Here’s everything you need to know:

Deactivate and delete organizations in Viva Goals

According to the Microsoft 36 Roadmap, admins can soon deactivate organizations or even delete them when requested from the iva Goals Admin portal. They’ll also be able to configure the settings to deactivate dormant organizations automatically.

The feature is expected to start rolling out to users later this month and should hit general availability by mid-July 2023. Microsoft further added that admins will be able to,

• Deactivate organizations that are not required or even permanently delete them.
• Configure to automatically deactivate and delete inactive organizations.
• Reactivate any deactivated organization within 90 days.

Animated Backgrounds in Teams Meetings

Microsoft is also busy at work in a bid to refresh the meeting experience in Teams with animated backgrounds. The feature will replace the platform’s existing background with a dynamic animation for a more immersive virtual environment. What’s more, it ships with a wide variety of options to enhance the meeting experience with creativity and personalization according to users’ preferences.

Teams already supports pre-defined backgrounds from Microsoft. The feature tagged 122513 in the Microsoft 365 Roadmap is expected to roll out in early July and will hit broad availability later that month.

The are also plenty of updates rolling out across the Microsoft 365 suite. Be sure to check out some of our recap posts for more information.

Featured image via Bing Image Creator

However, this experience will soon be coming to an end.  The company details that there are plans to end support for the feature this month, After which users can no longer access their boards. Instead, they will be redirected to a supported calendar view automatically.

Microsoft further highlighted that:

• Your content (calendars, emails, notes, tasks and files) will remain in your account and you can still access them using the respective apps.
• In Outlook settings (Privacy and data), you can export the metadata of your boards. This can be useful if you want to back up any links you had on your board for future reference.
• URLs to calendar boards will be redirected to a supported calendar view.

The feature created a more sophisticated experience compared to the basic display and features on a supported calendar view. Essentially, the calendar board view in Outlook for web features a customizable visual planner that can display multiple calendars simultaneously, thus making it easier for users to plan accordingly.

Moreover, it also features clocks for different time zones and task lists from Microsoft To Do. It also made it easier for users to create multiple boards and reorder them based on preference. However, you’ll no longer be able to leverage these capabilities from next month. “Calendar board view is not available to GCC/GCCH/DOD Microsoft 365 customers,” says Microsoft.

Do you use the Calendar board view in Outlook? Let us know below.

Loop components are live, interactive, and collaborative objects you can embed across multiple platforms. You can use them to create and collaborate on projects. Loop components allow users to make real-time changes, thus making it easier to keep track of pending tasks and the status of the project. You can also use

The feature is already available in Outlook and Teams, whereby users can embed them in their chats and emails through the Loop Components menu. And now, with this new integration, users will be able to manage their tasks better and make edits in Microsoft Planner. As for Microsoft To Do, users can now view their tasks via the Assigned to me section.

Microsoft further indicated:

With this change, all tasks created in these lists will automatically sync and be visible in Planner, and assigned tasks will show up in To Do in the ‘Assigned to me’ smart list. These tasks will also be visible in all apps that show Planner and To Do tasks such as the Tasks app in Microsoft Teams,

The integration is expected to start rolling out to users on Microsoft Loop desktop, web, and mobile later this month. It should hit general availability by mid-July. In related news, Microsoft released the Loop app to public preview back in March and later added support for personal accounts on Android and iOS.

via Petri

First, the Draw tab has been refreshed and now features a new capability that will allow users to undo and redo ink strokes directly from the Draw tab. Previously, users were forced to navigate through the Home tab to access these capabilities, which was a major deterrent to the user’s productivity.

Additionally, Microsoft has also added a new digital ruler that’s designed to help users create and insert straight lines accurately into their presentations. “You can also use the built-in angular display to create accurate angles between lines,” says the company.

And now, it will be easier for users to draw focus during presentations using the laser pointer on the slideshow. Through the feature, you can temporarily ink on slides to highlight important elements in a particular slide. What’s more, you’ll not need to erase the markings, after a few seconds, they’ll automatically disappear, leaving your presentation in its original state.

Finally, Powerpoint for web users will now be able to draw straight lines using their digital pen and mouse easily. You only need to press the Shift key while inking or highlighting your content.

Microsoft has also indicated that users should be able to partially erase strokes using the Point Eraser tool on the Draw tab soon. Let us know which feature you’re excited most about in the comments.

