Four Microsoft 365 Copilot Features That Will Make Your Workflow Easier

on
Microsoft has announced four Copilot updates, some already live or in preview, others rolling out soon, that are designed to simplify tasks, improve control, and boost productivity. These enhancements include smarter content referencing, flexible reasoning modes, customizable response scoping, and integrated meeting scheduling. Timelines may change, so keep an eye on official updates.  Copilot Chat Enhancements: Reference Files and Emails Easily Copilot Chat for users with a Microsoft 365 Copilot license is being enhanced by introducing quick access to emails directly in prompts. By typing “/” in the prompt box, users can search and reference relevant content without manual uploads, improving prompt quality and Copilot responses. Suggested prompts beneath the input box will also include relevant files or emails for faster starts. This capability will surely reduce friction and ensure responses are grounded in the right context (Also now known as ContextIQ). This update is associate...

More additions to the Backup-SfB script

on
The Backup-SfB script was just released, and keen eyes might have noticed the version 4.00 has been updated to 4.00 C by the time of the release.
I had several beta testers run the 4.00 release, and most of them ran it without too many comments. But I received two important requests:

  1. Please try to minimize error output from the script
  2. I don't know how to capture certain devices.
So here are the three minor, yet important changes to the script

Backup Common Area and Analog Devices
This request was simple enough: Neither the user nor the db backups hold any information on Common area phones or Analog devices. That's why the "backup-basics" function now will run get-cscommonarephone and get-csanalogphones and pipe it to a couple of csv files in the bakcup directory. 
From these files, it should be easy enough to import the information required back into SfB upon restore through a script.

CS Announcements
Although this information is present in the CMS configuration, I was asked if not this could be added as a standalone extra in the same way as the polices and voice settings are.
As it only took two lines of code, I decided it was a good idea to do so.
Included in the bakup are now two new files. A list of unassigned number ranges, and a list of cs announcements (The voice prompts should already be a part of the file backup)

Error handling
Error handling isn't my strongest powershell skill. After all, I'm only a UC techie trying to learn this stuff. But I have been requested on several occasions to quiet down the blood red text in the output of the script. In order to do so, I have now set the default error and warning handling to -silentlycontinue, unless you use the -DebugSQL switch.

I have tried to capture any missing backup files we would expect, so please read the transcript for errors. And then run the script again, with the -debugsql switch to capture the real error.