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Showing posts from 2021

Set custom rules for incoming Google Voice calls

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  Within the Google Voice settings, you can easily create rules for how incoming calls should be handled. These options allow you to route incoming calls in ways that are most efficient to your workflows and productivity, including granular settings for specific contacts.  Specifically, you can now:  Forward calls from specific contacts to your linked phone numbers or directly to voicemail,  Opt to screen calls from specific contacts,  Set custom voicemail greetings for specific contacts,  Apply rules for all your contacts or specific groups within your contacts  Admins: There is no admin control for this feature.  End users: These settings will be OFF by default and can be configured at voice.google.com/settings.  Rapid Release and Scheduled Release domains: This feature is available now for all users.  Available to all Google Voice users. Google Workspace Updates

How to investigate high tail latency when using Cloud Spanner

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  When you use Cloud Spanner, you may encounter some high tail latency cases. Some of the causes may be on the Cloud Spanner side, but there could be some other reasons as well. In this blog post, we will  talk about how to distinguish the high latency causes and also talk about some tips to improve Cloud Spanner latency. Check the relationship between the high latency and Cloud Spanner usage If you can find the high latency in Cloud Spanner metrics which are available in Cloud Console or Cloud Monitoring, the latency cause is either at [3. Cloud Spanner API Front End] or [4. Cloud Spanner Database] in the diagram from the  Cloud Spanner end-to-end latency guide . Further investigation at Cloud Spanner level is needed. On the other hand, if you can't confirm the high latency in Cloud Spanner metrics, the high latency likely happened before reaching Cloud Spanner from the client. If high latency was observed in your client metrics, I recommend you check if accessing other ...

Improving the speed and security of your cloud deployments

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For many of those building in the cloud, speed and security of deployments are amongst their top priorities. At times these goals can seem at odds with each other, especially if security guidance is distributed, written more as reference than opinion, and lacking in tooling for actual implementation in your environment. But they don’t have to be. In fact, these are some challenges the  security foundations blueprint  was created to address. We recently started diving into the blueprint here on the blog to  introduce what it is and who it is for ,  outline some best practices it recommends  for creating and maintaining a security-centric infrastructure, and  demonstrate how to get started with the automation repo  that turns these best practices into deployable Terraform modules. The security foundations blueprint is just one of the resources from our best practices center In today’s post, we’re highlighting the direct experiences of Google Cloud users ...

Automatically move breakout room participants back to the original meeting

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  What’s changing We’re introducing several improvements for breakout rooms in Google Meet. These improvements include: The ability for meeting hosts and co-hosts to automatically move participants back to the main meeting room once breakout rooms end. Better visual indicators for breakout room participants to indicate this movement. See below for more information. Who’s impacted End users Why it’s important In 2020, we introduced breakout rooms for Google Meet, which allows meeting hosts and co-hosts to split larger meetings into smaller groups for discussion or group work. We’ve heard from our customers that they need more controls to easily and effectively manage breakout rooms.  Breakout room participants will see a banner with a countdown indicating when they’ll be moved back to the main meeting room.  We’ve added better indicators confirming participants have been moved back to the main meeting room. Additionally, cameras and microphones will be turned off when part...

Admins can install Google Workspace Marketplace applications for specific groups

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  Admins can now install Google Workspace Marketplace applications for specific groups in their organization using the new “admin-install” functionality (formerly known as “domain-install”). Previously, admin-installing applications from the Google Workspace Marketplace was only possible for organizational units or an entire domain. This is useful in situations where only a subset of your users need to have the app installed, for example CRM applications required for your sales and marketing groups or e-signature applications required for your legal teams.  Rapid and Scheduled Release domains: Extended rollout (potentially longer than 15 days for feature visibility) starting on December 9 , 2021 Available to Google Workspace Business Starter, Business Standard, Business Plus, Enterprise Essentials, Enterprise Standard, Enterprise Plus, Education Fundamentals, Education Plus, Frontline, and Nonprofits, as well as G Suite Basic and Business customers Google Workspace Updates

All You Need to Know About Smart Gallery and Why It’s Changing Hybrid Meetings

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  When many of us switched to working from home, we became accustomed to getting a clear view of everyone’s faces in Zoom Gallery View. The hybrid work environment, with employees hosting meetings in office conference rooms while others attend from home, complicates the meeting experience.  Video meetings held in traditional meeting spaces can make it difficult for remote participants to see everyone in the room, depriving them of key communication elements like facial expressions and body language. To ensure remote workers can collaborate digitally as effectively as they can in person, organizations must democratize the experience for all of their employees, no matter where they work. That’s why we’ve worked closely with our hardware partners to create Zoom Rooms Smart Gallery, an innovative way to make your hybrid meetings more equitable.  What is Smart Gallery? Smart Gallery is a Zoom Rooms feature that uses cutting-edge hardware and AI to create individual video feeds...

Cloud IDS for network-based threat detection is now generally available

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As more and more applications move to the cloud, cloud network security teams have to keep them secure against an ever-evolving threat landscape. Shielding applications against network threats is also one of the most important criteria for regulatory compliance. For example, effective intrusion detection is a requirement of the Payment Card Industry Data Security Standard -  PCI DSS 3.2.1 . To address these challenges, many cloud network security teams build their own complex network threat detection solutions based on open source or third-party IDS components. These bespoke solutions can be difficult and costly to operate, and they often lack the scalability that is required to protect dynamic cloud applications.  Earlier this year,  we announced Cloud IDS , a new cloud-native network security offering that delivers on our vision of Invisible Security, where key security capabilities are continuously engineered into our trusted cloud platform. Today we’re excited to anno...