Just like most browsers, Vivaldi is powered by the Chromium open-source project and works perfectly across most sites. However, there have been instances where some users have reported being blocked out from accessing certain websites. The first account dates back to 2019, which prompted Vivaldi to incorporate the web browser’s name, the operating system’s name, and other technical information into its User-Agent strings.

The second account took place this year when the browser started using the new Client Hints standard. Yngve Pettersen, Vivaldi’s developer, further detailed how User-Agent discrimination works:

It’s not only websites that discriminate based on your name. Vivaldi now masquerades as Google Chrome for graphic card drivers, which unlocks graphic card driver optimizations made specifically for Chrome. By pretending to be Chrome, the GPU user uses less memory and resources. It improves battery life, reduces crashes, and improves system stability.

Vivaldi further details that finding workarounds to bypass these issues also opened up new opportunities for users to leverage in a bid to enhance their browsing experience. For instance, on this new version, users will be able to access Bing Chat.

Bing Chat has been available to users for close to four months now. And while Microsoft expanded its availability to more users recently by shipping it to open preview for everyone to try it out, the chatbot is still limited to the Edge browser.

Aside from releasing the chatbot to open preview, you’ll no longer be required to have a Microsoft Account to access it. However, your interactions with the tool will be limited. All these are great steps designed to get more users to interact with the chatbot. However, it’s still limited to Microsoft Edge.

According to the blog post:

Vivaldi masquerades as Microsoft Edge when visiting Bing. This means that you can access Bing Chat using Vivaldi on desktop and Android devices.

The new update is also enhancing the Workspaces feature on the desktop client. The feature is designed to help users with better tab management. Vivaldi has highlighted that users will now be able to navigate between different sets of tabs easily while keeping the tab bar less cluttered. You can also reorder your tabs based on your preference and level of importance.

Additionally, Vivaldi is also making it easier for users to share links, thus making the flow of work easier. “On desktop, you can now select tabs and copy links to all the selected pages,” the company indicated in the blog.

And finally, the company has announced that the browser will be available on iOS soon. It’s already in preview on iOS and iPads and should be rolling out to more users soon.

Minecraft: Education Edition made its way to Chromebooks back in 2020. However, it required the user to either have a school license or an Office 365 Education account. But the early access version was limited to select devices that met the minimum specifications.

However, if you’ve been meaning to get Minecraft on your Chromebook, you can now grab it from Play Store for $20. If you’ve already purchased the game on Android, you’ll be able to get it at $13 as long as you’re using the same Google account on your Chromebook.

Google has indicated that Minecraft will be available on any Chromebook manufactured in the past three years alongside other models that meet the set minimum requirements to access it. Minecraft on Chromebook will feature full cross-play support, which means you’ll be able to engage with other players on mobile, Xbox, PlayStation, Nintendo Switch, and Windows.

It’s also worth noting that if you have a Game Pass Ultimate, you’ll be able to access Minecraft on your Chromebook through Xbox Cloud Gaming. The latest version of Minecraft on Chromebook also ships with access to the Minecraft Marketplace and the new Trails & Tales update.

via Engadget

According to Microsoft via an email:

Four months after Microsoft introduced the new Bing and began to transform the expectations and experiences of Search, people have engaged in more than half a billion chats, created more than 200 million images with Bing Image Creator, and usage of the Bing mobile app has increased 8x since launch.

The company further cites that despite being able to hit these numbers, users are yet to leverage the tool’s full potential, which is why it’s launching the Bing Chat campaign. “Microsoft’s campaign aims to address this challenge by sparking creativity and curiosity to highlight the new possibilities of asking more fun and compelling questions,” Microsoft told OnMSFT.

The campaign will essentially help users learn how to give prompts, opening them up to a new world with endless possibilities. Here are a couple of illustrations of how much you can exploit the tool’s capabilities to get the exact response you might be looking for:

Microsoft should roll out additional campaign assets across digital, social, and OOH platforms in the next few weeks. You can check out more prompts here.

In the past, we’ve seen reports surface online with several users citing instances where the chatbot had hallucinated or outrightly given wrong responses. Perhaps, this campaign will help users learn how to use the tool properly, ultimately helping them make the most out of it.

How do you make your prompts while using Bing Chat? Share your experience with us in the comments.

Upon investigation, Microsoft was found to be collecting data from Xbox accounts belonging to children under 13 without their parents’ consent. This is contrary to stipulations by COPPA where online services are supposed to notify parents what data they are collecting from kids under the age of 13 and how the information will be used.

