Thanks to the Office 365 for IT Pros Subscribers

In a time when some question the value of books, we deeply appreciate the support of the folks who subscribe to the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook. AI tools like ChatGPT and Copilot can find and synthesize information scoured from across the internet to respond to questions, but so far generative AI cannot provide the context or insight that understanding technology often needs.

An ecosystem like Microsoft 365 can become terribly complicated through different combinations of products, licenses, and configurations. Throw in hybrid organizations and there’s enough to melt an administrator’s mind. We don’t pretend that we have more answers than AI can generate; we do say that our answers are based on hard-won experience and a ton of research into why Microsoft 365 works the way that it does. In other words, we ask “why” when AI just accepts what something is.

Heading for a July 1 Release

It’s just seven days to go before we release Office 365 for IT Pros (2026 edition), including Automating Microsoft 365 with PowerShell (2^nd edition). The writing team is still heads-down to make sure that the content is compelling, informative, and up to date, and that any of the issues raised by technical editor Vasil Michev are addressed.

We’ve received some questions about how we will release the 2026 edition. Thankfully, people want to know when they can subscribe to the new edition. With that in mind, here’s our plan.

The Release Plan

The first task is to complete all the updates to the chapters, resolve any open issues, chase down the last-minute glitches, and have a coffee. We can then proceed to do the following:

• Generate the PDF and EPUB files for the two books, check that everything is OK, and if all checks out, upload the new files to Gumroad.com. We then switch the shortcut URL for the current version from the 2025 edition to the 2026 edition.
• The 2025 edition files will remain online to allow subscribers to that edition to download the final updates. We made some small tweaks to the Office 365 for IT Pros (2025 edition) files since releasing update #120 on June 1. The current update number for the 2025 edition is 120.4, dated 21 June 2025. We will start the 2026 edition at update 121.0.
• We will send an offer to current subscribers to allow them to extend their subscription to cover the 2026 edition and receive monthly updates for the next year. To reward the folks who renew subscriptions immediately a new edition is available, the price to extend a subscription in July 2025 is $18.95. After August 1, 2025, the price to extend a subscription increases to $24.95.
• Anyone who bought a full-price ($49.95) copy of the 2025 edition in June 2025 will receive a full discount code to extend their subscription for the 2026 edition.
• The update offer and codes are distributed via email to the addresses registered when people subscribed to the 2025 edition. If an email address is incorrect, you won’t receive anything from us. In this case, send email to contact@office365itpros.com to tell us what’s going on. If we can find you on our subscriber list, we’ll respond with the code.
• Some tenants consider email from Gumroad.com as spam. Our email isn’t and we have experimented with sending email using the Exchange HVE and Azure ECS solutions during the last year. HVE is now out of the picture because Microsoft has decided that it will only handle internal email, but anyway, mass mailings about new versions are always sent from Gumroad.
• New subscriptions for the 2026 edition cost $59.95. This is our first price increase since 2015. According to Copilot, the price should be $67.73, but accepting an AI recommendation without question is never a good idea. We believe that the increase is more than justified by the massive amount of information contained in the two books, which can be reasoned over by a Copilot agent if you want.
• The Automating Microsoft 365 with PowerShell eBook is bundled with Office 365 for IT Pros and doesn’t have to be bought separately. People who subscribed to the first edition of the PowerShell book can download the second edition free of charge. It’s our way of saying thanks to those who bought the first edition while we built out the content.
• For those who like paper books, a version of Automating Microsoft 365 with PowerShell is available in paperback from Amazon.com. This is the same text as the electronic version, except that hyperlinks are converted to footnotes. The paperback also has an index because it’s harder to search through paper. Regretfully, we haven’t found a way to update a paperback remotely, so buying a paper copy of the PowerShell book is like buying any other paperback.
• Anyone who received a free copy of the 2025 edition from us or another source (companies commonly buy multiple copies to give to customers) can use the code to extend their subscription for $18.95. Alternatively, ask the source for the free copy – maybe they have free copies of the 2026 edition to distribute.

2026 or Twelfth?

Some ask us why we name the book after the year ahead. We do so because we match Microsoft’s fiscal year. Their FY26 begins on July 1, 2025. We could call this release Office 365 for IT Pros (12^th edition). Maybe that would be clearer, but the date does help in terms of telling people how recent the content is.

