Key Takeaways
- Copilot is expanding in various Microsoft 365 apps, offering users more control and enhanced productivity features.
- With new capabilities like on-canvas menu in Word and a new first-run experience in Whiteboard, Copilot aims to make your workflow seamless.
- Look out for upcoming advancements like referencing PDF and Excel files in Copilot for Microsoft 365, but remember release dates may shift.
Copilot is growing in popularity and so is Microsoft’s attempt to add the chatbot pretty much everywhere, including replacing the swipe gesture on Windows 11 tablets. Last week, Microsoft highlighted a plethora of Copilot features for various Microsoft 365 apps on its roadmap site, making a clear statement that the company is quite serious about making Copilot a helpful productivity tool.
In this week’s roadmap weekly update, we explore how upcoming Copilot capabilities in several Microsoft 365 apps can help boost your productivity. Additionally, we cover other useful features that aren’t AI-powered.
4 Copilot for Microsoft 365: Users get more control over how it generates summaries, referencing PDF and Excel file types, and more
Source: Microsoft
Copilot will generate summaries of user-selected text in documents
Copilot is undergoing massive changes across platforms to help users save time and be more productive. In Microsoft 365, Copilot will soon allow users to request a summary of a portion of the document instead of providing them with the summary of the full document in Copilot chat (Feature ID: 380826).
Limiting summary requests to user-selected text can come in handy in various scenarios, ranging from students reading a long research paper to a software developer reading technical documentation. In each case, the most relevant part of the document can be summarized to find the key points using Copilot. This is coming next month.
Draft with Copilot feature in Word can create new documents, as well as help you improve the existing documents you’re currently working on — but only if you have a Copilot for the Microsoft 365 license or Copilot Pro license. If that’s you, get ready for additional features in Copilot for Word this month.
Microsoft is working on an on-canvas Copilot menu for Word. The Copilot menu will appear on the screen when you select a piece of text, list, or table, providing you with additional suggestions to enhance that portion of the text (Feature ID: 373720). Although Microsoft hasn’t mentioned what suggestions will be given, it can mean several things — from offering you different tones to giving you insights on the topic. Microsoft is planning to introduce it this month.
Copilot first-run experience on Whiteboard
Copilot in Whiteboard can improve your workflow in several ways by helping you create and collaborate on different projects and ideas. If you’re new to Whiteboard, it can be a little cumbersome to figure out what Copilot can do to improve how you create. Microsoft will get past this issue with a new first-run experience, providing new users with guidance on key AI functionality so users can take full advantage of it (Feature ID: 392455).
Reference PDF and Excel files
Whatever document you’re currently working on, to make it more comprehensive and data-driven, you need to include various data and charts to support your point. If you have those data and charts in PDF or Excel files, you’ll soon be able to incorporate them into your documents while generating content using Copilot for Microsoft 365 (Feature ID: 373735). General availability is next month.
Related
How to use Microsoft Copilot
Microsoft Copilot is quite similar to ChatGPT, but it has a few key differences. Here’s how to use it!
3 Microsoft Teams: Slash commands in compose box, apps in group chats with external users, and more
Slash commands in Teams compose box
You can use slash commands in Microsoft Teams desktop apps to perform various tasks more quickly. For example, you can simply type “https://www.xda-developers.com/” followed by “app” to search for an app. You can also do the same to change your status. This is currently available in the Teams Command box. But by the end of this month, you’ll also be able to select a command from the Teams compose box (Feature ID: 120469).
For the full list of supported commands, open Teams and press Alt+K on Windows or Option key+K on Mac.
Apps support in Teams group chats with external users
Microsoft Teams allows users to add apps to a chat or channel tab with just a few clicks. Of course, you’ll need to have the required permission to be able to add or remove apps from chats. All of this will be available in the Teams group with external participants from next month (Feature ID: 391640). Based on the description given by Microsoft, Apps support in Teams group chat will establish a robust platform for collaboration between team members and different clients.
Recommended channels
When onboarded as a team member, users may become confused about which channels are the most relevant to them. One way to get around this is to browse all channels and attempt to understand what each is for. But from next month, team owners will be able to recommend the most relevant channels to team members for a smooth onboarding process (Feature ID: 381734). This way, users will know instantly where to look for a specific piece of information.
2 Microsoft Outlook: Prepare for meetings with Copilot
Copilot in the new Outlook for Microsoft will show a “Prepare” button in the inbox, and you’ll be able to use it to get a summary of key information attached to the meeting invitation (Feature ID: 374723). This way, you’ll come fully prepared for a meeting. Microsoft has plans to bring the option to the new Outlook for Windows and Outlook for the web this July.
1 Forms: Pre-filled link in Microsoft Forms
Microsoft Forms is a service that doesn’t get new features as regularly as Teams or Outlook. But this month, the company is bringing something many users on the Microsoft Community Hub have been requesting for a very long time. Microsoft is finally adding the ability to send respondents forms with pre-filled information in some fields (Feature ID: 391671). For example, if a company is sending out a feedback form to employees, information such as names and job titles can already be filled in, which then saves respondents time.
Take the release timelines with a small grain of salt
Everything that Microsoft added to its roadmap last week is expected to be available to users in the next few months. But release timelines mentioned on the Microsoft 365 Roadmap page are subject to change, so don’t be surprised if you don’t see any of the above-mentioned features arriving in the month they were originally promised.