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Microsoft has announced the public preview of Windows Server 2025, including a host of new features and enhancements to optimize server performance and security. The major highlights of this release include Active Directory updates, hotpatching capabilities to minimize downtime, and GPU partitioning for Hyper-V. Hotpatching Microsoft has introduced Arc-enabled hotpatching support in Windows Server 2025….

In this episode of First Ring Daily, Brad Sams and Paul Thurrott discuss the impact of a possible Apple/OpenAI partnership on Microsoft, which invested billions of dollars into the ChatGPT maker and obtained an exclusive license on GPT-4 and all other OpenAI models. Apple starting to use OpenAI technology on its products could also have big implications for Azure, which is now OpenAI’s main cloud provider.

Microsoft is adding a highly anticipated “Notify when available” feature to the new Teams desktop app, enhancing real-time communication among colleagues. This update intends to streamline connectivity by notifying users when team members become available. The “Notify when available” feature in Microsoft Teams helps users stay informed about their colleagues’ availability. This feature is handy…

Microsoft has announced a new converged platform to enhance risk management within enterprise environments. This new platform aims to streamline risk discovery and remediation, offering administrators insights and control over identities and permissions. This new converged platform will be built on Microsoft’s existing Entra ID products, including Privileged Identity Management (PAM), Permissions Management (CIEM), ID…

Microsoft is backtracking on its plans to retire Teams Live Events in September 2024. Last year, the company warned commercial customers that this feature would be deprecated by September 30, but those plans unexpectedly changed this week. Microsoft Teams introduced the town hall experience in Fall 2023. It allows organizations to host different types of…

In this guide, Bharat Bhushan shows you how to diagnose and resolve an Exchange dirty shutdown error and help you to bring the Exchange database back to a clean shutdown state. Thanks to Stellar Info for sponsoring this post. The Exchange Server logs serve as the backbone of data integrity and disaster recovery in Exchange…

Microsoft has recently announced a new Windows Autopilot device preparation experience for commercial customers. Built on a re-engineered architecture, this new solution delivers enhanced scalability, accelerated deployments, and support for cloud-based instances such as Windows 365 and Azure Virtual Desktops. What is Windows Autopilot? Microsoft first launched Windows Autopilot back in June 2017. It’s a…

Microsoft is set to enhance its Intune solution with a suite of new capabilities designed to optimize both administrative and user experiences across various platforms. Key features include the next-generation Windows Autopilot experience, advanced management tools for shared devices, improved security baselines, and streamlined device enrollment processes. Windows Autopilot device preparation Microsoft has launched the…

In this episode of First Ring Daily, Brad Sams and Paul Thurrott discussed the most interesting announcements from Microsoft this week as the company’s annual Build developer conference was coming to a close.

Last year, Microsoft unveiled its plans to end support for VBScript, a scripting language that has been a staple for Windows administrators for nearly three decades. The company announced yesterday that the deprecation process for this legacy tool will begin in the second half of 2024. Microsoft introduced VBScript (Visual Basic Script) back in 1996….

SharePoint Embedded, the new Microsoft Graph API-powered service that launched in public preview in November 2023 is now generally available. The company has also announced the public preview of SharePoint Embedded custom copilot experiences. SharePoint Embedded is a new API-based version of SharePoint that allows developers and ISVs to integrate advanced Microsoft 365 capabilities into…

Microsoft detailed today several new features coming to Microsoft Teams and Loop to help users collaborate more effectively with colleagues. The company is adding support for custom emojis and reactions in public preview to Microsoft Teams chats next month. Custom emojis and reactions In Microsoft Teams, custom emoji support is one of the top-requested features…