Setting preferences for Office 365 ProPlus using the Office Customization Tool for Click-to-Run

Today we are announcing a preview update to the Office Customization Tool for Click-to-Run, which provides desktop admins with a simple user interface to customize their deployment of Office.

With this update, you can now customize Office application settings as part of your configuration file, which means you can build a single configuration file that installs Office and configures preferences for Office applications. You can search for Office application settings based on Office application, category, and title to quickly find the settings you’re interested in:

For this preview release, we’ve provided a limited set of Office application settings to choose from. We plan to include the full set of application settings later this summer.

In addition to application settings, we have been listening to your feedback and since we introduced the Office Customization Tool for Click-to-Run we have made a few changes to the preview experience; adding Organization Name as a setting that is included as part of the deployment configuration, an update to the language selection experience, and an update to the Automatically accept the EULA option.

In our next update we plan to add many additional enhancements including; an update to the product selection experience to allow you to have more control over the products you can select from and the apps that you exclude, an update to the language selection experience including support for MatchOS, AllowCdnFallback, Proofing Tools and more.

Please try out the new application settings feature as well as the new enhancements and let us know what you think using the Send-a-Smile feature (button in the upper right-hand corner or this web page) — your feedback helps us plan future updates.

As always, make sure you download the latest version of the Office Deployment Tool (ODT) to enable this new feature during deployment.

Chris Hopkins

Senior Program Manager – Office Engineering

Setting preferences for Office 365 ProPlus using the Office Customization Tool for Click-to-Run

Today we are announcing a preview update to the Office Customization Tool for Click-to-Run, which provides desktop admins with a simple user interface to customize their deployment of Office.

With this update, you can now customize Office application settings as part of your configuration file, which means you can build a single configuration file that installs Office and configures preferences for Office applications. You can search for Office application settings based on Office application, category, and title to quickly find the settings you’re interested in:

For this preview release, we’ve provided a limited set of Office application settings to choose from. We plan to include the full set of application settings later this summer.

In addition to application settings, we have been listening to your feedback and since we introduced the Office Customization Tool for Click-to-Run we have made a few changes to the preview experience; adding Organization Name as a setting that is included as part of the deployment configuration, an update to the language selection experience, and an update to the Automatically accept the EULA option.

In our next update we plan to add many additional enhancements including; an update to the product selection experience to allow you to have more control over the products you can select from and the apps that you exclude, an update to the language selection experience including support for MatchOS, AllowCdnFallback, Proofing Tools and more.

Please try out the new application settings feature as well as the new enhancements and let us know what you think using the Send-a-Smile feature (button in the upper right-hand corner or this web page) — your feedback helps us plan future updates.

As always, make sure you download the latest version of the Office Deployment Tool (ODT) to enable this new feature during deployment.

Chris Hopkins

Senior Program Manager – Office Engineering

Use custom domains in Office 365 to build your brand and empower your work force

Organizations of all sizes win customers and create trust with a consistent and recognizable brand. Web and email addresses that match your organization’s name build brand equity and establish credibility. If your business is called Fourth Coffee, a web address of fourthcoffee.com makes you easy to find online, and email addresses that end in @fourthcoffee.com reassure your customers that they are dealing directly with you.

Microsoft makes it easy to integrate your custom domain with comprehensive collaboration tools like email from Office 365. Let’s look at your options.

Purchase a custom domain with your Office 365 subscription

For organizations creating their online presence for the first time, Microsoft makes it easy to purchase a custom domain and integrate it with Office 365. This new domain will instantly be linked with your Office 365 account, meaning that all your email addresses will include your new custom domain where you can also host your website. You can purchase this new custom domain from Microsoft at the same time as your subscription to Office 365 or later.

We’ve posted step by step instructions on how to purchase a custom domain directly from Microsoft in our support documentation.

