Google Workspace Updates: november 2018

Host Hangouts Meet meetings with up to 100 participants

torsdag 29 november 2018

Meeting with teammates, clients, or customers around the globe is critical to getting your job done. For those times when you need to meet with a larger group, Hangouts Meet now allows G Suite Enterprise users to organize meetings with up to 100 participants and G Suite Business users to host up to 50 participants. This participant count includes people from both inside and outside of your organization.

This new extended participant limit supports people joining from any mixture of video and dial-in entry points so you can flexibly bring together even more people from all over the world. It is now fully rolled out across all domains.

If you need to host an even larger meeting, you can enable live streaming, allowing up to 100,000 viewers to watch at once.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:

100-person meetings available to G Suite Enterprise and G Suite Enterprise for Education editions only
50-person meetings available to G Suite Business and G Suite for Education editions only

Rollout pace:
Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
All end users

Action:
Change management suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: Get Started with Meet
Help Center: Hangouts Meet Benefits and features
G Suite Learning Center: How many people can join a video meeting?

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Elevate your quizzing and grading experience with two G Suite for Education beta programs

torsdag 29 november 2018

We’re offering two new beta programs for G Suite for Education customers to improve their quizzing and grading experience.

Locked mode in Quizzes in Google Forms
This summer, we announced locked mode in Quizzes in Google Forms as a new way to keep students focused during assessments. Available only on managed Chromebooks running operating system 68 or higher, locked mode prevents students from navigating away from the Quiz in their Chrome browser until they submit their answers. Once enabled, teachers can enable locked mode with a simple checkbox, giving them full control over assessments.

Better grading in Classroom
Earlier this year, we introduced new grading tools and a comment bank for richer, better feedback. Today, we’re continuing to strengthen the grading process in Classroom with a beta for a new Gradebook to better enable teachers to keep their assignments and grades in one place, and keep this important task more organized.

Express interest in the betas
Beta programs for locked mode and Gradebook are now available to G Suite for Education customers. All teachers and G Suite for Education admins can express interest by completing this form. Check out the full post on the Google for Education blog and the Help Center for more details.

Launch Details

Editions:
Available to G Suite for Education editions only

Action:
Admins and teachers can express interest by completing this form

More Information
Help Center
Google for Education blog post

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Ten third-party applications added to the G Suite pre-integrated SAML apps catalog

onsdag 28 november 2018

With Single-Sign-On (SSO), users can access all of their enterprise cloud applications—including the Admin console for admins—after signing in just one time. Google supports the two most popular enterprise SSO standards, OpenID Connect and SAML, and there are many applications with pre-integrated SSO support in our third-party apps catalog already.

We’re now adding SAML integration for ten additional applications:

Automox
Boomi
GoodData
LinkedIn Learning
LiquidFiles
Proxyclick
Sigma Computing
TextExpander
VersionOne
Zimbra

You can find our full list of pre-integrated applications, as well as instructions for installing them, in the Help Center.

Note that apart from the pre-integrated SAML applications, G Suite also supports installing “Custom SAML Applications,” which means that admins can install any third-party application that supports SAML. The advantage of a pre-integrated app is that the installation is much easier. You can learn more about installing Custom SAML Applications in this Help Center article.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
Admins only

Action:
Admin action suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: Using SAML to set up federated SSO

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Google Classroom for all G Suite customers

onsdag 28 november 2018

Google Classroom makes it easy for teachers to create classes, distribute assignments, give quizzes, and communicate with students. Today, we’re expanding the walls of Classroom and making the platform available as an additional service to G Suite Basic, Business, and Enterprise customers. Admins can decide whether to opt in or out of new services. Classroom is on by default, unless you’ve chosen to manually opt in to new services.

Just as Classroom helps teachers and students save time, improve organization, and enhance communication, it can also help academies, tutoring centers, and for-profit institutions that manage groups of learners in an instructor-led setting. Explore the possibilities of Classroom for your organization, today.

What to expect from Classroom

Classroom is designed for schools and is not an enterprise learning management system, but it is now available as an additional service to G Suite Basic, Business, and Enterprise customers. It remains a core service for G Suite for Education, Enterprise for Education, and Nonprofits customers. Note that users in G Suite for Education, Enterprise for Education, and Nonprofits domains will not be able to join classes created by users in G Suite Basic, Business, and Enterprise domains.

