Recent Discussions
Microsoft Cans Power BI App for Reporting Microsoft 365 Usage
Microsoft has announced that the Microsoft 365 Usage Analytics Power BI app will retire on August 1, 2026. The alternative is the usage reports in the Microsoft 365 admin center or to develop a custom Power BI dashboard based on data imported through the Graph usage reports API. The decision isn’t surprising, but I’m sure that some will mourn the passing of Microsoft’s first tool to report usage information. https://office365itpros.com/2026/05/29/microsoft-365-usage-analytics/
Names in Excel Name Manager
I have a spreadsheet ( I will call it spreadsheet "A") driven by macros that creates a new worksheet each month. I am developing a second spreadsheet I will call it spreadsheet "B") that links to it for a monthly summary. I have given all the cells names that are to be linked. The issue I am dealing with is when a new monthly tab is created on "A", I want the links from "B" to be updated to the new month. The approach I am taking is to delete all of the names in "A" and recreate them for the new month. (The reason I want to delete the older names is because over time, the Names list would grow into a very large list of obsolete names). The problem I am encountering is that when a name is deleted, a dialog box appears that the user has to acknowledge that, Yes, I want to delete this name. I want to make this process transparent to the user. So, my question is: Can I delete a name without generating this dialog box?
BYROW/BYCOL/MAP Variants for Nested Arrays + BENCHMARK
Hey everyone! I made some simple BYROW, BYCOL, and MAP variants that can return nested arrays, and I also made a BENCHMARK function for performance testing. Here's some code for testing: BYROW⊟ = LAMBDA(array, function, [orient], LET( me, LAMBDA(me, seg, LET( n, ROWS(seg), IF( n = 1, function(seg), IF( orient, HSTACK( me(me, TAKE(seg, INT(n / 2))), me(me, DROP(seg, INT(n / 2))) ), VSTACK( me(me, TAKE(seg, INT(n / 2))), me(me, DROP(seg, INT(n / 2))) ) ) ) ) ), IFNA(me(me, array), "") ) ); I didn’t put a huge amount of effort into polishing this but In my tests on my device, these performed a lot better than using REDUCE + VSTACK for the same kind of thing, so maybe it’ll be useful to someone. Really curious to see how people use it, and if something looks like it should be optimized or changed, say so. I'll update them regularly, fix bugs whenever I can. You can find the rest of them on my Gist pages: https://gist.github.com/Medohh2120/f565516bc636700adf5ba27fd8f0d19e, https://gist.github.com/Medohh2120/d9d04f56d93694aed9d0c49d516f0fbf.
Migration from Hosted Exchange (Hybrid) to M365 Classic Outlook Client Problems and Solutions
Hello Everyone, I'm a tech who started on a 8088 processor in the 80's. Not mentioning the Vic20 and C64 since that hardly seem relevant! I'm posting here to hopefully help the next person with the issues I've had over the last few weeks. My client had to port his email from a provider with an on-perm Exchange server in a Hybrid setup with M365 to his own M365 environment. I expected this was to be about 3 hours of work for me - setup M365 environment, plan the cut-over window, update the Outlook clients on each PC. It ended up being roughly 20 hours of my time and at least 10 hours of dedicated time for my client. For those wanting to jump directly to what mostly fixed it use this link, it should get you past the dreaded "an encrypted connection to your mail server is not available" when trying to add the mail account into a clean profile. Use https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/classic-outlook-troubleshooters-086e3d66-5404-4034-9cc5-545909dcc166 and pick "Classic Outlook Profile Setup Troubleshooter" Most hits are going to tell you its an autodiscovery issue, but if you're reading this I'm going to assume you've already confirmed that. Our issue was some ghost configuration, only on the PCs previously setup for mail on the old server. A new PC could add the same account without issue. Some of the research suggested this would not happen if the proper Microsoft migration process is followed to move the account - but in our case the previous provider was unable to perform the migration. I'll skip over the research we tried along the way, such as New Outlook Profiles, Registry entry changes, MS Personal users with the same email as MS Business Users, Autodiscover problems (including concerns that the base website for the client was offering invalid data), and so on. After each hit where we applied a fix we again had to try adding the mail to the profile, and each time we sat watching the little circle for up to 5 minutes only to get the same error. Now, once we found the link above - which did not come up in most searches - things got better, but not 100%. We added the profile ok but then Outlook gave a permission error while starting. To fix that, the user signed in must have administrative access and you use File Explorer to navigate to the folder identified in the error. In our case it was in folders kept under \Windows\System32\. When prompted that we need to