Add Domain.PNG

Automatically join your own GoDaddy or 1&1 domain with Office 365 (UPDATED)

Many organizations will purchase a domain as soon as they have a name. As they grow and implement more advanced IT solutions, it can be challenging to integrate that custom domain. Microsoft makes it easy to join some domains to Office 365 services through an open standard called Domain Connect. Domain Connect automates many of the manual processes typically required for configuring web hosting and email service. Microsoft has enabled this standard in Office 365 to make it easy to integrate your Domain Connect enabled domains with your Office 365 subscription.

We’re excited to announce today that 1&1, a leading domain provider, has integrated the Domain Connect standard. This new partnership makes it easy to integrate your custom domain from 1&1 with your Office 365 subscription. 1&1 and GoDaddy are the first domain providers to offer compliance with the Domain Connect standard, with more on the way.

If you’re currently using another provider for your organization’s email service, it’s easy to migrate those email addresses and messages to your Office 365 subscription.

Check out the support documentation for more on how you can automatically join your existing domain to your Office 365 subscription and migrate your messages.

Manually join your domain with Office 365

You can still join your custom domain with your Office 365 services if you did not purchase it from Microsoft or a Domain Connect compliant provider. There are a few more steps to take, but it’s straight forward. The outcomes and benefits are the same.

The support documentation contains a step by step procedure for manually joining your domain to your Office 365 services.

Add Domain Verify.PNG

Easier to manage; easier to focus on your goals

Automatically connecting your custom domain with your Office 365 services is another example of how we want to simplify your IT management experience so that you can focus on your actual work. Join the Office 365 Tech Community to stay up to date on the latest news and releases.

Use custom domains in Office 365 to build your brand and empower your work force

Organizations of all sizes win customers and create trust with a consistent and recognizable brand. Web and email addresses that match your organization’s name build brand equity and establish credibility. If your business is called Fourth Coffee, a web address of fourthcoffee.com makes you easy to find online, and email addresses that end in @fourthcoffee.com reassure your customers that they are dealing directly with you.

Microsoft makes it easy to integrate your custom domain with comprehensive collaboration tools like email from Office 365. Let’s look at your options.

Purchase a custom domain with your Office 365 subscription

For organizations creating their online presence for the first time, Microsoft makes it easy to purchase a custom domain and integrate it with Office 365. This new domain will instantly be linked with your Office 365 account, meaning that all your email addresses will include your new custom domain where you can also host your website. You can purchase this new custom domain from Microsoft at the same time as your subscription to Office 365 or later.

We’ve posted step by step instructions on how to purchase a custom domain directly from Microsoft in our support documentation.

Add Domain.PNG

Automatically join your own GoDaddy or 1&1 domain with Office 365 (UPDATED)

Many organizations will purchase a domain as soon as they have a name. As they grow and implement more advanced IT solutions, it can be challenging to integrate that custom domain. Microsoft makes it easy to join some domains to Office 365 services through an open standard called Domain Connect. Domain Connect automates many of the manual processes typically required for configuring web hosting and email service. Microsoft has enabled this standard in Office 365 to make it easy to integrate your Domain Connect enabled domains with your Office 365 subscription.

We’re excited to announce today that 1&1, a leading domain provider, has integrated the Domain Connect standard. This new partnership makes it easy to integrate your custom domain from 1&1 with your Office 365 subscription. 1&1 and GoDaddy are the first domain providers to offer compliance with the Domain Connect standard, with more on the way.

If you’re currently using another provider for your organization’s email service, it’s easy to migrate those email addresses and messages to your Office 365 subscription.

Check out the support documentation for more on how you can automatically join your existing domain to your Office 365 subscription and migrate your messages.

Manually join your domain with Office 365

You can still join your custom domain with your Office 365 services if you did not purchase it from Microsoft or a Domain Connect compliant provider. There are a few more steps to take, but it’s straight forward. The outcomes and benefits are the same.

The support documentation contains a step by step procedure for manually joining your domain to your Office 365 services.