Have an idea for Classroom? We encourage you to submit your feedback through the “Send Feedback” button in the application. For more information, check out the Help Center and Help Forum.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available as an additional service to G Suite Basic, Business, and Enterprise editions; available as a core service to G Suite for Education, Enterprise for Education, and Nonprofits editions

Rollout pace:
Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
All end users

More Information
Help Center: About Classroom
Help Forum: Classroom

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Learn more about Google Groups with Contacts hovercards

tisdag 27 november 2018

Contacts hovercards provide lots of useful information about the people within your organization. We’ve heard from you that you’d like better visibility into Google Groups across G Suite, so we’re adding more information to these hovercards when the contact itself is a group.

When you mouse over the name of a group in Gmail, you’ll now be able to see essential information, like group members, as well as take some actions, such as:

Schedule an event with the group
Email the group
See more members

You can also select “More info,” which will take you to the Groups membership details page on groups.google.com. The group members will only appear on the hovercard if the user has permission to view them. This functionality will be added to other G Suite apps in the future.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
All end users

Action:
Change management suggested/FYI

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Secure LDAP now generally available to simplify the management of traditional applications

måndag 26 november 2018

We’re making secure LDAP generally available. See our post on the Google Cloud Blog for the full announcement, or read a summary of what this means for G Suite organizations below.

Secure LDAP lets you manage access to traditional LDAP-based apps and IT infrastructure using the G Suite identity and access management (IAM) platform. This means organizations can use a single user directory to manage access to both SaaS apps and traditional LDAP-based apps and IT infrastructure, and users can use the same login credentials for more apps and services. The benefits to your organization can include:

Simpler administration: Manage applications and users in one place, decreasing complexity and cost for IT teams.
Improved security: A single place to set up identity and access policies.
Minimized legacy infrastructure: Reduce your dependency on legacy identity infrastructure such as Microsoft Active Directory.

Using secure LDAP doesn’t change end user workflows—applications and IT infrastructure that use LDAP can be simply reconfigured to use the secure LDAP service.

Works with a wide range of apps and IT infrastructure

Virtually any app that supports LDAP over SSL can work with secure LDAP, whether it’s hosted on-premises or in the cloud. We’re actively working with many companies to validate their apps for this use case, including Aruba Networks (HPE), Atlassian, itopia, JAMF, Jenkins (Cloudbees), OpenVPN, Papercut, pfSense (Netgate), Puppet, Softerra, Sophos, Splunk, and Synology.

For more information, see our Cloud Blog post on the announcement. You can also check out our Help Center for more details on how to get started with the secure LDAP service.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to G Suite Enterprise, G Suite Enterprise for Education, G Suite for Education, and Cloud Identity Premium editions only

Rollout pace:
Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
Admins only

Action:
Admin action suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: About the Secure LDAP service
Google Cloud Blog: Cloud Identity now provides access to traditional apps with secure LDAP

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G Suite data migration and sync tools ending support for Windows XP and Server 2003

måndag 26 november 2018

On December 31, 2018, we will discontinue support for Windows XP and Server 2003 in the following Windows-based G Suite data migration and sync tools:

The Windows XP and Server 2003 platforms are no longer supported by Microsoft. If already installed, the G Suite tools will continue to function on these platforms, but will not be actively tested and maintained, and will not receive security updates. If you are still using one of these unsupported platforms, we encourage you to move to a newer version of Windows.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release on December 31, 2018

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Google Calendar SMS notifications to be removed January 7, 2019

måndag 19 november 2018

Starting on January 7, 2019, SMS notifications from Google Calendar will no longer be available. Since Calendar offers in-app notifications, you can still get notified, regardless of your device or connection.

If you had previously been receiving Calendar notifications via SMS, they’ll be replaced with in-app and email notifications. You’ll see these notifications:

As event notifications in a web browser that has Calendar open or a mobile device if you have the Google Calendar app for Android or iOS.
In an email if you had set up SMS notifications for new events, changed events, canceled events, or event responses.

We’ll also be making some changes to the Calendar API to support this change. Check out the Google Developers’ page to learn more.

Learn more about different Calendar event & notification settings in the Help Center.

More Information
Help Center: Change or turn off Calendar notifications

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Changes to the Google sign-in interface coming soon

torsdag 15 november 2018

Starting November 27th, 2018, we’ll make some small changes to the appearance of the Google sign-in page. These follow changes made earlier this year, which updated the sign-in page to match the Material Design principles used in other Google products.

