On episode 5 of the Microsoft Spotlight podcast, Andrew and Jon speak to Microsoft’s Laurie Pottmeyer! Laurie passionately talks about her role as the Microsoft Teams Community Manager and how she positively engages with the community to improve the Microsoft Teams experience, including the creation of the Women in Teams community. As a single Mum who travels alot, Laurie tells Andrew and Jon how she structures life around her kids and how her daughter even managed a trip to Paris for a conference!
Laurie’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/lauriepottmeyer Laurie’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lauriepottmeyer/ Women in Teams Community: aka.ms/WITCommunity Andrew’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/thewatchernode Microsoft Spotlight Twitter: https://twitter.com/msftspotlight Jon’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/jonjarvis
During Microsoft Ignite there was a session called OD370 – Introducing Microsoft Viva Learning. In this session, it provided details in how to configure Microsoft Viva Learning.
I am now going to run over this session and provide the details described in the video.
Whats is the Learning App?
The Learning App is an extension to Microsoft Teams which allows the content from various sources into a single panel of glass. By default, you will be able to access the following locations.
Important Note
Microsoft has not release much information around the licencing for LinkedIn Learning with the Learning App as present.
LinkedIn Learning
Microsoft Learn
Microsoft 365 Training
You will also be able to include the following 3rd parties at launch of the Learning App
Coursera
edX
Pluralsight
Skillsoft
You will also be able to pull SharePoint content via a connector into the Microsoft Team Learning App.
Configuring the Learning App
At present, you are unable to configure the Learning App as it’s not in public preview or general availability. However, this doesn’t stop me from explaining the steps required.
Launch you Microsoft 365 Admin Center Go to Integrated apps under Settings Under Services will be “Learning App”
Once you selected the Learning App you will be able to enable or disable the content sources.
Publishing the Learning App
In preparation for the launch of the Learning App, you are unable to publish the app centrally from Microsoft Teams Admin Centre. This will be made available at the launch of this solution.
But you can install Learning app manually to your Teams Client today.
Heres a blog post I did about the Insight apps which is available today, you can follow the same process to publish the Learning (when available) to your organisation.
Sign up here for latest information about http://aka.ms/vivalearning
Public preview of Microsoft Viva Learning App should be hitting tenants for Admins sometime in April. No confirmed date from Microsoft has been released.
I am now going to show you how to configure Power Automate to act as the schedule for publishing the messages to Microsoft Teams. It is a very simple process
Launch Microsoft Teams right click a channel within a Team and select Connectors. Search for Incoming Webhook and click Add
Click Add
Specify the name of the Webhook and click Create
Make a note of the URL below as you will need this for the PowerShell script later and click Done
Create Automation Account
Launch your Azure Portal and search for Automation Account to create a new account.
Specify; – Name – Subscription – Resource Group – Location
No should be selected for “Create Azure Run As Account” as this is will enable the Account to run against Office 365. Click Create
Once the resources has successful created, go into the resource
First of all we need to create a number of variables, these variables will use within the PowerShell script we are going to add to the Runbook.
You will need to add the following variables
– AzO365ServiceHealthApplicationID = Client ID – AzO365ServiceHealthApplicationKey = Client Secrey – AzO365TeamsURI = This is the url we created earlier in the post – AzO365TenantDomain = Tenant ID
If you unsure how to obtain these values, please visit this blog post for more details
Select Create a runbook – Provide a name – Runbook Type should equal PowerShell – Description (is optional)
Press Create
I am now going to use the following PowerShell script available from GitHub within my Runbook. https://github.com/einast/PS_M365_scripts. This script has been created for the sole purpose of extracting the Microsoft 365 Service Health using the Office Service Communication API, which I demonstrated how to configure in another post.
Under the “User Defined Variables” you will need to edit;
Mintues to reflect the same time as your schedule.