Add Domain Verify.PNG

Easier to manage; easier to focus on your goals

Automatically connecting your custom domain with your Office 365 services is another example of how we want to simplify your IT management experience so that you can focus on your actual work. Join the Office 365 Tech Community to stay up to date on the latest news and releases.

Office 365 and the Dept of Homeland Security Binding Operational Directive 18-01

In order to drive consistent protection for US Government information, employees, and infrastructure, the Department of Homeland Security issued requirements for Federal agencies using email and web services. The “Enhance Email and Web Security” Binding Operational Directive (BOD 18-01) outlines specific controls and configurations to be applied to email servers and web services within 30, 60, and 120 days of issuance.

The Department of Homeland Security is responsible for developing and enforcing binding operational directives under the Federal Information Security Modernization Act of 2014 (FISMA) (Id. § 3553(b)(2)), and BODs are mandatory for federal, executive branch, departments and agencies (44 U.S.C. § 3552(b)(1)). While the BOD 18-01 is not compulsory for the Department of Defense, Intelligence Community, or State and Local Governments, these policies and security protocols are strongly recommended and should be heeded by all agencies in public sector, as well as commercial companies.

The cybersecurity requirements issued by the Department of Homeland Security will help protect information by enforcing encryption and more secure connections when government employees use internet systems for email and websites. Additionally, emails will require a digital signature that makes it harder to fake an email address to deliver malware or trick users into providing passwords. (Learn more in Dan Lohrmann’s cybersecurity blog on govtech.com)

Microsoft’s cloud makes it easy to enhance email and web security to comply with BOD 18-01.

(Action may be required to configure SPF/DMARC policies. Resources can be found below.)

All agencies are required to:

Within 30 calendar days after issuance of this directive, develop and provide to DHS an “Agency Plan of Action for BOD 18-01” to:

Enhance email security by:

Within 90 days after issuance of this directive, configuring:

All internet-facing mail servers to offer STARTTLS, and
All second-level agency domains to have valid SPF/DMARC records, with at minimum a DMARC policy of “p=none” and at least one address defined as a recipient of aggregate and/or failure reports.

Within 120 days after issuance of this directive, ensuring:

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)v2 and SSLv3 are disabled on mail servers, and
3DES and RC4 ciphers are disabled on mail servers.

Within 15 days of the establishment of centralized National Cybersecurity & Communications Integration Center (NCCIC) reporting location, adding the NCCIC as a recipient of DMARC aggregate reports.
Within one year after issuance of this directive, setting a DMARC policy of “reject” for all second-level domains and mail-sending hosts.

Enhance web security by:

Within 120 days after issuance of this directive, ensuring:

All publicly accessible Federal websites and web services provide service through a secure connection (HTTPS-only, with HSTS),
SSLv2 and SSLv3 are disabled on web servers, and
3DES and RC4 ciphers are disabled on web servers.
Identifying and providing a list to DHS of agency second-level domains that can be HSTS preloaded, for which HTTPS will be enforced for all subdomains.

Upon delivery of its Agency Plan of Action for BOD 18-01 within 30 days of this directive per required action 1, begin implementing that plan.
At 60 calendar days after issuance of this directive, provide a report to DHS on the status of that implementation. Continue to report every 30 calendar days thereafter until implementation of the agency’s BOD 18-01 plan is complete.

Source: https://cyber.dhs.gov/

Email security with Exchange Online:

Uses opportunistic TLS and possible to force TLS
SSLv2 and SSLv3 are disabled
RC4 cipher is disabled
3DES cipher will be disabled in the future

Enterprise / GCC: 3DES cipher to be disabled with mandatory use of TLS 1.2 in Office 365. Please reference Preparing for the mandatory use of TLS 1.2 in Office 365 for details.
Group Policy can disable ciphers on the client side

Configuring DMARC and SPF within Office 365 is simple

Dynamics 365 (all environments and offerings):

SSLv2 and SSLv3 are disabled
RC4 cipher is disabled
3DES will be disabled by the end of January

Resources:

On disabling ciphers via GPO:

This entry does not exist in the registry by default. For information about ciphers that are used by the Schannel SSP, see Supported Cipher Suites and Protocols in the Schannel SSP.