As you might already be aware, to play Xbox games and even use its services, you must first create a personal account and provide your personal details, including your name, date of birth, and email address. Until 2021, users were required to provide contact details and agree to Microsoft’s advertising policy.

The FTC’s investigations further uncovered that Microsoft only asked kids under the age of 13 to get their parents to complete the signup process for them after they had provided their personal credentials. It was also discovered that from 2015 through to 2020, the company allegedly collected and stored the information from the children, despite the parents not completing the account creation process.

As such, this breaches the FTC’s rule where online services are required to have parental consent before using personal data obtained from underage children. Microsoft’s CVP for Xbox Player Services, Dave McCarthy disclosed that the company didn’t intentionally keep the personal data from the underaged kids and indicated that a “technical glitch” caused the issue.

McCarthy further detailed the company made this discovery while looking into this matter and that the engineering team has since resolved the issue and deleted the data retained from the children’s Xbox accounts without parental consent. He added that the data wasn’t used, shared, or monetized anywhere.

Regrettably, we did not meet customer expectations and are committed to complying with the order to continue improving upon our safety measure. We believe that we can and should do more, and we’ll remain steadfast in our commitment to safety, privacy, and security for our community.

Moving forward, per the DOJ’s proposed order, Microsoft will be required to streamline its account creation process for children. The company has already tweaked the process and will now require the user to provide their date of birth and, if found to be underage, seek parental consent before proceeding with the account setup process. Additionally, if you created an Xbox account before May 2021 while under the age of 13, you’ll be required to seek for parental consent before continuing to use the services in the next couple of months.

Microsoft is now making this possible for Word for Windows users. Just like email reactions in Outlook, users can now like comments in Word to enhance collaboration and productivity in Word.

And while the Like button in Word is designed to make it easier for users to collaborate on projects and give quick responses, it should be noted that it comes with limitations. For instance, if a document is in read-only mode, you won’t be able to make use of the feature as the Like button won’t be visible.

Additionally, the feature also ships with two known issues. First, the feature will not be available to Android and iOS users. Therefore, they’ll not be able to view comment reactions. Microsoft has also indicated that there might be instances where users might not be able to use comment reactions, especially while editing older documents. Though this doesn’t apply to newer comments added to the document, the feature should work properly.

The feature ships with a dedicated keyboard shortcut, as illustrated below:

• To react to a comment without using your mouse, navigate to the text in the document with an associated comment and press Alt+F12. From there, press the Tab key to select the Like button. You can press Enter or Spacebar to click the Like button, and then press the Alt+Down arrow keys to expand the user list. Move through the list using the Up and Down arrow keys. The Esc or Alt  keys can be used to dismiss the list.

The feature is now available to all Word for the web users and Beta Channel users and is currently rolling out to Current Channel users in preview. You must be running on version 2305 (Build 16501.20152) or later to access it. The feature will also be rolling out to Mac users in the next couple of weeks.

The issue seems to be quite critical as some users have also indicated that they are having issues accessing Outlook on the web. Microsoft has since confirmed the issue via its Microsoft 365 Status account on Twitter, and is currently investigating the matter.

We're investigating an issue with accessing Outlook on the web. Further details can be found under EX571516 in the admin center.

— Microsoft 365 Status (@MSFT365Status) June 5, 2023

After reviewing its networking systems and recent updates, Microsoft identified the issue as highlighted below:

We’ve identified downstream impact for Microsoft Teams, SharePoint Online and OneDrive for Business. We’re providing full impact details and updates for those services via MO571683. Updates pertaining to Exchange and Outlook on the web will continue to be provided via EX571516.

Consequently, the company has placed a pause on ongoing deployment and is keeping a close eye on things. It further added that users can get more details pertaining to the issue via the admin center under EX571516 and MO571683.

Additionally, the company also indicated that it has reverted the update citing significant improvements in the affected services. Microsoft has indicated that it’ll continue monitoring the situation and put elaborate measures in place to ensure that the issue is resolved fully.

We've reverted the update and telemetry shows service improvement. We're continuing to monitor the service to ensure recovery and performing actions to address any residual impact. Further information can be found under EX571516 and MO571683 in the admin center.

— Microsoft 365 Status (@MSFT365Status) June 5, 2023

Have you encountered this issue? Is the service better now? Share your experience with us in the comments.

via Neowin