grant permanent access we said yes. In our case this is where Outlook was storing the ost files. That worked for most of the clients, but we had one additional issue where the error was pointing to a folder that didn't exist. Just creating the folder was not enough, the final fix was to hold CTRL-SHIFT down while opening Outlook to start in administrative mode to allow it to create the ost file in the newly created folder. Finally 3 weeks after our cut over window, while the client had to use OWA, we were able to get outlook running. This was critical for my client because they did not have access to the mail history since the migration didn't happen - they had to open a copy of their PST in Outlook and use mail in OWA and constantly bounce back and forth. I hope this helps someone avoid the pain we went though!Microsoft Rolls Out the New Calendar Sharing Model
An automatic upgrade is currently ongoing to move Outlook calendar sharing from the old MAPI-based model to a new REST-based model. The new model has been available to Outlook classic clients on an optional basis and is now becoming the default. The REST model is simpler and exploits the Exchange Online service instead of depending on client transactions. It’s also part of the transition to the new Outlook. https://office365itpros.com/2026/05/28/calendar-sharing-outlook/
Microsoft Authenticator führt Wiederherstellung nicht aus
Ich möchte die App auf meinem neuen Handy weiter nutzen und habe dafür auf dem alten Gerät eine Sicherung erstellt. Wenn ich nun die App auf dem neuen Handy einrichten möchte, bekomme ich eine Fehlermeldung, daß es angeblich keine Sicherung gibt. Ich benötige die App dringend für die MFA. Kann jemand helfen?Sending a Welcome Message to New Employees Part 2
Recently, I wrote about how to use PowerShell to send a welcome email to new employees together with attached ICS files for corporate events. Although new employees can add the ICS files to their calendars (so the solution works), simply inviting employees to attend those events by updating the participant list with PowerShell is an easier and better approach. This article explains how to find calendar events, update participant lists, and update events with the Microsoft Graph PowerShell SDK. https://office365itpros.com/2026/05/27/new-employee-email2/
Combinar correspondencia ahora que han desaparecido los DDE con resultados con solo dos decimales
Buenos días: antes combinaba correspondencia de un word con un excell, para hacer mis facturas mensuales con DDE, pero ahora esa opción ha desaparecido y cuando combino me salen muchísimos decimales. He aplicado el formato directamente en Word modificando el campo de fusión con un cambio de formato numérico (por ejemplo, \# "#,##0.00" para forzar dos decimales), pero sigue sin hacérmelo... alguna idea para poder fijar solamente dos decimales en el excell para que los resultados de la combinación en word den solo 2 decimales?UltraTax CS Cloud Hosting for Secure and Flexible Tax Operations
Accounting firms are increasingly adopting UltraTax CS Cloud Hosting to improve operational flexibility, simplify collaboration, and securely manage tax preparation workflows. As remote work continues to grow across the accounting industry, cloud-hosted tax environments provide firms with reliable access to applications and client data from virtually any location. One major benefit of UltraTax CS Cloud Hosting is enhanced accessibility. Tax professionals can securely log in to their accounting environment using laptops, tablets, or desktop systems without being restricted to a physical office. This flexibility allows accounting teams to continue working efficiently during busy tax seasons while supporting hybrid and remote work models. Another advantage of hosted UltraTax CS cloud solutions is improved data protection. Cloud environments typically include encrypted access, automated backups, multi-factor authentication, and disaster recovery systems to help protect confidential financial records and client information. Centralized hosting also minimizes the risk of data loss caused by local hardware failures or unexpected disruptions. Performance and collaboration also improve in cloud-hosted tax environments. Multiple users can work on tax files simultaneously, share information securely, and maintain better workflow coordination across departments or office locations. Centralized management additionally reduces the burden of maintaining local servers and handling frequent software updates. Scalability is another important factor for growing accounting firms. Businesses can easily expand storage capacity, add users, and support larger workloads without making major infrastructure investments. Apps4Rent offers reliable hosting solutions designed to support secure tax-preparation environments, remote access, and efficient accounting operations for firms using UltraTax CS. Overall, UltraTax CS hosting services help accounting firms improve productivity, strengthen data security, simplify collaboration, and support more efficient tax preparation operations in modern digital work environments.