Enjoy the 2026 edition!

Update #80 for World’s Best eBook Covering Office 365 and the Microsoft 365 Ecosystem

Drafting the announcement of yet another monthly update for the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook and making the text interesting and different is a real challenge. After 80 monthly updates, seven of which are for the 2022 edition, you could say that we know how to process monthly updates. And we do. Every month. Each month throws up its own set of challenges, from authors being late submitting their chapter changes, to Word having a meltdown, or the OneDrive sync client becoming mildly confused. We suffer from the same minor crises that other Microsoft 365 users endure as we grapple with the cloud. But we persist and get the update done, which (boringly enough) has just happened (again).

The February 2022 update for Office 365 for IT Pros (2022 edition) is now available for subscribers of the EPUB/PDF version to download from their Gumroad.com account or by using the download link in the receipt received by email after subscribing. Amazon Kindle subscribers can ask Amazon to release the update to your account. See our FAQ for more details about downloading monthly updates.

About the Change Log

Changes made in the February 2022 update for Office 365 for IT Pros are described in the change log. We don’t note every edit, addition, or deletion across the 24 chapters, so the change log is more like a set of highlights rather than a comprehensive page-by-page notation of changes. For instance, we don’t usually note the fact when we remove text that we consider outdated, which happens all the time because of the way change occurs across Microsoft 365. We also don’t note tweaks made to text to improve its readability or to emphasize an important point, perhaps because someone has pointed out that we should (we love getting feedback from readers).

Although we do try to note the most important updates, life is too short for generating a tremendously detailed change log for a 650,000-word book, and we also doubt if people would read a very detailed change log. Suffice to say that more happens in a monthly update than meets the eye or gets written down.

Please Download and Use the Update

Which is one reason why we’d like subscribers to download and use the most recent text. You’ve paid us to deliver the most comprehensive and up-to-date material we can produce, so you deserve to take advantage of that content. Every month, we receive questions from Office 365 for IT Pros readers who cite information from an outdated version. Just like the Exchange development group have little sympathy for people who don’t install recent cumulative updates for on-premises Exchange servers, we don’t like getting questions already answered in available updates. In fact, it’s a little depressing, so please download and use the February 2022 update. We’d appreciate it if you do.

The Tide of Change Within the Microsoft 365 Ecosystem Keeps Advancing

Happy New Year!

Despite the traditional slowing of Microsoft 365 development activity during the holiday period, the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook team found many places to update the book and are happy to announce that the January 2022 update is now available. The change log contains details of chapter-by-chapter changes.

Subscribers to the 2022 edition can download the updated PDF and EPUB files from their Gumroad.com account or by using the download link in the receipt they received on purchase. See our FAQ for further information about downloading updates. We also updated the book on Amazon, but readers of that version must contact Amazon support to obtain access to the new file.

Seventy-Nine Updates

This is the 79^th monthly update for the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook, spread across multiple editions since the original release in May 2015. We update the book text to keep it current and accurate to match what tenants experience inside Microsoft 365. Remember that the text reflects a tenant configured in targeted release mode and we do cover some preview features. However, everything you read should be available to a tenant with the appropriate licenses (a complex subject in its own right!).

As we keep on saying, although maintaining a monthly update cycle is tough going sometimes, it’s the only way to keep on top of what happens across the spectrum of the Office 365 apps and the surrounding Microsoft 365 ecosystem. Being always up to date is our unique selling point.

Please download and update the new files at your convenience and have a wonderful 2022.

All the Latest News in the World’s Only Constantly Updated Book About Office 365

The Office 365 for IT Pros eBook team is delighted to announce the availability of the October 2021 update. Subscribers for the EPUB/PDF version can download the updated files from Gumroad.com. We have updated the Kindle file on Amazon, but if you bought the book there, you’ll have to ask Amazon support to make the file available. See our FAQ for more details about how to access updates.

September Changes

Demonstrating once again that Microsoft 365 changes constantly, September was a busy time for Office 365 for IT Pros. Apart from doing a ton of work to review and check text to improve flow and remove obsolete material in several chapters, we dealt with a steady flow of changes announced by Microsoft. Some of the changes were big and required a substantial alteration in a chapter. Many others were at the detail level and required changes to only a few words or sentences. Tracking down where to apply and update and what to say in an update often takes as long for a small change as it does for a big one, especially in a book covering so many workloads.

