SaaS Updates Summary: April 19 – April 23

A busier week for the folks at Google Workspace than we’ve seen in a while. Last week, we got access to Google Maps in the Quick Access Side Panel. Plus, more control over layouts in Google Meet. Read about these updates and many more in the links below.

More Ways To Work With and Analyze BigQuery Data Using Connected Sheets
Google Workspace Updates | Google is adding several new features that will give you more ways to work with, display, and organize your BigQuery data when using Connected Sheets. Specifically, the new abilities and improvements are: Column stats, filter by value, calculated fields for pivot tables, pivot table grouping, and slicers.

Use Google Maps in the Quick Access Side Panel
Google Workspace Updates | You can now use Google Maps in the quick access side panel. This means you can use Google Maps to see and research place information on the same screen, which can make it easier to: See place details such as location, opening hours, and user reviews, make sure you’re adding the correct location to a Calendar event, and get travel times and directions to plan ahead your trip to an upcoming event location.

Reminder: Website Creation in Classic Google Sites Will No Longer Be Available Starting May 15, 2021
Google Workspace Updates | As previously announced, Google is replacing classic Sites with new Sites. All Google Workspace customers will have until the end of 2021 to complete this transition. Note that the timeline for this transition varies for users with personal Google accounts — see the “Getting Started” section below for more details.

Google Meet Now Gives You More Space for Content and Control Over Layouts for a More Flexible Experience
Google Workspace Updates | Inspired by your feedback, Google is rolling out a refreshed Google Meet desktop/laptop experience with updates to video feeds, the viewing and presenting experience, and the bottom bar. This enables you to participate with confidence in Google Meet calls as a presenter, attendee, teacher or student, knowing you have more control over your video feed, layouts, and content.

Use Virtual Private Cloud Service Controls To Create Security Perimeters Around Google Cloud Search Data
Google Workspace Updates | Google is introducing support for Virtual Private Cloud Service Controls (VPC-SC) for Google Cloud Search. You can use these controls to define a service perimeter around Google Cloud Search resources and create policies to grant access based on contextual attributes.

Control Your Data Usage and Improve Device Performance With New Data Saver Setting for Google Meet on Mobile
Google Workspace Updates | Google Meet automatically adjusts to your device, network and set-up to provide the best possible meeting experience. However, you may want to adjust the quality of your meeting to reduce impact on your mobile device. When needed, you can use Google Meet in higher quality by simply toggling the data saver setting off.

For last week’s SaaS updates (and beyond), click here for our archive.