Microsoft has announced a bunch of new feature that are coming to its OneDrive cloud storage service and will be available for both business and consumer users. The changes are organized into four groups: More connected, More flexible, More control, and More personal.
What is OneDrive
OneDrive is the online document storage solution created by Microsoft which comes bundled as a free service with Windows 10. It can be used to store your documents and other data online in the cloud. It also offers synchronization of stored data across all your devices.
OneDrive is bundled with Windows since Windows 8. It is the all-in-one solution built by Microsoft to provide the user the ability to have the same files on every PC he signs in with using his Microsoft Account. Previously known as SkyDrive, the service got rebranded some time ago.
It also offers synchronization of stored data across all your devices. "Files on-demand" is a feature of OneDrive which can display placeholder versions of online files in your local OneDrive directory even if they were not synchronized and downloaded. The synchronization feature in OneDrive relies on Microsoft Account. To use OneDrive, you have to create one first. Besides OneDrive, Microsoft Account can be used to log in to Windows 10, Office 365 and most online Microsoft services.
For the files you store in the OneDrive folder, you can use the file history feature.
What's new in today's update for OneDrive
More connected
- Microsoft has added the ability to share files and manage file access for Teams.
- Synced metadata support - in the next few weeks Microsoft is rolling out an update to the OneDrive sync app supporting read and write sync for shared libraries that contain required metadata. This will enable business users to edit content in their synced libraries while working from their desktops.
- Move and keep sharing - Later this summer, business users will be able to move a file on OneDrive and to preserve its sharing options. This means all business users who had original access to a file will be re-added to it if that file changes shared library locations. Those users will now receive a new link maintaining the same permissions they had before and receive a notification about the move.
More flexible
- The maximum file size is being increased from 15GB to 100GB, making it easier to big files, e.g. ISOs or media files. Previously released differential sync will save your time on updating big files.
- You will be able to turn off comment notifications for individual files to see less notifications from OneDrive.
- Business users will be able to share file URLs from the address bar. These URLs will respect all sharing policies.
More control
Sync admin reports is a new feature that allows monitoring OneDrive's health. It allows checking sync app versions, sync status, and top sync errors on individual devices.
Admins will soon be able to implement automatic expiration of external access, multi-factor authentication policies, like prompting one-time passcodes (OTP), as well as extending continuous access evaluations to OneDrive and SharePoint.
More personal
- Family and group sharing is a new consumer feature, available on OneDrive for the web, lets you predefine a group of people from your personal life and then easily share files, photos, videos, and albums with that group. All members of the group need a Microsoft account, and each will need to accept your invitation to the group to access it.
- Dark Mode for the web - Microsoft is adding Dark Mode to OneDrive for the web across commercial and personal accounts.
Microsoft is now rolling out most of these features, with a few exceptions that are coming later this year.
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