Taking Exchange Online as an example, we learned that Microsoft plans to block basic authentication for a range of email connectivity protocols from October 1, 2022 (SMTP AUTH is an exception), and that Microsoft will impose a new 1.5 TB limit on auto-expanding archive mailboxes on November 1, 2021. Throw in the retirement notice for the old Exchange admin center and a hotly-disputed report by a security researcher into a purported problem with Autodiscover, and there was plenty to think about.

Teams is in a state of perpetual evolution, or so it seems. A new Whiteboard app is available for Teams (along with Android and browser clients). Teams desktop clients running in preview mode now sport a P beside the user photo. You can now send quoted replies in Teams chat (but not channel messages). Customization for together mode background scenes is generally available. Fixing a real annoyance, Teams now updates the underlying folder in SharePoint when a channel is renamed. We also investigated the artifacts gathered for Teams webinars (like attendee lists) and documented how Teams makes these objects available for eDiscovery. Another search capability now available is looking for spoken words in Teams meetings. This isn’t yet available for eDiscovery, but you can look for words with SharePoint search now.

Change Log

A complete change log covering all chapters in Office 365 for IT Pros is available online.

Thanks to our subscribers for their ongoing support for the Office 365 for IT Pros project. We couldn’t continue to track and document changes across all apps without this support.

Please download the new files at your earliest convenience. We wouldn’t like you to manage tenants based on obsolete information! We updated the companion book in September, and those updated files are also available for downloading.

Microsoft Reports Over 300 Teams Changes in the Last Year

During his remarks to analysts following Microsoft’s FY21 Q3 results, CEO Satya Nadella observed that Teams had added “over 300 features over the past year.” Although you can’t help but be impressed at the volume of new features created, tested, and deployed by Teams engineering, the sheer number of updates threatens to overwhelm Office 365 tenants at times. Every time you turn around, Teams has changed.

The problem is compounded by the volume of changes flowing for Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, OneDrive for Business, Planner, Yammer, Microsoft 365 Groups, Forms, Whiteboard, Azure AD, and anything else which might contribute to Microsoft’s cloud ecosystem. Collectively, a tenant might face dealing with over five hundred updates annually.

Both Small and Large Changes

It’s not as if the changes are small updates either. Some, like the introduction of Viva Topics, represent important new functionality. Others, like the transition of video storage from Stream to OneDrive for Business, affect the way people work, while it’s hard to put a value on other changes like the increase in Planner labels from six to 25.

It’s certain that change with the Microsoft 365 ecosystem will continue. When we started on the road to build the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook in 2014, we could already see that the cloud versions of Microsoft server applications developed faster than their cloud counterparts. Change became faster when Microsoft cut the ties between the on-premises and cloud code bases for Exchange and SharePoint in 2016 or thereabouts and began to develop cloud-only apps like Teams and Planner. We can confidently predict that what tenants see today won’t be the same that they will see in a year’s time. Or even in six months.

May Update for Office 365 for IT Pros

The degree of ongoing change within the ecosystem is why we update the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook every month. We believe that we are the only team covering Office 365 using a monthly republishing cycle for our eBook. Now spanning over 1,300 pages, Office 365 for IT Pros is packed full of practical and most importantly, up-to-date knowledge and guidance about Office 365, Exchange Online, SharePoint Online, OneDrive for Business, Teams, Planner, Azure AD, PowerShell, the Microsoft Graph, and many other topics.

We have just released the May 2021 update for Office 365 for IT Pros (2021 edition). Subscribers to our EPUB/PDF version can download the refreshed files from Gumroad using their account or the link in the receipt emailed to the address provided at the time of purchase. We have not updated the companion volume for May. Buyers of the Amazon Kindle version must ask Amazon support to make the new file available. See our FAQ for more information about how to download updates.

The May 2021 update contains changes to 20 of the 24 content chapters. Details of the change are available in the change log.

The writing team is moving forward with plans for the 2022 edition. We believe that we will release this edition on July 1, 2021. Before then, we will deliver the last (June) update for the 2021 edition early next month.

Happy reading!

