Microsoft Office 365 F1


What is Microsoft and Office 365 F1, and who is it for?

 Estimates suggest that there is a global workforce of over 2 Bn workers in customer facing roles: including staff in sales, call centers, field service teams, manufacturing shop floors.
Until now, the needs of this highly distributed workforce has been largely untapped, because businesses needed an affordable and secure solution for the large numbers of distributed workers; who don’t need all the bells and whistles of the full office suite. Staff turn-over is typically far higher in customer facing roles, presenting challenges for IT departments to keep up with demands for account and device provisioning.
What are the benefits?
Besides offering the optimised Office Online suite, Microsoft have bundled collaboration services, scheduling and task management software with tools that “… streamlines IT management, minimizes cost, and extends security to all employees and endpoints. Azure Active Directory provides management of employee identity and access; Microsoft Intune helps secure devices; and new features in Windows 10 simplify the management of Firstline Workers’ experiences, supporting locked down single purpose devices with Windows Assigned Access and automated deployment with Windows AutoPilot.”
How will IT deploy, and manage this new offering?
Device and app management is done through a combination of Microsoft’s InTune - a Mobile App Management (MAM) and Mobile Device Management (MDM) solution – and their new Auto Pilot solution, that enables you to provision user accounts and devices, by
  • Automatically join devices to Azure Active Directory (Azure AD)
  • Auto-enrol devices into MDM services, such as Microsoft Intune (Requires an Azure AD Premium subscription)
  • Restrict the Administrator account creation
  • Create and auto-assign devices to configuration groups based on a device's profile
  • Customize Out of the Box Experience (OOBE) content specific to the organization
How will customers deploy their line of business applications to their front-line staffs’ Win 10 S devices?
Apps can be pre-loaded on the devices by the OEM vendors, this could include the Office 365 F1 suite and other popular productivity tools. But how do Admins deploy new apps to Win 10 S over the lifetime of the device?
Windows 10 S security improvements include introducing safeguards to application install experience by restricting installs to applications from verifiable and trusted sources. Microsoft provide the validation for their new Universal Windows Platform (UWP), and signing of applications on behalf of the ISV. Signing is essential because Windows 10 S expressly forbids “side-loading applications” - this is the process that enables unsigned, untrusted applications to be installed on a device. Signed and validated apps can then be published in the Microsoft Store, so that users and businesses, know that they can safely install the application without fear of malware, or malicious code. New UWP apps, will work uninstall cleanly because there is clearer separation between the app and the operating system, and cross compatibility across a range of devices from PCs, tablets, Xbox and the new Hololens. 
It is worth noting, that businesses can deploy UWP's appx applications with other tools like Microsoft SCCM, Citrix XenMobile, VMware's AirWatch.
How will customers deploy line of business applications for their front-line staff?
While Microsoft have been working with ISVs to get their applications to the Store, Microsoft have also provided the Desktop App Converter to help businesses get Win 32 apps that run on Windows 10 into the required Appx format. The Converter does not perform any actual conversion, nor will it help an app comply with UWP’s requirements - customers will need to change the app’s source code to fix any violations identified during testing.
This presents a real challenge for Enterprises, because most of their proprietary order entry, stock control, patient record systems apps are still incompatible with Windows 10. What chance do they have of adopting UWP when they didn’t have the time, development budget or desire to risk making changes to an app that is critical to the running of their business.

Triphla Cloud Tech Solutions

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Microsoft Whiteboard: now more colorful and customizable than ever

Image
The Whiteboard team has been hard at work since our announcements at Ignite. A s we gather more and more feedback from our growing customer base, we’ve also been rolling out great new features, with more on the way soon. Let’s take a look at what’s changed. New pen colors and thicknesses Responding to popular demand, we’ve added 10 new pen colors and three more pen thicknesses, allowing Whiteboard users to express themselves more colorfully and boldly than ever. To access the new colors and thicknesses, click on the pen you have selected to pop up the palette. Background colors and gridlines Just like it’s great to have options for pen color, customizing the look and feel of the board itself can help your ideas stand out – and can make your boards more usable and readable as well. Whiteboard now offers nine options for board color and eight types of gridlines that can be used together or separately to customize your boards’ backgrounds. These options are selectable in
Read more

SharePoint page enhancements

Image
There’s a SharePoint page for that. From content-rich home pages that serves entire organizations, to recurring quarterly business review read outs, to internal campaigns, to “welcome to the company” starter pages. As the rich capabilities of modern SharePoint pages evolve, all communicators can better design and promote their information throughout their team and across the organization. We are excited to announce the following page enhancements (screenshots + links to learn more below): Customize title region  | control what the title region of each page looks like (layout, alignment, title, date). Section backgrounds  | display as distinct sections with visual variety throughout the page. Custom page thumbnails  | Choose a preferred thumbnail from Page details. Custom page descriptions  | Create a custom description from Page details. FYI:  removal of the Feedback button  in preparation of new feedback experience  |  in preparation for a new feedback experience coming soon
Read more

New device modeling experience in Azure IoT Central

Image
On the Azure IoT Central team, we are constantly talking with our customers to understand how we can continue to provide more value. One of our top pieces of product feedback has been for a clearer device modeling experience that separates the device instance from the device template. Previously, viewing the device and editing the device template took place on the same page through an “Edit Template” button. This caused a lack of clarity between when you were making a change that applied to the device or if your changes were getting applied to all devices in that template. Recently we've begun a flighted rollout of a new device modeling experience that begins to directly address this feedback. For app builder roles, we have introduced a new “Device Templates” navigation tab that replaces the existing “Application Builder” tab, as well as updated the pattern in which you view or edit your device templates. To edit your device templates, you can visit the “Device Templates” tab
Read more