Google Workspace Wednesday

Issue #29 / 13-DEC-23

New beta to add granular control options for who can respond to Google Forms

Google is introducing a beta that gives Google Forms creators more granular control over who can respond to their forms via sharing settings. Previously, forms creators had two sharing options: restrict responses to users within their domain (and trusted domains) or make forms public. With this new option, form creators can limit response access to specific users, groups, or target audiences—similar to how file owners can restrict the sharing of Google Docs, Sheets, Slides or Sites in Drive.

Introducing interactive questions for YouTube videos in Google Classroom

Educators can now turn any YouTube video into an interactive lesson by adding questions for their students to answer throughout the video. The interactive questions feature turns a passive watching experience into an engaging one, and improves students’ understanding of a subject by providing them with the space to make mistakes, review incorrect answers and assess correct answers at their own pace.

Use “Profile Discovery” to display basic information only in search results

Google Workspace admins can now turn on “Profile discovery” for their users. When turned on, users can customize how they appear across Google products to people who search for them by their phone number or email. Specifically, you can choose how you want your name to be displayed and how your profile picture will be displayed. This feature is available in open beta, which means no additional sign-up is required to use the feature.

Manage conversations by muting notifications in Google Chat

Google is introducing a new mute/unmute option in Google Chat to assist you in prioritizing and managing your messages. This feature helps you increase concentration, eliminate distractions, and focus on the most important conversations. Muted conversations will not send push notifications, will not appear in home, and will also be visually deprioritized by being moved to the bottom of each conversation section. Notification badges will still apply to muted conversations when there are new @ mentions for you or everyone in the conversation.

Easy access to people, documents, building blocks and more in Google Docs

Google Docs is adding more ways to quickly find and insert relevant content directly into your document with an additional way to open the @-menu. This feature boosts productivity and saves time by bringing smart canvas features to the forefront of your workflow. When moving to a blank line within your Doc, you will see an “@” button with the option to select, search and insert smart chips, such as people, dates, timers, file chips, building blocks, calendar events, groups and more.

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