September 2020 was an odd month. The Microsoft Ignite 2020 virtual conference happened over 48 hours to give us plenty to think about as we plan future monthly updates for the Office 365 for IT Pros eBook. We even managed to cover some of the new features which are available now in the October update. But what was strange was the amount of change which Microsoft introduced into Office 365 before Ignite. They certainly didn’t keep things wrapped up until the conference started and many updates appeared over the month. So much so that the result is updates for 21 of the 24 content chapters in the book. You can find full details of the chapter updates in our change log.

More Changes Coming

We expect the pace of change to pick up over the next several months as Microsoft release features announced at Ignite as previews or into general availability. This will add to other changes in the work that get posted as Office 365 notifications in the Message Center in the Microsoft 365 admin center.

Many of the changes announced in Office 365 notifications are tweaks to the UI of an application. We don’t tend to cover changes like that in the book unless they affect the way an application works or is managed. Office365itpros.com exists to document changes that we think are interesting at a level of detail that we can’t afford in the book unless the page count was to expand well past its current 1,200-odd limit.

Updates Available for Download

Subscribers can now download the October update through Gumroad.com (for EPUB/PDF subscribers) or Amazon (for Kindle). Our FAQ has lots of useful information about how to access updated files. Please download and use the updated files. We put a lot of effort into the monthly updates and it’s nice to know that the work is used.

We did not update the companion volume for October 2020.

Fifteen of Twenty-Four Chapters Updated in May

The Office 365 for IT Pros writing team is proud to announce that the fourteenth update for the 2019 edition is now available to subscribers. The updated files are dated May 15, 2019 (see the inside front cover for version data). The companion volume has not been updated.

What’s in Update #14

Update #14 includes changes to 15 of the 24 chapters. Included in the changes are a the V1.0 of the PowerShell module for Teams (14), the GA of the unified labeling client for Azure Information Protection (24), multiple small but important changes in Teams (13), new properties for Get-MailboxStatistics (6), updated SLA and financial results for Office 365 (2 and 1), and the Files Restore feature for SharePoint Online (8). Apart from these specific changes, the update includes many other small changes (including the update of Azure Active Directory to support 256-character passwords) from our work to track developments in and around Office 365 or to incorporate new elements of best practice. The number of changes, some large, some small, underlines once again that ePublishing is the only practical way to cope with technical information about Office 365. How many other technical (or otherwise) covering Office 365 have offered their readers 14 updates?

The full set of changes is described in our change log. In addition to updated text about new features and information, we have completed periodic technical reviews of several chapters. The web never remains static, so hunting down and fixing hyperlinks is a never-ending task.

We have asked Amazon to send notifications to purchasers of the Kindle version that updates are available. Our FAQ has for more information about how to download updates.

Getting Updates

Subscribers to the PDF/EPUB version should log into their Gumroad library  to download the updated files. The updated files are completely new books with the new content integrated into existing text. You don’t have to cut and paste change information into an existing book. If you can’t remember details about your Gumroad account, find the original receipt from when you bought the book and use the View product link found there.

Next Steps – On to the 2020 Edition

All good things come to an end. After 14 updates, the 2019 edition of Office 365 for IT Pros is now in its final phase and the writing team has moved to the work necessary to prepare the 2020 edition, which we expect to publish in July 2019. We will continue to monitor the content of the 2019 edition and might issue a further update if we need to fix any problems found in its content.

When the 2020 edition is available, we will offer current subscribers a large discount to renew their subscription for a further year. This offer can only apply to the EPUB/PDF version as we have no control over the terms and conditions for Amazon Kindle sales and cannot offer discounts on that platform.

We thank our subscribers and sponsors for their continued support. Without it, we could not dedicate the required time to working on content and making sure that Office 365 for IT Pros is as up to date as possible.

Office 365 for IT Pros (2019 Edition) Update 13

The Office 365 for IT Pros writing team is proud to announce that the thirteenth update for the 2019 edition is now available to subscribers. The updated files are dated April 15, 2019 (see the inside front cover for version data). The companion volume has not been updated.

