The following articles were included in our Exchange Messaging Outlook (EMO) newsletter published on February 1, 2024.
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Today's Highlights »
- Recent Files in Office Applications
- Outlook.com Connected Accounts Warning
- Clear the Recent Files List
- Show Fewer Recent Files
- Gmail and Yahoo Email Requirements
Recent Files in Office Applications
Earlier this week a user asked if sharing a Microsoft 365 Family subscription meant the family members would see each other’s files in OneDrive.
“If additional subscriptions are added to a Family group, does this mean that they share files?”
The only thing shared is the Family calendar / group in outlook.com. OneDrive is not shared – but files and folders can be, but only if the user clicks on Share.
As part of Microsoft's plan to sync as many Office settings as possible to the cloud so they roam with you, as of Office 2013, the recent files list synchronizes with your Microsoft Account. If you sign in on multiple devices using the same account, you’ll have the same recent files list on each computer.
I’ll start with Microsoft’s article on sharing Microsoft 365 Family, in the FAQ at Someone invited you to share their Microsoft 365 Family subscription
Q: Will my data be automatically shared with the subscription holder when I join the Family group?
A: None of your data is shared with the subscription holder once you join. If you wish, you can share certain types of data, like web browsing activity and screen time. Go to the Microsoft Family Safety home page to learn more.
Yet I often see questions like this one:
“My spouse and I have our own laptops. I have not shared any documents with her account. Yet, on her computer, she sees (and can open) files from my computer listed among her "Recent" files in Excel and Word.”
If, even once, the other person signs into their account in Word or Excel to edit one of their files on your computer and does not change the account displayed on the right side of the title bar, the shortcut to their file will be on your recent list. If their account is signed in as a Connected service in Office (File > Account page), you’ll be able to open the file. If they are signed out but there is a locally cached copy, you’ll be able to open the file but auto save will error.
The recent list will change depending on which account is selected in the title bar. If users share the same computer and added the OneDrive storage accounts to Office and do not change the account shown in the title bar, any files opened will be the Recent list on the computers that account signs into as the Recent list is synced to OneDrive.
The only way to avoid “recent list bleed” is to change the account in the title bar or sign out of all but one account. Signing out guarantees the recents won’t be on the list of another person, because if only one account is signed it, they won't be opening their files in your Office account.
The other option – which is also the best option - is to use separate Windows logins. With separate Windows logins, everyone’s files will be separate, in every application they use.
Outlook.com Connected Accounts Warning
As I mentioned previously, during most of January users could not access the Sync Email page to manage their connected accounts. (View tab > View settings > Mail > Sync Mail)
This was fixed last week but several users said they had multiple connected accounts and after they got back into the settings, they decided to remove an account. When they deleted one, all the connected accounts were removed.
Ever since the feature was removed from accounts not using in May 2021, when the last account is removed the connected accounts feature is completely removed from outlook.com and accounts cannot be added back.
What is new is that deleting one account from the list removes all accounts.
This should serve as a warning to anyone still using the Connected Accounts feature: If you want to keep using it, do not delete an account from the list.
Users appear to be able to update passwords on their accounts by editing the account. What they can't do is delete the account and add it back.
Clear the Recent Files List
If you want to clear a file from the recent files list in the Office apps, you can right click on the file and choose Remove from list.
To clear all files from the Recent list, go to File > Open, right click on one of the files and choose Clear unpinned items. This will remove all files on the recent list that is not pinned.
Microsoft's article: Customize the list of recently used files in Office apps
Show Fewer Recent Files
If you want to see fewer (or more) recent files, you can change this in File > Options > Advanced. About halfway down the page are the Display settings. The default (and maximum) number of recent files is 50.
You can also set a number to “Quickly access this number of Recent Documents”. This is the number of documents you’ll see listed at the bottom of the File tab menu. The default is 4 and the maximum is 50 files.
Gmail and Yahoo Email Requirements
Google and Yahoo now require all domains sending to their subscribers must have SPF, DMARC, and DKIM records in DNS to authenticate the email. If the authentication fails, the message will either go into Junk Email folder, bounce, or be silently dropped. It won't be long before all major email hosts require this authentication.
If you use an address from your ISP or a free email service, they will have the correct SPF, DMARC, DKIM DNS records so you shouldn’t have problems sending to any account, with 2 exceptions: group mails and forwarding.
If you send a group mail and too many people in your group are in either domain, the messages may bounce. Based on information from clients, if there are 10 or more Gmail addresses in group mail it will bounce, with Google suggesting using Google groups instead.
Too many Gmail addresses in the BCC field will bounce. My first client to report problems was able to send with less than 10 BCC, but some users told me one Gmail address in the BCC field was one too many.
The solution: use mail merge instead of BCC to avoid problems. The con: it requires Word and classic Outlook desktop software.
Anyone using the option to forward all incoming to an account at Gmail or Yahoo (or other addresses) could have some mail “lost”. When mail is forwarded, it appears to be from the original sender but sent from your mail server. If their domain’s DMARC is set to reject messages coming from other servers, the forward could be marked as spam or rejected. It *shouldn't* be rejected because the header shows it was forwarded, but is lost.
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