Pushover notifications and Services to monitor as shown below
# ------------------------------------- USER DEFINED VARIABLES -------------------------------------
$ApplicationID = Get-AutomationVariable -Name 'AzO365ServiceHealthApplicationID'
$ApplicationKey = Get-AutomationVariable -Name 'AzO365ServiceHealthApplicationKey'
$TenantDomain = Get-AutomationVariable -Name 'AzO365TenantDomain'
$URI = Get-AutomationVariable -Name 'AzO365TeamsURI'
$Minutes = '1440'
# Pushover notifications in case Teams is down.
# Due to limitations and readability, the script will only send the title of the incident/advisory to Pushover.
# COMMENT OUT THIS SECTION IF YOU DON'T WANT TO USE PUSHOVER!
#$Pushover = 'yes' # Comment out if you don't want to use Pushover. I use 'yes' for readability.
#$PushoverToken = Get-AutomationVariable -Name 'AzO365PushoverToken' # Your API token. Comment out if you don't want to use Pushover
#$PushoverUser = Get-AutomationVariable -Name 'AzO365PushoverUser' # User/Group token. Comment out if you don't want to use Pushover
#$PushoverURI = 'https://api.pushover.net/1/messages.json' # DO NOT CHANGE! Default Pushover URI. Comment out if you don't want to use Pushover
# Service(s) to monitor
# Leave the one(s) you DON'T want to check empty (with '' ), add a value in the ones you WANT to check (I added 'yes' for readability)
$ExchangeOnline = 'yes'
$MicrosoftForms = 'yes'
$MicrosoftIntune = 'yes'
$MicrosoftKaizala = 'yes'
$SkypeforBusiness = 'yes'
$MicrosoftDefenderATP = 'yes'
$MicrosoftFlow = 'yes'
$FlowinMicrosoft365 = 'yes'
$MicrosoftTeams = 'yes'
$MobileDeviceManagementforOffice365 = 'yes'
$OfficeClientApplications = 'yes'
$Officefortheweb = 'yes'
$OneDriveforBusiness = 'yes'
$IdentityService = 'yes'
$Office365Portal = 'yes'
$OfficeSubscription = 'yes'
$Planner = 'yes'
$PowerApps = 'yes'
$PowerAppsinMicrosoft365 = 'yes'
$PowerBI = 'yes'
$AzureInformationProtection = 'yes'
$SharePointOnline = 'yes'
$MicrosoftStaffHub = 'yes'
$YammerEnterprise = 'yes'
# Classification(s) to monitor
# Leave the one(s) you DON'T want to check empty (with '' ), add a value in the ones you WANT to check (I added 'yes' for readability)
$Incident = 'yes'
$Advisory = 'yes'
# ------------------------------------- END OF USER DEFINED VARIABLES -------------------------------------
You will now need to define a schedule within the Runbook for it to execute.
Once you have done all of the above, you will receive a nice notification in Microsoft Teams about the Service Health Status
In my next article I will show how simple it is too trigger this Runbook using Power Automate.
In this post I am going to show you how to install the Webex Call app for your end users at a administrative level from the Microsoft Teams console.
So in April 2020, Cisco announced a new Call App for Microsoft Teams. The app launches calls through Webex technology, even when you click the call button in Microsoft Teams.
To access this functionality, follow these steps:
Verify users have accounts activated in the Webex Control Hub
Ensure users are registered to the Cisco Webex Calling or Unified Communications Manager
Make sure users have the Webex app
Ensure you have Administrator privileges for Microsoft Teams
Update phone numbers for users in the Azure Active Directory
So lets get to it;
Launch https://admin.teams.microsoft.com
Go to Teams App –> Setup Policies
Best Practice / Recommendations
It is always best practice not to modify the Global (Org-wide default) policies. It recommended to create a new policy which will limit impact to the production environment.
Once you have either create a new policy or decided to modify the global policy. Click Add Apps
Search for Insights and click Add
While in the policy you may decide to add Insights as a Pinned App, you will need to add Insights app as shown below
Click Save
The Webex call application will now be installed and added to pinned apps with the Teams Client. As a global admin launch the application for the first time to approve the application in your Microsoft tenant.
As you can see below you now have the ability to make Webex call through Microsoft Teams.
Now for the Pros / Cons.
Pros:
Simple way to connect Webex calling functionality with Microsoft Teams
Embedded buttons in Teams make the function easy to use
Cons:
Only works to connect two VoIP calling strategies. You can’t connect your chat messages or file sharing this way.