Registry path: HKLM SYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlSecurityProvidersSCHANNEL

To disable a cipher, create an Enabled entry in the appropriate subkey. This entry does not exist in the registry by default. After you have created the entry, change the DWORD value to 0. When you disable any algorithm, you disallow all cipher suites that use that algorithm. To enable the cipher, change the DWORD value to 1.

Source: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn786418(v=ws.11).aspx#BKMK_SchannelTR_Ciphers

Want to stay up to date on technology trends in government, Microsoft 365 for US Government product updates, and the musings of a Microsoft product manager? Follow @brian_levenson on Twitter.

Office 365 and the Dept of Homeland Security Binding Operational Directive 18-01

In order to drive consistent protection for US Government information, employees, and infrastructure, the Department of Homeland Security issued requirements for Federal agencies using email and web services. The “Enhance Email and Web Security” Binding Operational Directive (BOD 18-01) outlines specific controls and configurations to be applied to email servers and web services within 30, 60, and 120 days of issuance.

The Department of Homeland Security is responsible for developing and enforcing binding operational directives under the Federal Information Security Modernization Act of 2014 (FISMA) (Id. § 3553(b)(2)), and BODs are mandatory for federal, executive branch, departments and agencies (44 U.S.C. § 3552(b)(1)). While the BOD 18-01 is not compulsory for the Department of Defense, Intelligence Community, or State and Local Governments, these policies and security protocols are strongly recommended and should be heeded by all agencies in public sector, as well as commercial companies.

The cybersecurity requirements issued by the Department of Homeland Security will help protect information by enforcing encryption and more secure connections when government employees use internet systems for email and websites. Additionally, emails will require a digital signature that makes it harder to fake an email address to deliver malware or trick users into providing passwords. (Learn more in Dan Lohrmann’s cybersecurity blog on govtech.com)

Microsoft’s cloud makes it easy to enhance email and web security to comply with BOD 18-01.

(Action may be required to configure SPF/DMARC policies. Resources can be found below.)

All agencies are required to:

Within 30 calendar days after issuance of this directive, develop and provide to DHS an “Agency Plan of Action for BOD 18-01” to:

Enhance email security by:

Within 90 days after issuance of this directive, configuring:

All internet-facing mail servers to offer STARTTLS, and
All second-level agency domains to have valid SPF/DMARC records, with at minimum a DMARC policy of “p=none” and at least one address defined as a recipient of aggregate and/or failure reports.

Within 120 days after issuance of this directive, ensuring:

Secure Sockets Layer (SSL)v2 and SSLv3 are disabled on mail servers, and
3DES and RC4 ciphers are disabled on mail servers.

Within 15 days of the establishment of centralized National Cybersecurity & Communications Integration Center (NCCIC) reporting location, adding the NCCIC as a recipient of DMARC aggregate reports.
Within one year after issuance of this directive, setting a DMARC policy of “reject” for all second-level domains and mail-sending hosts.

Enhance web security by:

Within 120 days after issuance of this directive, ensuring:

All publicly accessible Federal websites and web services provide service through a secure connection (HTTPS-only, with HSTS),
SSLv2 and SSLv3 are disabled on web servers, and
3DES and RC4 ciphers are disabled on web servers.
Identifying and providing a list to DHS of agency second-level domains that can be HSTS preloaded, for which HTTPS will be enforced for all subdomains.

Upon delivery of its Agency Plan of Action for BOD 18-01 within 30 days of this directive per required action 1, begin implementing that plan.
At 60 calendar days after issuance of this directive, provide a report to DHS on the status of that implementation. Continue to report every 30 calendar days thereafter until implementation of the agency’s BOD 18-01 plan is complete.