Specifically, you might notice outlines around some entry fields, and changes to the spacing and styling of other text on both the web and mobile screens. The changes will start to take effect on November 27th and may take up to two weeks to reach all users.

See the new sign-in UI

Sign-in page that will start rolling out on November 27, 2018

Sign-in page prior to November 27, 2018

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
All end users

Action:
Change management suggested/FYI

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Advanced password controls for increased security

onsdag 14 november 2018

When it comes to protecting online accounts, a strong password is the first line of defense. As such, organizations have various stipulations for their users’ passwords. G Suite admins can already specify minimum and maximum length limits for passwords for their users. With this launch, we’re making it possible to enforce additional rigorous password requirements for increased security and to meet their compliance needs.

Going forward, an admin can do the following:

Require that users set a strong password.

Admins can already see which passwords in their domain are weak; enabling this setting will allow admins to force users with weak passwords to change them. Direct your users to this Help Center article for tips on creating a strong password. Note that this setting is OFF by default.

Control when password length and strength requirements go into effect.

You can choose to enforce password length and strength requirements either the next time a user changes their password or the next time they log in. The default is to start enforcement the next time a user changes their password. To change it, check the box next to “Start password policy enforcement at next sign in.”

Prompt users to change their passwords after a certain number of days.

If you’re unsure about whether or not you need to do this, we recommend you leave this setting as “Never.”

Prevent users from reusing old passwords.

To prevent password reuse, we recommend you leave the box for “Allow password reuse” unchecked. This is the default.

Each of these settings can be found in the Admin console under Security > Password management. As part of the launch we are also moving the password length (minimum and maximum) settings from the Basic Settings card to this new Password management card. For more information, visit the Help Center.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
Admins and end users

Action:
Admin action suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: Manage your users' password settings

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Now your Activity Dashboard is one click away in Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Drawings

tisdag 13 november 2018

We’ve made it easier for you to open the Activity dashboard directly from Google Docs, Sheets, Slides and Drawings. You’ll now see the Activity dashboard icon (a jagged arrow pointing upward) next to the comments button in the upper right-hand corner of the page.

Clicking on the icon opens the dashboard, where you can analyze time statistics and adjust privacy and document settings. This gives you instant access to the Activity dashboard information you’re seeking. Hovering over the icon enables you to view the information others can see about you in the Activity dashboard. To learn more about seeing the view history of your Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides files, consult the Help Center.

Launch Details

Release track:
Launching to Rapid Release, with Scheduled Release coming in 2 weeks

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:All end users

Action:
Change management suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: See the view history of your Google Docs, Sheets & Slides

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Organize and create apps for your domain directly from the Admin console

måndag 12 november 2018

With this launch, we’re making it easier for you to create—and for your users to find—the Android apps they need at work.

Group and order apps in the managed Google Play store

To help your users find the apps they need, you can now group whitelisted Android apps into “collections” that users will see in the managed Google Play store. For example, you can create a collection for frequently used apps or one for apps related to expenses. You can then change the order in which those collections appear, as well as the order of apps within those collections.

You can do all of this without leaving the Admin console; visit the Help Center for detailed instructions. Note that this feature is only available to customers with advanced mobile device management enabled.

Create private apps quickly and easily in the Admin console

We know that creating a private app in the Google Play Console can be time-consuming and often requires unnecessary steps. To streamline that process, we’re now making it possible to publish a private Android app directly from the Admin console.

You no longer need to create a Play Console account, provide a credit card, or fill in irrelevant fields; simply upload the APK and give the app a title (see full instructions here). The app will then appear in the managed Play store within minutes—as opposed to the hours previously required.

Note that this feature is also only available to customers with advanced mobile device management enabled.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
Admins and end users

Action:
Admin action suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: Organize Android apps into collections
Help Center: Manage Google Play private apps

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Invite people to an ongoing Hangouts Meet meeting

fredag 9 november 2018

We’re adding a new way to invite people to an ongoing meeting directly within Hangouts Meet. When you’re in a Meet meeting, you’ll now see an option to “Add people” at the top of the participant list.

Add people directly from the call

Clicking on this option will open a dialog box to send them an email invite to join as a full participant or call them into the meeting by phone.

To invite someone into your meeting, simply input their email address or lookup by name from the company directory.The invited participant will receive an email with instructions to join your meeting.

Enter the person's name, email address, or phone number

As always, inviting someone using their phone number will immediately call the phone number to to add them to the meeting. They will join as an audio only participant and will not see any video or the screenshare.

