Google Workspace Updates: Contacts

Review and approve your Contacts delegates by November 13, 2023

Thursday, October 5, 2023

What’s changing In May 2023, we announced several changes for Contacts delegates, specifically that they will be able to update labels and manage “Other” contacts. We’d like to share an updated timeline for this change and provide additional clarity around what’s required of users.

As part of this change, you must review and approve your existing delegates by November 13, 2023 or they will lose their delegate status.
Admins can use the Admin SDK API to delegate access on behalf of their users. Note that using this method takes care of re-approving delegators on behalf of the delegator.

Between now and November 13, 2023, you’ll be prompted in Contacts to review your existing delegates.

Who’s impacted

Admins and end users

Why it matters

For many of our customers, administrative support for managing inboxes is business critical — this includes making sure that contacts are properly sorted and labeled. Since updating labels and managing “Other” contacts are new functions for delegates, it’s important that you review existing delegates to ensure that access to these features is appropriate.

Additional details

Does this change impact Gmail delegation?

No — while similar functionality is available in Gmail, there are no changes or impact for Gmail delegates. This change is specific to Contacts and contacts delegates only.

Getting started

Admins: Use our Developer Documentation to learn more about using the Admin SDK API to delegate access or visit the Help Center to learn more about delegating a user's contacts.

End users:

Delegators:

You’ll see a prompt in Contacts to review those who currently have Contacts delegation for your contacts.
Beginning November 13, 2023, those with assigned and approved delegation will be able to update labels and manage Other contacts on your behalf. If you do not submit your approval, delegates will lose their access.

Delegates: Visit the Help Center to learn more about updating labels and managing Other contacts for delegators.

Rollout pace

You must review and approve delegates by November 13, 2023

Availability

This update impacts all Google Workspace customers

Resources

Google Workspace Updates Weekly Recap - September 15, 2023

Friday, September 15, 2023

4 New updates Unless otherwise indicated, the features below are available to all Google Workspace customers, and are fully launched or in the process of rolling out. Rollouts should take no more than 15 business days to complete if launching to both Rapid and Scheduled Release at the same time. If not, each stage of rollout should take no more than 15 business days to complete.

Insert links in the Google Sheets app on iOS devices

We’re adding the ability to insert a hyperlink into a cell in the Google Sheets iOS app by selecting a cell > clicking “+” in the top left corner > Insert > Link. If a cell contains a link, you’ll see options to edit or remove the link. | Available to all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts. | Visit the Help Center to learn more about working with links & bookmarks.

Insert links in the Google Sheets app on iOS devices

Enhanced spam protection through automatic labeling of suspected spam messages in Google Voice

If you're using Google Voice, you're familiar with our suspected spam caller warnings. We're extending this feature to SMS messages on Android and iOS devices. You'll see these labels within the message, and you can either:

Confirm a suspected spam message, which causes future messages from that number to go directly into the spam folder.
Mark a labeled message as not spam, after which the suspected spam label is never displayed for that number again.

Available to Voice Starter, Standard, and Premier customers, as well as users with personal accounts in the US. | Rolling out now to Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains at an extended pace (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility).

Enhanced spam protection through automatic labeling of suspected spam messages in Google Voice

Birthday decorations for people cards

In Google Contacts and across various Google Workspace products, you’ll begin to notice birthday decorations when hovering over another user’s people card. This small change can have a big impact on building deeper connections with your colleagues and stakeholders. Birthday decorations will be displayed on your birthday if you’ve added your birthday to your Google Account profile and you’ve set the information to be visible to others. | Available now for all Google Workspace customers and users with personal Google Accounts. | Visit the Help Center to learn more about your Google Account profile and what information others can see.

Add an organizational unit as an attribute in your external directory

When using Directory Sync, you can now place users from the Azure Active Directory or Active Directory to a specific organizational unit on the Google Workspace side. To do so, you’ll need to add an organizational unit as an attribute in your external directory. This makes it easier to sync users who will be mapped to different organizational units on the Google Workspace side. | Directory Sync is available as an open beta to all Google Workspace customers. | Visit the Help Center to learn more about setting up users to sync based on an organizational unit attribute.

Previous announcements

The announcements below were published on the Workspace Updates blog earlier this week. Please refer to the original blog posts for complete details.

Dual Display on Poly Studio X Series Makes Video Meetings More Productive

We are excited to announce dual display support for Google Meet on the Poly Studio X Series to help make video meetings more productive. With dual displays, you can see more meeting participants, presentations, and documents at once, which can help you stay focused and engaged in meetings. | Available to Google Workspace customers with Poly Studio X50, X52, and X70 devices only. | Learn more about Dual Display on Poly Studio X Series.

Completed rollouts

The features below completed their rollouts to Rapid Release domains, Scheduled Release domains, or both. Please refer to the original blog posts for additional details.

Rapid Release Domains:

Scheduled Release Domains:

A new look for Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides apps on Android devices

Rapid and Scheduled Release Domains:

For a recap of announcements in the past six months, check out What’s new in Google Workspace (recent releases).