Allow Canvas Studio Public Embeds in Microsoft Sway
Sway is a hidden gem inside of Microsoft 365. I just discovered it, and it's an amazing tool to turn old PowerPoints or even lecture notes into dynamic lessons for students! One limitation I'm running into is the embed whitelist. While I know this app likely has low priority, is there any chance there is a way to request a specific site be added to the embed whitelist? My biggest priority would be Instructure's Canvas Studio. Microsoft's new LTI 1.3 integration with Canvas has some rough edges, but it's an amazing start! Thing is, I don't want to share a wall of text lecture notes from Microsoft Word through OneDrive. I like the dynamic and more visually oriented style of Sway. The Problem: Currently, when trying to embed instructional videos from Canvas Studio into a Sway presentation, the platform blocks the embed code. This forces educators to either upload duplicate files to a different hosted service (like YouTube or Vimeo) or break the seamless student experience by using text hyperlinks. And the problem with YouTube is that many of our local community partners at K-12 schools have YouTube blocked on the Chromebooks early college students use. Proposed Solution: White-list Canvas Studio public embed domains so that users can seamlessly paste iframe code from Canvas Studio directly into Sway Embed Cards. This will create a smoother workflow for the thousands of schools utilizing both Microsoft 365 and Canvas LMS. And while you're in there adding Canvas, You might consider expanding that whitelist further. Scribe tutorials would be great, or similar services. TikTok might be controversial, but that would be good. Students don't click links; they'll click play on embedded content. Expand the whitelist, please!
Pasting formatted tables from Excel into other software - issues
I am copying and pasting a large table, with lots of cells merged into, headers for combined rows and colums, with lots of coloured and formatted cells. When it is pasted into Word or Excel, the first 20-30 rows are OK, but then after a while, mid-row, the colour formatting (but not the cell text contents) becomes displaced a two cells to the right. The colouring then corrects itself further down the table, but then drifts in and out of alignment. I think it may be an issue with the merged cells, particularly in the case where if they weren't merged then the content of the cell is wider than the cell, so requires wrapping - but this does not appear to be consistently the issue. I have tried unmerging everything and allowing columns to autofit to full width, but that does not resolve... it had been fine until around March 2026 - was there an update around then? Any suggestions welcome.Reporting Usage Patterns for Room Mailboxes
A recent post on the EHLO blog discusses how to find whether room mailboxes are active. I've been down this path before and created a PowerShell script to analyze the usage of room mailboxes. In this article, I explain some of the finer points about the topic, including whether to use Exchange Online PowerShell or the Graph Places API to find room mailboxes, the permissions required to retrieve event data from the room mailboxes, and what has to be done to run the check on an ongoing basis. https://office365itpros.com/2026/05/26/room-mailboxes-usage/How to Send a Welcome Message to New Employees with Attachments for Calendar Events
ICS files are a useful method to send information about calendar events between different IT systems. This article discusses using PowerShell to create ICS files for Teams Online meetings as part of a project to send welcome messages to new employees that contain information about upcoming corporate events that the new people might like to attend. Suffice to say that formatting the ICS files to Outlook’s satisfaction takes some effort. https://office365itpros.com/2026/05/25/online-meeting-ics-files/Microsoft 365 PC: The Modern Windows Experience for Work and Business
In today’s workplace, a computer is no longer just a machine used to write documents or browse the internet. Modern businesses need devices that are secure, connected to the cloud, easy to manage remotely, and powerful enough to support hybrid work. That is where the concept of a “Microsoft 365 PC” comes in. https://dellenny.com/microsoft-365-pc-the-modern-windows-experience-for-work-and-business/Automate Copilot in Excel
Hi, Is it possible to automate opening Copilot in Excel and send a prompt using VBA? Currently, Copilot in excel seems to work only through the UI, where we have to manually click the Copilot button in the ribbon section and paste the prompt. I want to automate this process so that, with a single click, Excel opens Copilot and enters the prompt automatically. If this is not possible, are there any alternative approaches to achieve similar automation?Switching Data Loss Prevention Client-Side Checks for OWA
Purview Data Loss Prevention (DLP) rule checks can happen client-side and server-side. This change updates the Exchange Online organization configuration to instruct OWA to stop using Exchange Online to detect potential DLP rule violations before users send email. Instead, OWA will use the workload-neutral Data Classification Services (DCS). Using a workload-neutral service comes with some consequences in terms of OWA being unable to evaluate Exchange-specific predicates. https://office365itpros.com/2026/05/22/data-loss-prevention-dcs/Use a SharePoint List to Store Weekly Open Tasks Statistics
