Cisco Webex Latest Release - 42.5

Overview

Your Webex service will be upgraded to the Latest release 42.5 according to the Cisco Webex maintenance schedule.

Summary of the upcoming release is below. 

For users

Webex Pre-Meeting Experience

• The option to update your meeting app before you join the meeting is now available. The goal is to ensure that all attendees are able to participate in the meeting effectively and use all the available features.
• Email reminder for up to 100,000 licenses is supported. Starting with the 42.5 update, organizations or sites who have more than 10,000 licenses can also schedule email reminders. To support a large volume of emails, the reminder can be scheduled to be sent at least 12 hours before the start time. This feature also supports webcast view for attendees.
• The Registration page has been improved. Now, when you go to register for an upcoming meeting, you see the meeting title, time, and host. This helps make it clear what meeting you're registering for. As a host, you also get a registration link that you can copy to the Meeting information page.
• Entry and exit beep changes are introduced. All new sites have this feature turned off by default. For existing sites that have entry and exit beep that is turned on, phone users continue to hear the beep, while it is turned off for computer audio users. This feature is available on a delayed release cycle. Check status.webex.com/maintenance to see when it’s available on your site.
• Introducing the Webex Meetings for Chrome PWA. Webex Meetings web app is now available for download as a Progressive Web App (PWA) for Chrome OS in the Google Play store.
• New and improved scheduler is available for Meetings and Webinars. Scheduler on website for Meetings and Webinars is undergoing the following UI enhancements:
  • A new section that is called Security is added and all scheduling options that are related to security are moved here. This includes passwords for meetings and webinars. 
  • Tooltips are added to most scheduling options including options under Attendee privileges and Meeting options.
  • Agenda is now part of the main or basic scheduling flow instead of under Advanced options.

Webex In-Meeting Experience

• French, German, and Spanish spoken language transcription is available in closed captions. For meetings with Webex Assistant or closed captions, the host can now select the spoken language (transcription) of the meeting in four different languages in addition to the existing English. This feature is available on a delayed release cycle. Check status.webex.com/maintenance to see when it’s available on your site.

• Users can now change the size of the closed captions (CC) box to show more or fewer lines.
• Music Mode now uses Fullband audio quality on Mac and Windows Meetings app, by default. Administrators that require the use of lower quality audio for Music Mode can request the feature toggle to be disabled for their site. By default, Music Mode sessions are encoded using up to Fullband audio quality. With this toggle disabled, Music Mode operates up to Super wideband audio fidelity on desktop clients.
• Breakout support has been added for audio-only users. A user joining a meeting using audio only (PSTN) can now be placed in a breakout session. This feature is available for meetings desktop and mobile.
• Full HD (1080p) content sharing for motion and video is available. Webex Meetings app for Mac and Windows can now support sharing Full HD (1080p) video quality with high motion content. This works when selecting Automatically Optimize or Optimize for Motion and Video with high motion content.
• You can now receive 4K shared content in the Webex App. When 4K content is being shared in a meeting or webinar, users joining via the Web App can now see that content in 4K (rather than being downgraded to 1080p).
• Enjoy a better attendee experience with images in Slido polls.  In the Webex-Slido integration, attendees can now zoom in on a picture that is inserted into a Slido poll.
• Slido rating poll improvements are introduced. The option to choose between the emoji and the star scale has been added.
• You can remotely control interpretation on your device (Windows). When the Webex Meetings app for Windows is paired with a new cloud-registered device that is supported for Simultaneous Interpretation (attendee view only), the interpretation controls can be toggled remotely on the app (or directly on the device). Remote control for Mac will be supported in a future update.

Webex Meetings for iOS and Android

• Move Webex Meetings from your desktop to mobile app using a QR code. With this update you can scan the QR code using your mobile camera and move your meeting to Webex Meetings mobile app without disrupting or disconnecting the meeting.
• User setting for webinar default video layout is available. The default video layout for Webinars on iPad and tablet is the Stack view and for mobile it is the Focus view. You can change your webinar default layout by going to Settings > Audio & video settings menu.
• See the Cisco Webex Meetings Mobile App Resources for more info on the Webex Meetings mobile app.

For administrators

• Collaboration restrictions can be applied for your company users from Control Hub settings templates. With this update, collaboration restrictions can now be applied at an individual user and group level from the settings template in Control Hub. Currently as an IT administrator, you can block users from joining meetings that are hosted on the external sites at the org level only. With this update, you can apply this policy at group and user level using the settings template. Collaboration restrictions are applicable to the permitted sites too. This feature is not available for Webex for Government.
• Webex Meetings compliance policies are introduced for Bring Your Own Device (BYOD).  As an IT administrator, you can now prevent users from joining company meetings from a BYOD. This feature leverages registry keys or tokens. Users can join your company meetings using BYOD only if a registry key or token is detected on that device. For more information on tokens and registry keys and how to configure them, see Collaboration restrictions for Webex Meetings in Control Hub. This feature is not available for Webex for Government.
• Forced authentication before joining Webex Meetings has been added. In Control Hub, as an administrator, you can now lock the company device to allow only authenticated company users to join meetings using that device. This feature is applicable to your users using company device to join meetings that are held within your organization or joining external meetings. Without the registry key, if Authenticated Sign-in is ON, it applies to the user trying to join meetings with a claimed email address. This feature is not available for Webex for Government.
• Administrators can now disable Broadcast Message using Control Hub templates for meetings and webinars. The control to disable this feature is available at the user, group, or org level.
• There is a new join policy for your company meetings with allowed lists for IT administrators. As an IT administrator, you can now set rules on who can join your company meetings. You can choose to allow anyone to join your internal meetings or choose to create an allowed list of domains. Only users who are authenticated on that domain can join your internal company meetings. This policy can be applied at the organization level. You can also choose to apply this policy at user and group level using the settings template in Control Hub. This feature is available for meetings desktop and mobile.

Webex Meetings APIs

• Bulk registration for Webinars and Meetings is now supported. Currently, when applications utilize Webex Meetings APIs to register for a specific participant to join a Meeting or a Webinar, it must happen on a participant-by-participant basis. In this update, this API is updated to allow bulk registration of participants for more efficient use of the APIs. You can visit the updated API here.
• Go here for more details on what's new in the 42.5 Latest release.

 

Impact description and actions

• Review the above features and inform your users
• Follow 'Next steps' below

Next steps

Refer to the below resources for support through this upgrade process:

• Customer Monthly Update for 42.5
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Latest Channel Guide for IT Managers

We recognize that you may require software to remain on lockdown for compliance with regulations or internal policies. Please submit your request by completing this form.

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