For more information on inviting people to Meet meetings, check out the Help Center.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to Rapid Release, with Scheduled Release coming in two weeks

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
All end users

Action:
Change management suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: Invite people

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Check out the most recent G Suite launches

onsdag 7 november 2018

Last year, we introduced a new resource for admins: What’s new in G Suite? Don’t forget to visit the page regularly for a list of the most recent launches across G Suite.

Feedback? Let us know.

Improving search in Google Vault with custodian counts and saved queries

tisdag 6 november 2018

Before you perform a search of Gmail messages in Google Vault, you can see the number of results that your search criteria will return—helping you plan next steps and establish resources for review. Going forward, in addition to the total number of results, you’ll also see the number of accounts with matches. You can then download a list of those accounts and the number of messages that match each. This can help you determine the key custodians involved in an investigation. (Note that this feature is only available when searching Gmail messages.)

Programmatically save your search queries with the Vault Matters API

In addition to the feature above, we’re making it possible for admins to programmatically read, create, and delete saved search queries with the Vault Matters API. This will allow you to quickly and easily copy search parameters from one matter to another, saving you valuable time.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to G Suite Business, Enterprise, and Enterprise for Education editions, as well as G Suite users with the Vault add-on license

Rollout pace:
Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
Admins only

Action:
Admin action suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: How does the count feature work?

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Copy formatting to multiple objects in Google Slides

måndag 5 november 2018

We’re making it easier to copy formatting from one object (like a block of text or a shape) to multiple others in Google Slides. Previously, you could use the paint format tool to copy formatting from one object to another, but you’d need to reclick it every time you wanted to apply it to a new object. Now, you can simply double-click the tool icon to enter “persistent” mode and apply that formatting to multiple objects in a slide. Just re-click the icon or tap Escape on your keyboard to stop.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Gradual rollout (up to 15 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
All end users

Action:
Change management suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: Copy and paste text and images

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What's New in G Suite - October 2018

torsdag 1 november 2018

Check out the latest "What's New in G Suite" launch recap (pdf) for a roundup of all G Suite launches from October 2018.

Archive and translated versions (coming soon for October issue)

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Timeline to move users to new Google Contacts and shut down old Contacts

torsdag 1 november 2018

Over the next few months, we’ll completely replace old Google Contacts with new Google Contacts (also known as Contacts preview).

We launched new Contacts in 2015 to provide a modern, smart, and quick contact management experience. We’ve added many features since then and, with the recent launch of contacts delegation, new Contacts now has many comparable features from old Contacts, and more.

As a result, new Contacts will replace the older version, and it will be the only Google Contacts version after February 12, 2019. The replacement process will take place in three stages:

Stage 1: New admin-controlled defaults and user options

On November 28, 2018, we’ll change the Admin console setting that controls new Contacts. Currently, there’s a checkbox to enable new Contacts for your users. If you enable it, your users are moved to new Contacts but can opt out. On November 28, this setting will change to formally define a default version of Contacts for your organization. Your current setting will determine the impact of this change:

If you currently have new Contacts preview enabled, new Contacts will be the default and there will be no change for your users. Your users will stay using new Contacts with the option to revert back to old Contacts. If they previously opted out of new Contacts preview, they’ll remain opted out until stage 2 (see below).
If you don’t currently have new Contacts preview enabled, old Contacts will be the default but users will get a new option to try new Contacts. None of your users will be automatically upgraded to new Contacts, but all users will be able to opt in to new Contacts individually if they choose.

You can find and change the setting in the Admin console at Apps > G Suite > Directory > Sharing settings > Contacts Preview.

The setting to control new Contacts preview in the Admin console

Stage 2: All users upgraded to new Contacts, with the option to opt out

On January 15, 2019, new Contacts will automatically become the default version in your domain and we will remove the Admin console setting. When this happens, all users still using old Contacts will be moved to new Contacts. You won’t be able to change this for your organization, but individual users will still be able to revert back to old Contacts if they want until stage 3 (see below).

Stage 3: All users upgraded to new Contacts, old Contacts turned off

On February 12, 2019, old Contacts will be turned off completely, and any remaining users will be moved to new Contacts. There will be no option to use the old version.

Launch Details
Release track:
All stages launching to both Rapid Release and Scheduled Release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility) for all stages

Impact:
Admins and end users

Action:
Admin action suggested/FYI

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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.