Source: https://cyber.dhs.gov/

Email security with Exchange Online:

Uses opportunistic TLS and possible to force TLS
SSLv2 and SSLv3 are disabled
RC4 cipher is disabled
3DES cipher will be disabled in the future

Enterprise / GCC: 3DES cipher to be disabled with mandatory use of TLS 1.2 in Office 365. Please reference Preparing for the mandatory use of TLS 1.2 in Office 365 for details.
Group Policy can disable ciphers on the client side

Configuring DMARC and SPF within Office 365 is simple

Dynamics 365 (all environments and offerings):

SSLv2 and SSLv3 are disabled
RC4 cipher is disabled
3DES will be disabled by the end of January

Resources:

On disabling ciphers via GPO:

This entry does not exist in the registry by default. For information about ciphers that are used by the Schannel SSP, see Supported Cipher Suites and Protocols in the Schannel SSP.

Registry path: HKLM SYSTEMCurrentControlSetControlSecurityProvidersSCHANNEL

To disable a cipher, create an Enabled entry in the appropriate subkey. This entry does not exist in the registry by default. After you have created the entry, change the DWORD value to 0. When you disable any algorithm, you disallow all cipher suites that use that algorithm. To enable the cipher, change the DWORD value to 1.

Source: https://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dn786418(v=ws.11).aspx#BKMK_SchannelTR_Ciphers

Want to stay up to date on technology trends in government, Microsoft 365 for US Government product updates, and the musings of a Microsoft product manager? Follow @brian_levenson on Twitter.

The best version of OneNote on Windows

We’re incredibly lucky to have millions of passionate OneNote users around the globe, and we love learning how we can help you remember, think, and organize better. In spending time with you, we heard a recurring theme: you want a single version of OneNote on Windows that combines all the benefits of the modern Windows 10 app with the depth and breadth of capabilities in the older OneNote 2016. We took that feedback to heart, and over the last few years we’ve been focused on making OneNote for Windows 10 the best version of OneNote on Windows.

Beginning with the launch of Office 2019 later this year, OneNote for Windows 10 will replace OneNote 2016 as the default OneNote experience for both Office 365 and Office 2019. Why OneNote for Windows 10? The app has improved performance and reliability, and it’s powered by a brand new sync engine (which we’re also bringing to web, Mac, iOS, and Android). You don’t need to worry about being on the latest version since it’s always up-to-date via the Microsoft Store, and it lets us deliver updates faster than ever before. In fact, over the last year and a half we’ve added more than 100 of your favorite OneNote 2016 features based on your feedback (thank you!), with more improvements on the way including tags and better integration with Office documents.

We’d love for you to start using OneNote for Windows 10 today, however we know some of you might not be ready yet. Maybe you rely on a feature we don’t yet support on Windows 10 (please let us know using the Feedback Hub), or you don’t want to store your notebooks in the cloud. If so, you’re more than welcome to continue using OneNote 2016.

What’s happening to OneNote 2016?

While we’re no longer adding new features to OneNote 2016, it’ll still be there if you need it. OneNote 2016 is optionally available for anyone with Office 365 or Office 2019, but it will no longer be installed by default. If you currently use OneNote 2016, you won’t notice any changes when you update to Office 2019. We’ll continue to offer support, bug fixes, and security updates for OneNote 2016 for the duration of the Office 2016 support lifecycle, which runs through October 2020 for mainstream support and October 2025 for extended support. For more details, please refer to this FAQ.

A preview of what’s to come

We’ve been listening to your feedback about what you like—and what you don’t—and working hard to address it in the product. Your opinions, feature requests, and, yes, complaints have been critical in helping us shape the current experience. Today, we’d like to walk you through some of the work we’ve done to bring your favorite features from OneNote 2016 to OneNote for Windows 10, highlight some of the capabilities that are only available in the Windows 10 app, and give you a sneak peek at a few of the improvements coming this year.

