Office 365 for IT Pros March 2021 Update Available

The Office 365 for IT Pros eBook team is delighted to announce that the eighth update for Office 365 for IT Pros (2021 edition) is now available. Remember that every month we make a completely new book available to our subscribers with all the changes and new information integrated in the right place. Office 365 for IT Pros is the only book offering such an extensive update service.

Subscribers to the EPUB/PDF version can download the updated files from their Gumroad account. The link to download the files is also in the original receipt issued for the book. We have not updated the companion book this month.

Amazon Kindle subscribers can ask Amazon support to make the updated files available.

Almost Every Chapter Updated

Despite being a short month and one which you might expect to be quiet as Microsoft prepared for the virtual Ignite event, updates are present for 23 of the 24 chapters. The updates include new functionality such as template policies for Teams and Exchange Online health monitoring. We’ve also taken the opportunity to rewrite several sections across different chapters to improve their clarity and include new information. Finally, we have adjusted text where necessary because Microsoft has slipped dates for new features, such as the transition from Stream classic to OneDrive for the storage of Teams meeting recordings.

We’ll include coverage of anything Microsoft announces at Ignite in future updates.

Additional Resources

Additional resources are available online:

Office 365 for IT Pros FAQ

Office 365 for IT Pros Change log

Office 365 for IT Pros code example GitHub repository

TEC 2021 Waitlist Now Available

Many of our team will be involved in the TEC 2021 conference in September. You can register for the conference waitlist now.

Changes in the March Update

Here’s the set of changes included in the March update for Office 365 for IT Pros (2021 edition).

Chapter	Change
1	SLA for Q4 CY2020 is available (99.97%).
2	Minor text cleanup.
3	Microsoft will require tenants to run a recent version of Azure AD Connect.
4	Application access policies now cover impersonation scenarios for EWS programs. Rewrote some paragraphs in the Graph Explorer section. Cleaned up discussion of Power Automate admin center. Introduced Exchange Online health monitoring feature.
5	Microsoft has paused their program to remove support for basic authentication for several Exchange Online connectivity protocols.
7	Updates for UI changes and to be more consistent and accurate in text descriptions. Add discussion about allow/block list.
8	New retain file sharing option when files move to a new site or OneDrive. Updates for the Microsoft 365 PnP project.
9	Included new script to print off group membership.
10	Minor updates and clarifications.
11	Added details about how features are enabled in the Teams client. New Allow cloud recording for calls option available for meeting policies to control the ability to record 1:1 calls.
12	Changes to Teams meeting policy to support 1:1 call control. Note that the Bulletins and Milestones sample apps are available to demonstrate integration between Power Platform and Teams. Template policies are now available to control the set of templates available to users when creating new teams.
13	Note that the New-Team and Set-Team cmdlets do not support the assignment of sensitivity labels. Included new script (downloadable) for reporting membership of a Microsoft 365 group.
14	Satin is now the codec for Teams 1:1 calls.
15	Planner now supports 25 labels instead of six.
16	Adjustment to July 7, 2021 for the date for the switchover from Stream to OneDrive storage for Teams meeting recordings.
17	Minor text cleanup; added info on new Intune reports.
18	Introduced Office LTSC. Added detail on M365 Apps Health service center.
19	Preservation lock for retention policies can now be enabled using the GUI (Compliance Center).
20	Content search previews can now decrypt and display protected messages.
21	Added note about how to discover new audit events.
22	Update some details in the description of how to create a new sensitive information type for use with DLP policies.
23	Microsoft is renaming the terms used to describe different types of flows.
24	Include note about how to audit who updates sensitivity label policies. Be more specific about the support for sensitivity labels with user-defined permissions.