What’s in Update 13

Update #13 includes changes to 14 of the 24 chapters (plus an update for the sponsor chapter), so it’s a reasonably big release. Included in the changes are new data loss prevention policies for Teams (22), integrating Microsoft Search for Bing into Office 365 (9), the General Availability of Live Events (16), and hard deletes for compliance searches. Apart from these specific changes, the update includes many other small changes from our work to track developments inside Office 365 (like environments for Flow) or incorporate new elements of best practice. The number of changes, some large, some small, underlines once again that ePublishing is the only practical way to cope with technical information about Office 365. How many other technical (or otherwise) covering Office 365 have offered their readers 13 updates?

The full set of changes is described in our change log. In addition to updated text about new features and information, we have completed periodic technical reviews of several chapters. The web never remains static, so hunting down and fixing hyperlinks is a never-ending task.

How to Get the Updated Files for Office 365 for IT Pros

Subscribers to the PDF/EPUB version should log into their Gumroad library to download the updated files. The updated files are completely new books with the new content integrated into existing text. You don’t have to cut and paste change information into an existing book. If you can’t remember details about your Gumroad account, find the original receipt from when you bought the book and use the View product link in it.

We have asked Amazon to send notifications to purchasers of the Kindle version that updates are available. See our FAQ for more information about how to download updates.

On to May

The Office 365 for IT Pros team would love to hear from you. We welcome tips about new features, ideas for what you’d like to see covered in the book, and information about any issues you find. Please use the contact form on this site to connect. And now we start working on the May 2019 updates. Nothing about Office 365 ever stays static for long.

Do We Pay Attention to Reader Ratings?

The Office 365 for IT Pros writing team is a pretty pragmatic bunch, and we don’t spend a heap of time checking if the book receives reviews and ratings. Life’s too short and we have other stuff to do, like checking what’s happening inside the sometimes crazy world of Office 365. All of which explains why we totally failed to notice that the book had accumulated a nice number of five-star ratings on Gumroad. com (where we sell the EPUB/PDF version). In fact, we never knew that Gumroad allowed readers to rate books (Gumroad posted a Twitter update on January 31 to say that ratings was the largest feature they had shipped in a while).

We have a page to record comments we’ve received and do see comments posted on our Facebook page when we post messages there, but checking Amazon for reviews and ratings is not a daily priority, especially has the 2019 edition has received just one rating on Amazon.com and another on Amazon.co.uk. This amuses us because the last edition (2018) received 29 reviews! Clearly we’re not doing something right.

Comments

What we do value enormously are comments from readers that help us find problems or identify topics we need to cover. Broken hyperlinks are the bane of our lives, so it’s great (in an odd way) to hear from someone when they find a bad link. Everyone has an idea about what should be in the book and we like hearing about this too, even if we don’t always agree to include extra content (the book’s pretty big already).

If you have a comment, please use the contact form on this site to tell us. Or if you’re more comfortable with Facebook, post the comment there. Either way, we’ll respond. It is really helpful when you tell us the chapter, heading, or page number where the problem exists and what update you’ve found it in. Remember that we update the book monthly, so a problem in the March 2019 update might not exist in the April 2019 update. That’s one good reason to always download updated files after we release them.

This project has only succeeded (so far) thanks to the support we’ve received from the Office 365 community. Keep on sending those comments to us.

Office 365 for IT Pros Update #11

The Office 365 for IT Pros writing team is proud to announce that the eleventh update for the only book that continually evolves to track developments in Microsoft’s cloud office system is now available to subscribers. The updated files are dated February 18, 2019 (see the inside front cover for version data).

This update spans 16 of the 24 chapters, so it’s a reasonably big release. The number of changes, some large, some small, underlines that ePublishing is the only practical way to cope with technical information about Office 365.

The full set of changes is described in our change log. In addition to updated text about new features and information, we have completed reviews of several chapters and fixed small but irritating problems like outdated hyperlinks. The web never remains static, so hunting down and fixing hyperlinks is a never-ending tasks

How Subscribers Get Updated Files

Subscribers to the PDF/EPUB version should log into their Gumroad library to download the updated files. The updated files are complete new books with the new content integrated into existing text. You don’t have to cut and paste change information into an existing book.

We will prompt Amazon to send notifications to purchasers of the Kindle version that updates are available. See our FAQ for more information about how to download updates.

The Office 365 for IT Pros team would love to hear from you. We welcome tips about new features, ideas for what what you’d like to see covered in the book, and information about any issues you find. Please use the content form on this site to connect. And now we start working on the March 2019 updates. Nothing ever stays static for long.