U-M Google Updates

Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides offline mode

6/14/2019

Note: The Google Docs Offline extension is required. You will be prompted to install it when enabling offline mode if it is missing.

It’s now possible to create, edit, and comment on Docs, Sheets, and Slides files when your device is offline or has a slow internet connection. Any changes made while offline will sync in Drive once connected again. You can also preview which files are available offline with a new offline preview mode.

Enable offline access in Drive settings:

  • In Google Drive, select Settings from the Settings (gear icon) drop-down list. In the general section, select Sync Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Drawings files to this computer.
  • Once offline access is enabled, a checkmark icon will appear next to Settings and Support (question mark). Click this icon to find the offline preview toggle. 

Make files available offline:

  • Google Drive automatically makes a certain number of files available offline based on how recently you accessed them. 
  • While connected, mark a file available offline:
    • In offline preview mode.
    • In Drive, right-click on any file and toggle Available offline.

This feature has begun to roll out in U-M Google and will gradually become fully visible. 
 

New G Suite Learning Center

6/7/2019

Google has completely redesigned its G Suite Learning Center to include more customer-friendly features, including 300+ how-to’s and guides.

Some of these new features include:

Note: The new G Suite Learning Center can now be found at support.google.com/a/users, but you can still use the old web address (gsuite.google.com/learning-center).

 

Interested in our latest updates about Google G Suite at U-M? Check out the Google Service Updates page.

 

Office files are now easier to edit in Google Drive!

6/6/2019

Google has recently added the ability to edit, comment, and collaborate on Microsoft Office files using Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides. This feature brings the real-time collaboration tools of G Suite to Office files and eliminates the need to convert file types.

To access this feature:

  • In Google Drive, double-click your Office file. This will open a preview of the file.
  • At the top, select Open with. In the dropdown, select the file type you are trying to open (i.e., Google Docs, Sheets, or Slides). From here, you can edit, share, view version history, collaborate in real-time with others, and more.

All changes you make will be saved to the original Office file.

GIF of the new Google Microsoft Office editing

The following Office file types are supported:

  • Word files: .doc, .docx, .dot
  • Excel files: .xls, .xlsx, .xlsm, .xlt​
  • Powerpoint files: .ppt, .pptx, .pps, .pot

Note: If you edit Word, Excel, or PowerPoint documents older than Office 2007, files will be saved to a newer format when editing using this feature.

According to Google, full rollout began on May 30th and is expected to take up to 3 days for feature visibility.

Interested in our latest updates about Google G Suite at U-M? Check out the Google Service Updates page.

U-M Google May Monthly Summary

6/4/2019

The monthly U-M Google Summaries inform campus of Google releases for Core Apps. We communicate important information on Core Apps throughout the month. Core and Non-Core Apps are listed on the G Suite website.

New Updates:

Last year, Google launched the Activity dashboard to help users see who’s viewing a particular document and viewer trends. These updates add more content to the dashboard, making it a centralized hub where owners and editors can see how other collaborators are engaging with their content.

These features include:

  • Sharing history

Sharing history provides you with a brief summary of how your file is being shared with others across the University of Michigan and elsewhere. You can now easily find who shared access with who and what level of editing access they’ve been granted.

Google activity dashboard screencap - sharing history

  • Comment trend

Comment trend will help you to visualize the conversations in a file. It will show the number of comments, suggestions, and replies created per day. Additionally, a graph will display the number of new comment threads, replies, and unresolved comments over the lifetime of the file.

Google activity dashboard screencap - comment trend

Google has made it easier for Google Sites editors to share a selection of images in new Sites by creating an image carousel.

To insert an image carousel to your Site:

  • In the right sidebar, click Insert > Image carousel
  • Select images to upload or select from already uploaded images.
    • Drag images to reorder as desired.
    • Hover over the image to delete or add alt text.
  • To set carousel settings, click the gear icon to the top right and select from the following:
    • Auto start: images in the carousel will automatically cycle.
    • Show dots: displays progress indicators for the carousel.

gif of new Google Sites image carousel

Google has made it easier to create and edit events on your Android device.

You’ll see several changes when creating/editing a meeting on Android such as:

  • Maintain visual access to calendar grid: You can now collapse or expand the creation/edit view, so you can go back and forth between this screen and the Calendar. This allows you to interact directly with the Calendar by tapping on the desired time slot, drag & dropping vertically to another time in the same day, or horizontally to another day.
  • See guest availability without leaving the create/edit view: You can now see the availability of guests directly in the Calendar, as their calendars will load as you add them to the event. Google Calendar may also suggest a title for the meeting. After adding guests, organizers can see schedules of their guests by selecting View Schedules or by dragging down the Creation View.

gif of new meeting creation flow for Google Calendar on Android

Google’s Calendar and Keep apps will now support Dark mode on Android. (This feature does not apply to the iOS apps at this time).

Dark mode is a popular feature that creates a better viewing experience in low-light conditions by reducing brightness.

To enable this feature:

  • In Calendar
    • Enable Dark mode by going to Settings > General > Theme.
  • In Keep
    • Dark mode by going to Settings > Enable Dark Mode.

screenshot of new android dark mode for google calendar  screencap of new Google Keep dark mode on Android

Previously Communicated:

 

Note: Keep in mind that even when Non-Core Apps are found in a Core App (like Add-ons in Gmail and Google Drive), they are not covered by the G Suite for Education agreement.

Interested in our latest updates about Google G Suite at U-M? Check out the Google Service Updates page.

Three new features in Google Sheets!

5/23/2019

Google has announced they are releasing three new features in Google Sheets to help you format and work with your data easier.

These features include:

Remove duplicates

You can now use this tool to easily remove duplicate values from your sheet, instead of manually finding and removing them.

To remove duplicates from a range of data:

  • Select a range of data in your spreadsheet
  • From the toolbar, select Data > Remove duplicates. In the dialogue box, you’ll see your selected range of data.
  • Select Remove duplicates. You’ll see an additional dialogue box that details how many duplicates were removed from your dataset.

gif depicting new Google sheets feature to remove duplicates from a spreadsheet
 

Trim whitespace

Occasionally when you add data to a spreadsheet, it may not be in the format you want. Now, you can easily keep your spreadsheet standardized by using the trim whitespace feature to remove any leading, trailing, or excessive whitespace from a cell or array of data.

To trim whitespace:

  • Select a cell or range of data that contains whitespace on your spreadsheet
  • From the toolbar, select Data > Trim whitespace​
  • You’ll then see a dialogue box that details how many cells had whitespace that was removed.

gif of new google sheets feature to trim whitespace from the spreadsheet cells
 

Compatible spreadsheet shortcuts

You can now use popular keyboard shortcuts you may know from other spreadsheet applications in Google Sheets.

To enable compatible keyboard shortcuts:

  • Users can access keyboard shortcuts by going to Help > Keyboard shortcuts.
  • From here, you can see a list of keyboard shortcuts and their corresponding functions.
Note: Compatible shortcuts will be denoted with an information icon.
  • At the bottom of the webpage, you can enable compatible spreadsheet shortcuts.
  • You can click View compatible shortcuts at the bottom right of the webpage to see a complete list of all newly available shortcuts.

new google sheets feature to add additional keyboard shortcuts

 

According to Google, these features will start to roll out on May 22 and may take up to 3 days to reach all users.