Office 365 News Roundup for 15 June 2016

Over the last few days there has been a lot of Office 365 related news out of Microsoft and so we wanted to round it all up for you for a one stop summary of all of it.

Yesterday we already covered the updated Office 365 Admin app for Android and Windows Phone (it will arrive for iOS users in a couple of weeks). 

The app has become very popular among small businesses who depend on it for their primary administration access to their Office 365 service.

Since its initial release in the fall of 2014 it has picked up over 40 enhancements in the development process.

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The month of June means new updates for Office 365 and the availability of the Deferred Channel updates for the Office 365 Client (Version 1602).

Companies and organizations that choose to enroll their clients in the deferred channel opt into only receiving updates three times a year (February, June and October). The idea behind these infrequent updates is to maintain stability of your users software installations and not having to be concerned about monthly user training about new features.

You can read all of the release notes for the Office 365 client for this June update and find information about downloading and installing this update at the Office 365 ProPlus TechNet website.

The Office 365 team has also adopted the new versioning model that the Windows team is using with Windows 10. That means the version will have four digits with the first two representing the year, i.e. 16, and the last two digits indicating the month, i.e. 06 (June).

So that means the update included this month for the deferred channel is from February 2016 or Version 1602. 

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Over the last 30 days the Office 365 team has delivered several security updates to the suite of software that add new capabilities and improves your security posture.

These updates included:

In addition you can learn more about the security products Microsoft has developed and general security practices to help you with identity protection, secure apps and data, safeguarding infrastructure and controlling the devices in your organization.

You can access all of this data and more through Microsoft Secure.

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If you are a company or organization that has not made the move to Office 365 and might still be researching your options you can check out the Office 365 Test Drive sessions being hosted over the next couple of weeks.

During these sessions you will access a remote desktop with the latest Office 365 technology readily available and learn how the suite of software can make you more productive.  Seats are limited to 20 persons in each session and while it may be too late for today's opportunity there are additional sessions on 22 and 29 June 2016.

Details about those sessions and the sign up process are located at the Office 365 Test Drive article.

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Another great way to learn about a service you are considering using is to see how other companies made that transition and what it has done for their employees.

Kelley Drye & Warren LLP is a law office in the United States and Europe which moved seven offices to Office 365.

You can read their story over at the official Office 365 blog and find out how Office 365 has not only impacted their workflow but how it is directly impacting the service received by their customers.

But, wait...there's probably more so be sure to follow me on Twitter and Google+.

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