Table of Contents
Sixth Edition Packed Full of Office 365 Information
The Office 365 for IT Pros writing team is thrilled to announce the publication of Office 365 for IT Pros (2020 Edition), the sixth in our series of the only continually-updated eBook covering Office 365 architecture, deployment, and management. The main book is a svelte 1,115 pages long and the companion volume adds another 344 pages. Not that we’re boasting, of course.
The files for the new edition are now online on Gumroad.com (PDF/EPUB version) and Amazon (Kindle). We prefer people to buy the PDF/EPUB version for many reasons, including our ability to offer discounted subscriptions to a new edition to existing subscribers. You can convert the EPUB book to MOBI and load that on a Kindle.
Lots of Changes You Might Not Immediately Appreciate
Our attitude to eBooks is that it’s like cloud software – always changing! A casual glance at the 2020 edition might conclude that it simply carries on from where the 2019 edition left off. But under the covers we have:
- Conducted a deep technical review of all the content to find any errors that might have been lurking. Errors creep in overtime as we update the book to describe changes happening inside Office 365. We need to do a housekeeping review annually to chase out all the small but annoying bugs that have crept into the text.
- Our review also updated figures to make sure that they reflect the latest GUI seen inside Office 365. We’re always delighted when Microsoft makes a small change to an interface.
- Likewise, we checked every hyperlink in the book to ensure its accuracy and that it works. Microsoft has a habit of updating hyperlinks that we track but sometimes miss. All fixed now.
- Incorporated new material across many chapters to cover topics like Office 365 Information Barriers.
- Moved some older but still valuable material (like Exchange mailbox retention policies) to the companion volume. We also moved the chapter on Delve to the companion volume. Not because we don’t like Delve, but because we’ve not seen much innovation in the space over the last two years, possibly because Microsoft Search is taking the headlines at present. Moving material to the companion volume keeps the main book at a manageable size and allows us the space to include content about new Office 365 functionality.
- Expanded the Flow chapter to include coverage of PowerApps.
- Created a new chapter for Microsoft Stream to reflect its growing integration with other parts of Office 365 like Forms, SharePoint, and Teams.
- Split the coverage of Teams into two chapters. Chapter 11 covers the basics of working with Teams while management has been moved into Chapter 12. The two chapters amount to around 100 pages, which we think is a fair representation of the importance of Teams to Office 365 right now.
New Author
The 2020 Edition welcomes Brian Desmond to the writing team. Brian is a very experienced MVP who specializes in directories and identities and is the author of “Active Directory: Designing, Deploying, and Running Active Directory.” He has taken over Chapter 3 and will develop this content over the coming year to track the explosion in Azure Active Directory functionality that has a huge influence over Office 365.
How Existing Subscribers Can Upgrade
Subscribers to the 4th and 5th (2019) editions, including those who received sponsored copies, will receive email to tell them how to claim their discounted $14.95 renewals to subscribe to the 2020 edition. If you bought the 2019 book and don’t receive a message, please get in contact with us and we’ll sort things out. Files for the 2019 book will remain online to allow people to download the latest updates (11 June 2019). See our FAQ for more information about how to download updates.
People who bought a full-price copy of the 2019 edition in May or June 2019 will receive a note from Quadrotech, who are kindly proving free upgrades to the 2020 edition for these subscribers.
Join Our Happy Band
If you’ve never subscribed to Office 365 for IT Pros, we’d love for you to join us on this journey. Your $49.95 subscription covers the main and companion volumes in both PDF and EPUB formats and includes all updates issued until the 2021 edition appears. We issued 15 updates spanning 164 significant chapter updates for the 2019 edition and plan on doing much the same for the 2020 edition. The book is packed full of practical and insightful information and our readers love it – or so they tell us (and they would never lie, would they?)