users

Why you’d use it

Enhanced Smart Fill can help make data entry and analysis easier. Get started today with Duet AI for Google Workspace Enterprise.

Additional details

This feature will only appear if relationships between data points exist within your spreadsheet.

Getting started

Rollout pace

This feature is available now for customers with the Duet AI for Google Workspace Enterprise add-on.

Availability

This feature is available as part of the Duet AI for Google Workspace Enterprise add-on.

Resources

Useful Links

Join the official community for Google Workspace administrators

In the Google Cloud Community, connect with Googlers and other Google Workspace admins like yourself. Participate in product discussions, check out the Community Articles, and learn tips and tricks that will make your work and life easier. Be the first to know what's happening with Google Workspace.

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Learn about more Google Workspace launches

On the “What’s new in Google Workspace?” Help Center page, learn about new products and features launching in Google Workspace, including smaller changes that haven’t been announced on the Google Workspace Updates blog.

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Updates