Cisco Webex Latest Release - 42.11

Overview

Your Webex service will be upgraded to the Latest release 42.11 according to the Cisco Webex maintenance schedule.

Summary of the upcoming release is below. 

For users

Pre-meeting experience

• New lobby controls for Personal Room meetings* re-categorises guest users to enhance meeting security. Users are categorised into two groups with separate lobby controls, including:
  • unverified users: users who have not signed in and whose identity can't be verified.
  • verified external users: users who have signed in but belong to a different organization to the one hosting the meeting.
• Each of these user groups have separate and independent lobby controls:
  • They can join the meeting.
  • They wait in the lobby until the host admits them.
  • They can't join the meeting.

• Microsoft Edge WebView2 (Windows) is automatically installed with the latest version of Webex Meetings and Webinars, if it’s not already installed. This ensures that WebView2 is always running with the latest updates. For VDI Environments, Webex users are prompted to install WebView2 each time they sign in. To avoid this, we recommend IT administrators to deploy WebView2 to their VDI environments following the below steps:
  • Check if WebView2 has already been installed by going to Add or remove programs and searching for Webview2.
  • For BT users, they can check the BT Software Center.
  • Follow this link to install the software.

• Webex Scheduler support preferred site to login. Webex Scheduler uses the default Webex site when scheduling a meeting. You can change the default Webex site in Webex App preferences. Administrators can perform a bulk default Webex site change for users by a user CSV export and import in Control Hub.

• Notice of default value change to On for the Enable Webex Assistant administrator site setting. The Enable Webex Assistant setting is now On by default, unless an administrator has already manually set it to Off. This change is applied to all customers, including both slow and latest channel customers.

In-meeting experience

• The New Webex whiteboard is an infinite canvas where you can collaborate together with any meeting participants whether they are using Webex Meetings app, Webex App, or Webex devices.

• Edit in-meeting display name in the meeting. * Use a preferred name or control how you want your name to be seen by others.

Webinar experience

• Change attendee status to pending in the Manage Webinar Registration page. The change status to pending button in the manage webinar registration page now allows you to change the registration status of an approved or declined attendee to pending. Attendees marked as pending are listed in the pending tab of the manage registration page. When the status of an approved attendee is changed to pending, the attendee receives an email informing them that their invitation to the webinar is cancelled. No such email is sent to attendees whose registration status has been changed from declined to pending.

• You can now schedule a webinar from Webex Scheduler to support webinars for Microsoft 365 Cloud Customers.

Slido experience

• Participants are now able to withdraw their replies to questions using icon > Withdraw. The feature works similarly to question withdrawal and therefore the withdrawn submissions are anonymized.

• Create a new modal from Slido administration. Event code and invite collaborators input fields have been removed. They’re still available under Event Settings.

• Typing indicator in administration helps moderators to identify the number of people still typing before moving onto the next poll or question while moderating from Slido administration.

• PPT(PowerPoint) and Switcher applications for organizations in US data centers are available as part of this release. To use Slido in PPT, you’ll need download and install Slido for PowerPoint. Follow this link for the installation file. To download and learn more about Switcher, refer to this article.

• Ability to change settings when poll is live. The toggles appear changeable for the user as opposed to being grayed out previously.

• Accessibility Improvements for Slido Webex Sidebar include:
  • Focus: Slido now manages keyboard focus more efficiently so users can navigate the interface easily.
  • Screen reader announcements: Slido correctly announces several elements in the user interface and helps users understand what content is presented.
  • Quiz improvements: Timed questions are now announced to let users know when a question is closed.

Post-meeting experience

• Host notification for recordings reaching expiry based on retention policy. Webex users receive an email notification if they have recordings reaching expiry soon. They can see an expiring soon label next to their recordings in the recordings tab in the Webex site. These notifications are set either weekly or monthly, depending on the retention period set by the administrator and are controlled by the existing recording email notification toggle in settings.

For administrators

• Restrict meeting experiences using registry keys on your company devices. IT administrators can restrict their company devices to adhere to certain meeting experience based on their company policies. This can be done via pushing down a registry key across all your company owned devices. To learn what features can be restricted and how to configure this restriction refer to the Cisco article on Collaboration restrictions for Webex Meetings in Control Hub.

• Forced authentication before joining Webex Meetings. As an IT administrator you can lock the company device to allow only authenticated company users to join meetings using this device. You can turn ON this feature in Control Hub and it is applicable if you are using company device to join meetings that are held within your organization or joining meetings held outside of your organization. The types of devices this change can apply to include Windows, Mac, Android, and iOS devices and it leverages registry key and tokens. For more information see Cisco’s article on Collaboration restrictions for Webex Meetings in Control Hub. Without a registry key, if Authenticated Sign-in is ON, it applies to everyone trying to join meetings with a claimed email address.

• Ability for IT administrators to control secondary camera experience for their meeting users. As an IT administrator, you can now decide if your users should have the secondary camera capability in their meetings or not. You can apply this configuration to a specific user, group of users, or to their entire organization using Control Hub settings template or to their entire organization using organization level settings on Control Hub. These settings can be enabled either to internal or external meetings, using the options that are provided in the settings templates. The end users will receive a notification from the app when this secondary camera feature is disabled.

• Trusted domains for Personal Room meetings and internal only Personal Room meetings. This feature provides more granular control over internal Webex Meetings and can be applied to:
  • all users in the organization.
  • a group of users in the organization (using Templates and User Groups).
  • an individual in the organization.

        It allows the above controls to apply only to Personal Room meeting such that:

• Scheduled Meetings and Personal Room meetings are accessible by all external users.
• Personal Room meetings are accessible only by users from approved email domains, scheduled meetings are accessible by any external user.
• Personal Room meetings are accessible only by internal users, scheduled meetings are accessible by any external user.
• This Personal Room meeting only filter can be applied to all users in the organization, a user group, or an individual user.

*This feature is available on a delayed release cycle. Check status.webex.com/maintenance to see when it’s available on your site.

Go here for more details on what's new in the 42.11 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 42.11 
• Frequently Asked Questions
• Latest Channel Guide for IT Managers

Bookmark our website so you don't miss out on updates and actions you may need to take. You can also register your details to receive future Webex service notifications.