Calling opens a new window, which means there are more tabs for users to keep track of.
Only works to add Webex Calling to Microsoft Teams. You can’t add Microsoft calling to Webex instead.
In this post I am going to show you how to install the Microsoft Viva Insights app for your end users at a administrative level from the Microsoft Teams console. So lets get to it;
Launch https://admin.teams.microsoft.com
Go to Teams App –> Setup Policies
Best Practice / Recommendations
It is always best practice not to modify the Global (Org-wide default) policies. It recommended to create a new policy which will limit impact to the production environment.
Once you have either create a new policy or decided to modify the global policy. Click Add Apps
Search for Insights and click Add
While in the policy you may decide to add Insights as a Pinned App, you will need to add Insights app as shown below
Click Save
The Insights applications will now be installed and added to pinned apps with the Teams Client
Microsoft recently announce a new product called Microsoft Viva which has 4 pillars
In this blog post I am going to focus on Learning, as a member of a large organisation that has multiple platforms for Learning Tools. I can definitely see a use case within my organisation.
Whats is Microsoft Viva Learning
Microsoft Viva Learning add a new experience within Microsoft Teams where all learning platforms can be consolidated to a single location. As you can see from my screenshot below this functionality is yet to be released, so definitely keep an eye on updates from Microsoft.
Microsoft has built a new, transformational learning experience that makes organisation learning content available in one place – including LinkedIn Learning, Microsoft Learn, third-party content providers, Learning Management Systems, and a company’s own content.
Microsoft partnered with the following 3rd parties which you will be able to included into Learning.
Social Learning
You will see the term Social Learning mentioned with Microsoft Viva, this refers to sharing content in a chat or channel in Microsoft Teams. The example Microsoft have used is “Onboarding” and for me makes perfect sense. As a new starter within my organisation, getting access to all the onboarding content from a centralized platform is key to the success of integrating a new member to your team.
Image taken from Microsoft
Personal Learning
Browsing Microsoft Viva Learning, you will be able to find content that you are interested in and Microsoft uses Graph to recommend learning content based on signals.
Once you have found content you are interested in, it can be assigned to you for consumption.
Learning Tools
Learning tools introduces “Assign and Manage” that lets you share relevant, interesting and important learning content with others. Whether its your line manager sharing content with you or you sharing content with colleagues within your group or team. You can use the manage tab to track the progress and complete of the courses.
So thats completes this introduction to Microsoft Viva, I hope to release more content about the product as it continues to develop.
Send an email when a new message is added in Microsoft Teams couldnt be any easier. Power Automate has a defined template which allows to connect with Microsoft Teams and Office 365 Outlook connectors to provide the required functionality. So from you Power Automate dashboard look for the template and press continue.
Define which Microsoft Team you would like to target and the required channel.
Define the email address you want to send the messages to
Important Note
The email address must be an active mailbox within your organisation.
Save….
The next time a message is posted, an email will be sent to the defined mailboxes.
Sometimes when working with customers you need to validate if a particular port has been opened on their Firewall. I am unable to count how many times I’ve had a discussion where a port hasnt been opened. So for simplicity the following PowerShell function allows you to check instantly;
Function Get-CheckPort{
[cmdletbinding()]
Param (
[parameter(Mandatory=$true)]
[string]$ipaddress,
[string]$port
)
# End of Parameters
Process{
$Date = Get-Date
$MyDate = " " + $Date.Day + "." + $Date.Month + "." + $Date.Year + " " + $date.Hour + ":" + $date.Minute
Try{
$connection = $null
$connection = New-Object System.Net.Sockets.TcpClient($ipaddress, $port)
}
Catch{
Write-host "Warning: Port $port is closed - $MyDate" -ForegroundColor Red
}
if ($connection.Connected){
Write-Host "Info: Port $port is open - $MyDate" -ForegroundColor Green
}
}
}
Get-CheckPort -ipaddress '' -port ''
As you can see from the test above, I am to validate that port 80 to the teams.microsoft.com is open
When working with Power Automate recently I was struggling being able to get the Teams and Channel IDs but with a bit of Googling I managed to work out how to obtain this information. So all that is required is the following expressions created under Data Operation