Creating a PowerShell script to send details of open tasks to users for follow up is a good thing. Storing open task statistics in a list for analysis of open task burndown over time is even better. This article describes how to update the script that sends email about open tasks to add the code necessary to use a list in a SharePoint Online site to store details about open tasks. https://office365itpros.com/2026/05/21/open-task-statistics-planner/Microsoft 365 Apps SHOULD NOT overwrite Office 2019/2021 one-time retail installs
I want to raise a serious concern about Microsoft 365 Apps being imposed over existing Office 2019/2021 installations that were activated with legitimate one-time installation retail keys. In our case, these are not Microsoft 365 subscriptions and they are not licenses we can simply deactivate and reactivate freely. They are one-time installation retail keys. Once the product has been installed and activated, removing Office and reinstalling it later can make the original key unusable or trigger “already used” activation problems. That is precisely why the current behavior is so damaging. We have PCs with legitimate Office 2019/2021 installations. These machines did not request a migration to Microsoft 365 Apps. However, after internet connection, Office update activity, or Microsoft account interaction, Office appears to silently update, convert, or replace the existing retail installation with the Microsoft 365 Apps version. This is not a minor inconvenience. It creates a serious licensing and operational problem: -A valid one-time Office 2019/2021 installation is replaced by Microsoft 365 Apps without clear, explicit consent. -The original retail installation is no longer cleanly usable. -Fixing the issue requires uninstalling Office, removing Click-to-Run/licensing/account leftovers, and reinstalling the previous Office 2019/2021 version. -But because these keys are one-time installation keys, that reinstall process can render the original key unusable or create activation failures. -In practice, a forced Microsoft 365 conversion can destroy the value of a legitimate one-time Office license. From a user’s perspective, this looks less like a normal software update and more like an exploitative commercial strategy: using Microsoft’s control over Office updates, account sign-ins, Click-to-Run, and activation systems to push already-paid retail users toward Microsoft 365 subscriptions. Even if Microsoft does not intend that result, the practical effect is that users who already paid for Office 2019/2021 can lose practical access to their licensed product and are then nudged toward paying again through a subscription. This should not happen. A perpetual or one-time installation Office license and Microsoft 365 Apps are different products with different licensing models. Microsoft should not silently replace or convert one into the other because a Microsoft 365 account exists on the PC, because the user signs into Office, because OneDrive is present, or because Office updates are enabled. At minimum, Microsoft should provide: -A clear opt-in confirmation before replacing, converting, upgrading, or rebranding Office 2019/2021 retail installations as Microsoft 365 Apps. -A supported way to block Microsoft 365 Apps from taking over one-time installation Office versions. -A clean removal tool that fully removes Microsoft 365 Apps, Click-to-Run leftovers, licensing remnants, and account-based activation conflicts. -A reliable way to restore the original Office 2019/2021 retail installation without invalidating or losing the original one-time key. -Clear separation between Windows account sign-in, OneDrive sign-in, Microsoft 365 entitlement, and local Office retail activation. Users who purchased legitimate one-time installation Office licenses should not be forced into Microsoft 365 Apps by unclear update behavior. If Microsoft wants users to move to Microsoft 365, that should be a deliberate, informed choice — not a silent process that leaves the user cleaning up the installation and losing access to a paid retail license. I am not asking how to install Microsoft 365. I am asking Microsoft to stop Microsoft 365 Apps from taking over valid one-time Office 2019/2021 installations without explicit consent.Forcing Gridlines to print through shaded cell formatting
I know how to force gridlines to print but if any cells are formatted with a fill shading in them, the gridlines will not print through them. Is there a way to print gridlines in formatted cells which are filled? No gridlines will print through the shaded cells.Error del complemento. No pudimos conectarnos con el servidor de catalogo "{0}" para este documento
Estoy usando Word Online (Office 365) y al abrir complementos como Mendeley Cite aparece el error: “Error del complemento. No pudimos conectarnos con el servidor de catálogo {0} para este documento.” En general, este error aparece en todos los complementos existentes, como si en mi cuenta los mismos no estuvieran habilitados. Ya probé: Cambiar de navegador (Edge, Firefox, Google). Limpiar datos de navegación. Reiniciar sesión y el computador. Permitir cookies y permitir permisos de los navegadores Hasta ahora no hay forma de que los complementos funcionen en Word Online. ¿Alguien sabe cómo resolverlo? El flujo concreto es: Entro a un documento en word online -> oprimo el botón de complementos -> se abre la lista de complementos -> elijo cualquier complemento y me aparece el error del titulo de esta discusión. Hace una semana si me funcionó en edge, ahora no hay formas.
Recent Blogs
- Earlier this month, we announced Microsoft 365 Copilot federated connectors were coming to Copilot in Excel. Built on the emerging industry standard Model Context Protocol (MCP), federated connectors...May 28, 2026
- Update health in cloud update is now generally available, with clearer insights into update issues.May 27, 2026
