(Cross-posted from the Google+ Keyword blog)

By Anna Kiyantseva, Product Manager, Google+

Millions of people use Google+ to connect around the things they’re interested in. To help you sort through the many Collections and Communities where people share, we’ve created a new feature called Topics. With Topics, you’ll see a high-quality stream of Collections, Communities and people related to things we think you’ll be interested in.


Today, there are already hundreds of Topics available in English, Spanish and Portuguese, covering everything from black-and-white photography to hiking and camping. So whether you’ve recently discovered the wonders of woodworking, love gardening, or can’t get enough of street photography, there’s a stream of unique and interesting stuff waiting for you on Google+.

To see the recommended Topics, head to your home stream and look for the “Topics to explore” cards. Topics will be rolling out over the next day or so, so don’t worry if you don’t see any suggestions right away.

Hope you enjoy it!


Launch Details
Release track:  
Launching to both Rapid release and Scheduled release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace: 
Full rollout (1-3 days for feature visibility)

Impact: 
All end users

Action:
Change management suggested/FYI

More Information
Google+ Keyword Blog


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Protecting proprietary and sensitive data is a top priority for many G Suite admins, just as is enabling their employees to work anywhere, anytime—with or without an internet connection. Today, we’re making it easier for admins to balance those interests by introducing settings in the Admin console for managing users’ access to Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides files offline.

Going forward, admins will have the following options to control offline access on desktop computers (in the Admin console at Apps > G Suite > Drive and Docs > Data Access):

1. Control offline access using device policies - If an admin selects this option, she will need to take additional steps to control offline access for her users. IMPORTANT:
• If an admin does not want to enable offline access for ANY of her users, she should select this option and not take the extra steps to implement device policies on managed computers.
• If offline access was previously enabled in an organization and an admin selects this option, her users will lose offline access until she takes the extra steps to implement device policies on managed computers.
2. Allow users to enable offline access (recommended) - If an admin selects this option, his end users will be able to manually enable offline access from their Docs or Drive settings. Before doing so, the user will be asked if the computer is a trusted one and warned not to turn on the setting for any public or shared device.

If offline access is enabled for all or specific computers, recent Google Docs, Sheets, and Slides files on those computers will be automatically synced to the device and made available offline. This should improve the user experience on Docs, Sheets, and Slides, allowing employees to continue working, uninterrupted, even when their internet connection is poor or failing. Please note that these settings will not apply to non-Docs, non-Sheets, and non-Slides files in Drive.

Since launching in November 2016, we’ve continued to add features and functionality to the new Google Sites, including support for Team Drives, section dividers, subpage creation, and more. Today, we’re making it possible to add a logo to your site and to use the colors from that logo to customize your site further. Simply add the logo of your choice, and we’ll intelligently detect its colors and offer them for use in your theme. A common request from our enterprise users, this new feature will help you create professional, business-ready sites for your organization.


For more information on custom logos and colors, visit the Help Center.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to Rapid release, with Scheduled release coming on May 2nd, 2017

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
All end users

Action:
Change management suggested/FYI

More Information
Google Sites Help Center
Google Sites Learning Center


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Update: This launch has been updated to Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility)

This week's Admin console release changes the default behavior of the Highlights, Aggregate Reports, and Security reports in the Admin console to always show the latest available metrics for each data source. Before, these reports were filtered on a default date in the past that contained the first complete set of reports, which may have included delayed metrics even when more up to date information was available. Going forward, we’ll remove the date picker and always show you the latest available metrics and notify you when metrics are delayed.
Benefits:

• Under the Highlights section, you can now see the latest data for each metric.
• Under Apps Usage, Document Link Shared Status, User Status, Storage, and Security Reports, we’ll display “Latest data available for: ” for the relevant metric when you hover over the metric.
• A '*' symbol may appear next to stale metric values under each section, indicating when data may be delayed compared to other metrics in the same section.

FAQ: 

• Does this change affect the Reporting API? 
  No, the Reporting API is not affected by this change. We will notify you of any future API changes.
• If the 'date picker' is removed, will I lose the ability to review results from the "last month" in the Highlights report? 
  No, the drop down to view the "last 7 days", "last month", "last 6 months" (screenshot) will continue to function as it does today. Docs reporting data was often delayed (3+ biz days), so many customers were confused or didn't realize that using the date picker didn't allow them to see more recent data than what was actually available in the system - it gave them a false sense of control over the data. The new reporting heading explicitly states "latest data available", which more accurately exhibits the data that is actually available. Admins can always search for data for a specific date range (historical) using the Reports API.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid release and Scheduled release on April 19

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

One of the most compelling reasons to adopt Google+ is its power to connect and engage your workforce. Having a more engaged workforce increases retention and innovation within an organization and leads to more productivity. Since announcing that Google+ is now a core G Suite service last September, we’ve heard that you’d like better reporting on Google+ adoption and engagement throughout your organization. In response, we’re taking the first step by adding new enterprise-focused Google+ usage reporting in the Admin console and the Reporting APIs. With this change, you’ll now be able to look up:

• Daily active Google+ users
• Weekly active Google+ users
• Monthly active Google+ users
• Number of new users
• Number of new posts
• Number of new comments
• Number of new +1s
• Number of posts viewed
• Number of posts reshared

We’re excited for this first launch of enterprise reporting metrics for G+, and look forward to adding even more improvements, like user-level reports, later this year. Please let us know how you’re using them and what else you’d like to see through the Feedback options in the Admin console.

Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid release and Scheduled release

Editions:
Available to all G Suite editions

Rollout pace:
Full rollout (1-3 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
Admins only

Action:
Admin action suggested/FYI

More Information
Help Center: Aggregate reports


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This past February, we introduced Google Cloud Search, a new product that uses machine intelligence to provide a unified search experience across G Suite. Already available on the web and via the Android app, Cloud Search is now accessible on your iOS device as well. Starting today, you can download the Cloud Search iOS app from the App Store and search across your G Suite applications right from your iPhone or iPad. For more details, check out the Help Center articles below.


Launch Details
Release track:
Launching to both Rapid release and Scheduled release

Editions:
Available to G Suite Business and Enterprise editions only

Rollout pace:
Full rollout (1–3 days for feature visibility)

Impact:
All end users

Action: 
Change management suggested/FYI

More Information
Cloud Search Admin Help Center 
Cloud Search User Help Center


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We previously announced that a new Google Accounts login page, aimed at giving users an improved experience to sign in to their accounts across devices, would start slowly rolling out on April 5, 2017.

Based on customer feedback, we’ve decided to push the start of that rollout back to April 10, 2017, so we can further clarify how this change will impact G Suite customers.

What’s changing for all G Suite customers
The Google Accounts login page will have a new look and feel, consistent across computers, phones, and tablets. The rollout will start with a small set of users on April 10 and ramp up slowly over the course of several weeks.

Additional changes for customers not using a third-party SSO provider
In addition to the design changes described above, the new Google Accounts login page will also remove the “Stay signed in” checkbox that at certain times appeared for G Suite customers who did not use a third-party SSO provider.


We learned that users didn’t fully understand the implications of interacting with the "Stay signed in" checkbox across all browsers. To mitigate confusion, we're removing the checkbox and users will remain signed in unless they specifically sign out. When using shared or public devices, we recommend using private browsing windows.

Additional changes for customers using a third-party SSO provider when accessing third-party applications that use OAuth

If you’re using a third-party SSO provider to access Google applications, such as Gmail, Calendar, Drive, etc., your G Suite users will not see any differences apart from the newly designed Google Accounts login page described above.

If you’re using a third-party SSO provider to access third-party applications, your G Suite users will see an additional account selection page when they log in. This page will make it clear to them which account they’re authenticating, as well as the permissions they’re granting to applications.


Your G Suite users will be shown the account selection page either before or after being redirected to the third-party application, depending on whether they’re signed in to their browser and the specific third-party application they’re accessing. Please refer to the FAQ below for more details on when the account selection page will be shown.

Additional questions are addressed in the FAQ below.

-- Frequently Asked Questions --

Does this impact G Suite customers who are using Google as their identity provider?
If you’re a G Suite customer whose identity provider is Google, the only change you’ll see is the redesigned Google Accounts login page.

Which third-party SSO providers are included in this launch?
All third-party SSO providers, including Active Directory Federation Services (ADFS) SSO, will use this new Google Accounts login flow.

When will G Suite users see the additional account selection page?
The account selection page will not be shown in either of these cases:

• when G Suite users are accessing Google applications such as Gmail, Calendar, Drive, etc.
• if you don’t use a third-party SSO provider.

For customers using third-party SSO providers and accessing third-party applications, the account selection page will be shown in the situations below.

If there are accounts already signed in to the browser:

• G Suite users will simply be required to confirm the G Suite account that they would like to use before being redirected to the third-party SSO provider, as illustrated in the post above.

If there are no accounts already signed in to the browser:

• If the third-party application has set the hosted domain (“hd”) parameter, the user will be redirected to the third-party SSO provider and the account selection page will be shown with the G Suite account that is returned.
• If the third-party application has not set the "hd" parameter, the user must enter the account they would like to use prior to being redirected to the third-party SSO provider.

For more details on the “hd” parameter, please refer to the Google Developers Blog post or reference the developer documentation directly.

Will I need to confirm my account and grant the requested permissions every time I log in to a third-party application with a third-party SSO provider?After being prompted to confirm the correct Google account and granting the requested permissions upon initial login, only the account selection page will be shown again upon subsequent login attempts.

Does this impact SAML-based applications where a third-party cloud application will be the service provider?
SAML is an authentication-only protocol, and SAML apps do not ask for “extra permissions” from the user. If you have third-party SAML-based applications so that your users can use their G Suite credentials to sign in to enterprise cloud applications like Salesforce, Concur, and Zendesk, the only change resulting from this launch will be that the new account selection screen will be shown.

How can I remove my account from the account selection page?
G Suite accounts can be removed from the account selection page by clicking the “Remove an account” link.


Are all browsers impacted?
Yes, newer versions of all supported browsers will have this change applied, including Chrome, Firefox, IE, Edge, Safari, and Opera.

Users of older browsers or those browsers that do not have JavaScript enabled will temporarily continue to see the old Google Accounts login page.

When will my users see these changes?
The rollout will start on Monday, April 10, to a small set of users. It will ramp up slowly over the course of several weeks.



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Check out the latest "What's New in G Suite" launch recap [pdf] for a roundup of all G Suite launches from March 2017.

Archive & Translated Versions (coming soon for March issue)


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Starting April 10, 2017*, we’re rolling out an update to the Google Accounts sign-in page to give users an improved experience to securely sign in to their accounts. This new design will make browser sign-in flows consistent across computers, phones and tablets.

If you use third-party applications within your organization, or you use a third-party Single Sign-on (SSO) provider, we recommend contacting your developer(s) or SSO provider to see if any updates are necessary. To learn more, visit today’s G Suite Developer blog post.