Now available: Faster, simpler sign-in experiences for Azure AD-connected apps

[Alex Simons (AZURE)]

First published on CloudBlogs on Jan, 23 2018
Howdy folks, Today, I’m happy to announce that we’ve made it faster and easier for your users to sign into all their Azure AD-connected applications. The My Apps portal is a convenient one-stop place for users to discover and launch their Azure AD-connected applications. Now your users can access their applications through an even simpler experience, by simply clicking on an icon in their browser bar.

Signing into apps from the app sign-in pages

Users can now sign into password-based single sign-on applications by navigating directly to the sign-in page for the application. To enable this, just install the latest version of the My Apps browser extension for your favorite platform: Edge , Chrome , Firefox . Users who are already using an older version of the extension will receive the update automatically. The next time a user visits the sign-in page for the app, they'll see an experience like this one: Users get a sign-in experience for password-based single-sign on applications that’s much like the experience they get for federated single-sign on applications.

Launching apps from the browser extension

We've also streamlined the experience for signing into an app so your users don’t have to remember the sign-in URL or navigate to a portal. Now they can click on a button we've added to the browser bar, select an app, and be signed into the app without navigating to the My Apps page. When they click this button, they’ll also see shortcuts to recently used apps. See how this all works together in this quick video: [video width="1920" height="1200" mp4="https://cloudblogs.microsoft.com/uploads/prod/2018/01/My-Apps-Extension-Video.mp4"][/video] These new features are a direct response to your feedback. For Kodak Alaris, one of our private preview customers, this extension makes a lot of sense for their users, leading them towards greater adoption of apps, and increased satisfaction and productivity:

“I’ve always been pushing that the best place for the waffle (app launcher) was as part of the browser.” -Dan Hurst, Chief Technology Officer, Kodak Alaris

Using My Apps on the Intune Managed Browser

We’ve also substantially improved the mobile experience to sign into Azure AD-connected applications. In partnership with Intune, we’ve enabled the My Apps functionality directly from within the Intune Managed Browser. The Intune Managed Browser application lets IT administrators protect company information through Intune App Protection policies that might include controlling the use of cut, copy, and paste; preventing screen captures; and ensuring that links to content users select open only in other managed apps. This experience is available for all Azure AD users with no need for Intune MDM enrollment. Now, when a user launches the Intune Managed Browser they see the My Apps page as their homepage and have richer browser functionality, like customizable bookmarks, multi-tab viewing, and application proxy remote access features . Users can download the Intune Managed Browser for Android and iOS and start using the My Apps with it. These awesome sign-in experiences are all available for you to use today. We’re confident these new features will complement your users’ My Apps experience. For more details, see our access panel documentation . As always, we love hearing your feedback! Feel free to leave a note below our reach out to us on the Azure AD feedback forum . Best regards, Alex Simons (Twitter: @Alex_A_Simons ) Director of Program Management Microsoft Identity Division