Your favorite features, improved

OneNote for Windows 10 was designed to feel natural with any input method, from mouse and keyboard to pen and touch, and it contains numerous improvements under the hood for better performance, reliability, and battery life. It also has a number of new features not available in OneNote 2016, including ink effects* and dramatically improved ink-to-text (check it out—it’ll even preserve your ink color, size, and highlights!), Researcher*, a notification center, deep integration with Windows 10, and much more.

Your browser does not support the video tag.

For many of you, shifting our focus to the Windows 10 app won’t come as a surprise. Aside from a handful of targeted improvements, we haven’t added any new features to OneNote 2016 in some time. Instead we’ve been focusing on consistency, ensuring that nearly all your favorite features in OneNote 2016 are also available in OneNote for Windows 10. We’re almost there, and in the coming months we’ll be adding even more top-requested features.

Top-requested features coming soon to OneNote for Windows 10

Here’s what you can expect later this summer:

Insert and search for tags: OneNote 2016’s popular tags feature is coming to OneNote for Windows 10! Soon you’ll be able to insert, create, and search for custom tags, making it easy to mark key information and find it later. Tags you create will now roam with you to across your devices, and OneNote will even show you tags other people have used in a shared notebook so you don’t have to recreate them yourself. The new tags experience was designed based on your feedback, and it will be available later this summer.

View and edit files: See live previews of Office files in OneNote, work together on attached documents, and save space in your notebooks with cloud files. You’ll get all the benefits of saving a file on OneDrive with the context and convenience of an attachment or preview on a OneNote page.

Cloud Files.png

Additional Class Notebook features: The full slate of Class Notebook features available in the add-on for OneNote 2016 will be available in OneNote for Windows 10 this summer. Best of all, you no longer need to install a separate add-in—it’s all built-in!

These are just a few of the improvements coming soon to OneNote for Windows 10. The app is updated every month with new functionality, and we have a lot of cool stuff in the works—including page templates. Stay tuned for more exciting announcements.

An improved sync experience

We’ve been hard at work making sync faster and more reliable on OneNote for Windows 10, as well as on Mac, iOS, Android, and web. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, here’s a look at the new sync engine in action:

Your browser does not support the video tag.

You can try the first set of improvements today by opening a OneDrive notebook in OneNote for Windows 10, Mac, iOS, or Android. These improvements will be rolled out to OneNote Online in the coming months, as well as notebooks on OneDrive for Business and SharePoint.

Improving the user experience

Last year, we unveiled a new look and feel for OneNote on Windows 10, Mac, iOS, Android, and OneNote Online that aligned the disparate designs into a single, unified interface. In addition to bringing consistency to our apps, the new user experience scales much better for large notebooks and significantly improves accessibility for those who rely on assistive technologies. To learn more about the new design, check out our help article.

This is just a quick look at OneNote for Windows 10, but we’re not done yet. We’ll continue listening to your feedback and incorporating it into our future plans, so leave us a comment below or add your feature request using the Feedback Hub. You can also join the Office Insider program for early access to the latest updates. And before we sign off, we want to say a huge thank you for your support. We really hope you love the new OneNote for Windows!

—OneNote Team

*Requires Office 365 subscription

The best version of OneNote on Windows

We’re incredibly lucky to have millions of passionate OneNote users around the globe, and we love learning how we can help you remember, think, and organize better. In spending time with you, we heard a recurring theme: you want a single version of OneNote on Windows that combines all the benefits of the modern Windows 10 app with the depth and breadth of capabilities in the older OneNote 2016. We took that feedback to heart, and over the last few years we’ve been focused on making OneNote for Windows 10 the best version of OneNote on Windows.

