SaaS Updates Summary: June 20–24

It was an eventful week in the SaaS world. Google released several updates: new simplified settings for 2-step verification; a new version of Google Apps Directory Sync (GADS); a centralizated location in the Admin console called Insights for mobile device management insights; and the ability to create or delete Google+ profiles for multiple employees at once in the Admin console.

Microsoft announced new updates to Office 365 Education, including the availability of Microsoft Forms. It also released its new SharePoint mobile app for iOS, as well as new connectivity features for Excel.

A new update from Slack lets you chat with bots using buttons, and Dropbox introduced new productivity tools. Evernote connected its business card scanning features to Salesforce, and it also introduced a passcode lock feature for all customers. Salesforce introduced its new Event Monitoring Wave App and App Cloud Mobile. HipChat announced a faster and more secure HipChat Server 2.0.

Google Apps Directory Sync (v4.3.0): Sync Additional LDAP Attributes into Custom User Fields – A new version (v4.3.0) of Google Apps Directory Sync (GADS) is now available for download. With this latest update, Google Apps admins can now use GADS to sync additional LDAP attributes into Custom User Fields for use with SAML SSO, or for simply building out richer Google Apps profiles for their users.

Create or Delete Google+ Profiles for Multiple Employees at Once – In the Admin console, you can create Google+ profiles for employees in your domain—either one by one or across an entire organizational unit (OU). Until now, however, if you needed to create profiles for multiple individuals or only a portion of an OU, that process was tedious and lengthy. And if you needed to delete profiles, no tool existed. To save you valuable time and to give you greater control over your employees’ information, Google is launching the ability to create and delete Google+ profiles for several employees at once.

Microsoft Forms—A New Formative Assessment and Survey Tool in Office 365 Education – The Office 365 Team is pleased to announce the availability of Microsoft Forms for their Office 365 Education customers. Forms is the result of direct feedback from educators that they want to have a quizzing function with Office 365 Education.

Educators, Increase Collaboration and Professional Development with New Office 365 Education Updates – As part of Microsoft’s Education announcement in April, the Office 365 Team announced new experiences and updates to Office 365 Education coming this summer that will make it easier for teachers to manage their classroom and collaborate with peers, and for them or their IT administrators to set it all up. As part of this announcement, they mentioned there’d be even more updates coming this summer! They’re thrilled to share these with you today—all are teacher inspired and student focused.

New Settings for 2-Step Verification – Google knows that security is one of your top concerns as a Google Apps admin and that many of you require your employees to turn on 2-Step Verification (2SV) to keep their accounts safe. There are multiple ways your end users can approve sign-in requests via 2SV—by tapping a Security Key, by entering a verification code sent to their phone or, starting today, by approving a prompt like the one below that will pop up on their phone.

Your Intranet in Your Pocket—the SharePoint Mobile App for iOS is Now Available – Last month, the SharePoint Team unveiled a new vision for the future of SharePoint, and they’re pleased to release the new SharePoint mobile app for iOS. Install it now and take your intranet with you—your intranet in your pocket.

June 2016 Updates for Get & Transform in Excel 2016 and the Power Query Add-in – Today, the Excel Team is pleased to announce four new data transformation and connectivity features that have been requested by many customers.

Never Leave Slack with Message Button Bots for Using Kayak, Trello, and More – Now you can approve expenses, assign deadlines, check flights, and interact with other enterprise tools from inside Slack with its new Message Buttons. Slack is vying to become your always-open portal to work with the biggest update to its API since its December launch. 

Introducing Salesforce App Cloud Mobile: Everything You Need to Build, Run, and Manage Your Mobile Apps – The Salesforce team is excited to introduce Salesforce App Cloud Mobile. It brings together the platform services that their community of Salesforce Trailblazers love—the no-code rapid app development capabilities of Lightning; the powerful clicks and code development services of Force and Heroku; the ability to bring the best of Salesforce, like Wave Analytics and Lightning Snap-ins, into any mobile app—with new mobile back-end services for security, data integration and scalability that accelerate the development of any kind of business app.

Turn Your Business Card Collection into Salesforce Connections – Evernote launched Evernote for Salesforce in 2013 to make it easy for salespeople to manage client relations and follow-up opportunities. Today, they’re connecting Evernote’s business card scanning features to Salesforce. This is their most-requested feature from sales teams using Evernote Business, and an example of how a small but truly useful innovation can have a big impact on daily work.

Mobile Device Management Insights Now in One Place – In May, Google launched Mobile Audit, which audits activities on iOS and Android devices managed by Google Mobile Management, and which allows Apps admins to view reports on these activities and to receive alerts when certain activities take place. Today, the team is introducing Insights, a centralized location where admins can perform each of those actions. Located in the Device Management area of the Admin console, it features three sections: Mobile Reports, Mobile Audit, and Mobile Alerts.

DocuSign for Outlook 2016: Find Us in the Ribbon! – With this newest release, you can now access the DocuSign for Outlook add-in directly from the ribbon – allowing you to request signatures or sign and return critical documents in seconds.

Make Work Simple with New Dropbox Productivity Tools –  Dropbox is introducing new productivity tools to simplify, unify, and secure your work.

Keep Your Notes Private with Passcode Lock, Now Available for All Customers – Your private notes should stay private, even when you take them out into the world. By popular request, Evernote is making this previously paid-only feature available for everyone. Starting now, you can enable a 4-digit passcode lock on your mobile Evernote, even if you’re using the free version.

Make Better Use of Your Data with the Event Monitoring Wave App – Salesforce is introducing the new Event Monitoring Wave App. This app gives customers built-in visualization with 15 customizable dashboards to quickly analyze, drill down into, and act on detailed Salesforce usage information.

Introducing HipChat Server 2.0: Faster, More Secure & More Reliable – HipChat is excited to announce the official arrival of HipChat Server 2.0! They worked out some kinks in the 2.0 beta and this new release ships with some key upgrades in security, controls, and flexibility.