Google Workspace Updates Weekly Recap - July 21, 2023

Friday, July 21, 2023

2 New updates Unless otherwise indicated, the features below are available to all Google Workspace customers, and are fully launched or in the process of rolling out. Rollouts should take no more than 15 business days to complete if launching to both Rapid and Scheduled Release at the same time. If not, each stage of rollout should take no more than 15 business days to complete.

Including the Alt text option in the Image options sidebar of Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Drawings

Currently, users add alternative text to images in Google Docs, Sheets, Slides, and Drawings by right-clicking an image and selecting “Alt text,” which then opens a box for them to input the text. Starting this week, we’re making this feature more discoverable by adding it to the “Image options” sidebar.

Screenshot of alt text options newly located in the image options sidebar

Reminder: delegators must re-approve contacts delegates by August 2023

In May 2023, we announced that delegated users can manage contact labels on behalf of their delegator via contacts.google.com. As part of this update, delegators need to review existing delegates, as well as add new delegates. This must be completed by July 31, 2023 or delegates will lose access to manage contacts. Admins can also make these adjustments for users in their domain using the Admin SDK API to remove and re-add the contacts delegate privilege. | Learn more about managing contact labels.

Previous announcements

The announcements below were published on the Workspace Updates blog earlier this week. Please refer to the original blog posts for complete details.

Ability to create spaces, memberships, group chats, and more using the Google Chat API is now generally available

Last year, we announced that developers could use the Google Chat API to programmatically create new spaces and add members to those spaces through the Google Workspace Developer Preview Program. Those features are now generally available for all Google Workspace developers. | Learn more about Google Chat API.

AppSheet Core licenses will be included by default for more Google Workspace editions, along with a new Admin security setting

We’re expanding AppSheet Core license access to additional Google Workspace editions and also giving Admins a new org-level setting, which controls how users are able to use their AppSheet Core licenses, including whether app data can be shared externally. | AppSheet Core licenses are already included for domain-verified Google Workspace Enterprise Plus, Enterprise Essentials Plus, and Education Plus users. AppSheet Core licenses will now be included for domain-verified Google Workspace Business Starter, Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Starter, Enterprise Standard, Frontline Starter and Standard, Nonprofits, and Education Standard customers. | Learn more about AppSheet Core licenses.

Improved meeting room suggestions in Google Calendar

To better optimize meeting rooms and foster greater collaboration, especially in a hybrid work environment, we’ve introduced an updated structured meeting room setting. The working location set by a user is taken into account for all room suggestions, and in cases where location data is unavailable, proposed meeting rooms will be based on frequently used rooms. | Available to Google Workspace Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Fundamentals, Education Plus, and Nonprofits only. | Learn more about room suggestions in Google Calendar.

Introducing membership search and the option to add up to 50,000 members to spaces in Google Chat

We’re increasing the number of users you can add to a space in Google Chat from 8,000 to 50,000. We’re also introducing the ability to easily search for members within a space. | Learn more about new capabilities in spaces.

Programmatically read and write working locations for a portion of the day with the Calendar API

Recently, we introduced the ability for users to set working locations in Calendar that indicate where they’re working for specific portions of the day. Now, we’re adding the ability to programmatically read and write working locations for specific portions of the day. This update expands on the existing reading and writing functionality announced earlier this year. | Available to Google Workspace Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Fundamentals, Education Plus, Education Standard, the Teaching and Learning Upgrade and Nonprofits customers only. | Learn more about the Google Calendar API.

Completed rollouts

The features below completed their rollouts to Rapid Release domains, Scheduled Release domains, or both. Please refer to the original blog posts for additional details.

Rapid Release Domains:

Use companion mode to check-in to a Google Meet conference room, so everyone can know you by name
Easily convert emails and links into smart chips using the tab key in Google Sheets

Scheduled Release Domains:

Rapid and Scheduled Release Domains:

For a recap of announcements in the past six months, check out What’s new in Google Workspace (recent releases).

Contacts delegates can now update labels and manage “Other” contacts

Friday, May 26, 2023

[Update - October 12, 2023]: Please refer to this post for an updated timeline and more information regarding this change.

What’s changing We’re updating the functionality for delegated users to manage contact labels on behalf of their delegator via contacts.google.com. While this functionality was previously available in Gmail, they can now be managed directly at the source: Contacts. This will happen in two phases:

Beginning this month, delegators will be prompted to review and re-approve access for their existing delegates. If existing delegates are not re-approved before July 2023, they will lose access to manage contacts. See below for guidance.

Additionally, Admins can make these adjustments for users in their domain using the Admin SDK API to remove and re-add the contacts delegate privilege.

Beginning July 2023, all users who have been approved or assigned as Contacts delegates will be able to update labels and manage Other contacts.

Who’s impacted

Admins and end users

Why it’s important

For many of our customers, administrative support for managing inboxes is business critical — this includes making sure that contacts are properly sorted and labeled.