Beginning with the launch of Office 2019 later this year, OneNote for Windows 10 will replace OneNote 2016 as the default OneNote experience for both Office 365 and Office 2019. Why OneNote for Windows 10? The app has improved performance and reliability, and it’s powered by a brand new sync engine (which we’re also bringing to web, Mac, iOS, and Android). You don’t need to worry about being on the latest version since it’s always up-to-date via the Microsoft Store, and it lets us deliver updates faster than ever before. In fact, over the last year and a half we’ve added more than 100 of your favorite OneNote 2016 features based on your feedback (thank you!), with more improvements on the way including tags and better integration with Office documents.

We’d love for you to start using OneNote for Windows 10 today, however we know some of you might not be ready yet. Maybe you rely on a feature we don’t yet support on Windows 10 (please let us know using the Feedback Hub), or you don’t want to store your notebooks in the cloud. If so, you’re more than welcome to continue using OneNote 2016.

What’s happening to OneNote 2016?

While we’re no longer adding new features to OneNote 2016, it’ll still be there if you need it. OneNote 2016 is optionally available for anyone with Office 365 or Office 2019, but it will no longer be installed by default. If you currently use OneNote 2016, you won’t notice any changes when you update to Office 2019. We’ll continue to offer support, bug fixes, and security updates for OneNote 2016 for the duration of the Office 2016 support lifecycle, which runs through October 2020 for mainstream support and October 2025 for extended support. For more details, please refer to this FAQ.

A preview of what’s to come

We’ve been listening to your feedback about what you like—and what you don’t—and working hard to address it in the product. Your opinions, feature requests, and, yes, complaints have been critical in helping us shape the current experience. Today, we’d like to walk you through some of the work we’ve done to bring your favorite features from OneNote 2016 to OneNote for Windows 10, highlight some of the capabilities that are only available in the Windows 10 app, and give you a sneak peek at a few of the improvements coming this year.

Your favorite features, improved

OneNote for Windows 10 was designed to feel natural with any input method, from mouse and keyboard to pen and touch, and it contains numerous improvements under the hood for better performance, reliability, and battery life. It also has a number of new features not available in OneNote 2016, including ink effects* and dramatically improved ink-to-text (check it out—it’ll even preserve your ink color, size, and highlights!), Researcher*, a notification center, deep integration with Windows 10, and much more.

Your browser does not support the video tag.

For many of you, shifting our focus to the Windows 10 app won’t come as a surprise. Aside from a handful of targeted improvements, we haven’t added any new features to OneNote 2016 in some time. Instead we’ve been focusing on consistency, ensuring that nearly all your favorite features in OneNote 2016 are also available in OneNote for Windows 10. We’re almost there, and in the coming months we’ll be adding even more top-requested features.

Top-requested features coming soon to OneNote for Windows 10

Here’s what you can expect later this summer:

Insert and search for tags: OneNote 2016’s popular tags feature is coming to OneNote for Windows 10! Soon you’ll be able to insert, create, and search for custom tags, making it easy to mark key information and find it later. Tags you create will now roam with you to across your devices, and OneNote will even show you tags other people have used in a shared notebook so you don’t have to recreate them yourself. The new tags experience was designed based on your feedback, and it will be available later this summer.

View and edit files: See live previews of Office files in OneNote, work together on attached documents, and save space in your notebooks with cloud files. You’ll get all the benefits of saving a file on OneDrive with the context and convenience of an attachment or preview on a OneNote page.

Cloud Files.png

Additional Class Notebook features: The full slate of Class Notebook features available in the add-on for OneNote 2016 will be available in OneNote for Windows 10 this summer. Best of all, you no longer need to install a separate add-in—it’s all built-in!

These are just a few of the improvements coming soon to OneNote for Windows 10. The app is updated every month with new functionality, and we have a lot of cool stuff in the works—including page templates. Stay tuned for more exciting announcements.

An improved sync experience

We’ve been hard at work making sync faster and more reliable on OneNote for Windows 10, as well as on Mac, iOS, Android, and web. Since a picture is worth a thousand words, here’s a look at the new sync engine in action:

Your browser does not support the video tag.

You can try the first set of improvements today by opening a OneDrive notebook in OneNote for Windows 10, Mac, iOS, or Android. These improvements will be rolled out to OneNote Online in the coming months, as well as notebooks on OneDrive for Business and SharePoint.

Improving the user experience

Last year, we unveiled a new look and feel for OneNote on Windows 10, Mac, iOS, Android, and OneNote Online that aligned the disparate designs into a single, unified interface. In addition to bringing consistency to our apps, the new user experience scales much better for large notebooks and significantly improves accessibility for those who rely on assistive technologies. To learn more about the new design, check out our help article.

This is just a quick look at OneNote for Windows 10, but we’re not done yet. We’ll continue listening to your feedback and incorporating it into our future plans, so leave us a comment below or add your feature request using the Feedback Hub. You can also join the Office Insider program for early access to the latest updates. And before we sign off, we want to say a huge thank you for your support. We really hope you love the new OneNote for Windows!

—OneNote Team

*Requires Office 365 subscription

New Apps and Services in Office 365 US Government

Office 365 US Government.png

By meeting compliance requirements of the US and State Governments, Office 365 US Government empowers agencies to realize a modern workplace supported by devices and services. Increased collaboration breaks down siloes within and across agencies, and secure mobility allows civil servants to remain productive in the field and away from desks. Cost savings and data center footprint reduction can be re-invested into digitizing citizen services.

Microsoft delivers Office 365 secure productivity and communication services like email, document creation apps and storage, intranet sites, and instant messaging/telephony to the US Government from three environments designed to meet the unique data handling regulations for controlled unclassified information. Architected according to NIST controls, FedRAMP requirements, and the DISA Security Requirements Guidelines, these environments store content in the continental United States, are operated by US citizens, and are authorized to hold Federal, criminal justice, Federal tax, and covered defense information.

We want to answer a few questions about the Office 365 US Government environments and offerings: What services and applications are included, why is the roadmap different from Enterprise offerings, and what services will be released in the future and when?

To answer this question in a meaningful way, we must explain the compliance commitments, audit process, and accreditation requirements. But if you want to skip ahead, the roadmap for Office 365 Government Community Cloud (GCC), Government Community Cloud (GCC) High, and DoD can be found at the end of this post.

The Office 365 GCC environment is designed for Federal, State, and Local government and has been available for about five years. With millions of monthly active users, agencies across the country are benefitting from cloud productivity and security services that meet their compliance requirements.

The Office 365 GCC High environment is designed for Federal agencies, defense industry, aerospace industry, and other organizations holding Controlled Unclassified Information. Introduced more recently, the GCC High offerings are ideal for national security organizations and companies with International Traffic in Arms Regulations (ITAR) data or Defense Federal Acquisition Regulations Supplement (DFARS) requirements.

The Office 365 DoD environment is designed for the US Department of Defense exclusively.

Office 365 US Gov Environments.png Office 365 US Government environments and associated compliance commitments

Every service introduced into the US Government offerings has undergone a third party review to ensure that we meet our compliance commitments to you. We complete audits regularly to make new capabilities available as frequently as possible. Release cycles differ from Enterprise offerings for new services, but once available, the service will align with the commercial user experience.

The October audit is complete, and Microsoft has received the 3PAO report, so we can confirm what will be released in the coming weeks. We will be sharing an updated roadmap at the Microsoft Government Tech Summit taking place in Washington DC on March 5-6, so stay tuned and don’t hesitate to register to attend! Information will be published online also.

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Brian Levenson is the product manager for Microsoft 365 for US Government. Follow him on Twitter (@brian_levenson) and LinkedIn (Brian Levenson) for the latest in government technology and Microsoft 365 news.

New Apps and Services in Office 365 US Government

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