This article is contributed. See the original author and article here.

It’s been a few years since we blogged about this topic, so we thought we’d share a few updates with you. Below we’ve provided options and tips for you to consume new feature, service change, and service health notices for Microsoft Intune. Let us know what questions you have by replying on this post or asking us out on Twitter @IntuneSuppTeam.


 


Message center posts


Intune aligns to the Modern Lifecycle Policy and we communicate planned service changes through the Message center, such as:




  • New major features (communicated at release)




  • Changes to existing service behavior (typically communicated 30 days in advance)




  • Planned maintenance (at a minimum 5 days prior)




  • End of Support statements (if an entire service, typically a year; if an OS or large feature typically 90 day in advance)




You can see all of your Intune Message center Posts in the Microsoft Endpoint Manager admin center on the tenant status blade. Here’s a screen shot from my Message center:


 


Screenshot of the MEM admin center - Service health and message center bladeScreenshot of the MEM admin center – Service health and message center blade


 


We do our best to make sure that you only see Message center posts that affect your organization, particularly when there are changes that will affect a specific scenario. For example, the top message shown in the screen shot above – about Apple updating their T&C’s – went to customers with managed Apple devices. If the scope is broader or indeterminate, we’ll post to all customers and explain how you could be impacted in the “How does this affect my organization” section of the post.


 


If you are interested in other M365 service messages outside of Intune, then head to the M365 admin portal. It’s the same Intune messages posted there – we use the M365 service API’s to pull Intune messages from the M365 admin center to Endpoint Manager. Within the M365 admin portal, you can then set preferences for the messages you see – for example if you administer Exchange and Intune you can select both and view them in the M365 admin portal. We’ve linked from the Microsoft Endpoint Manager admin center on the tenant status blade to the M365 admin center to make it easy for you to go from one to the other without having to reauthenticate.


 


Screenshot of the M365 admin center - Message center preferences paneScreenshot of the M365 admin center – Message center preferences pane


 


Message center FAQ:



 


Intune In development/What’s new


Intune also publishes a list of UI updates and features In development (expect to ship in the next monthly release) and in What’s new (what ships in the monthly service release). Items move from In Development to What’s New as we ship each release. There are times a feature gets pulled back into development after it ships or a feature misses our readiness documentation process. We work back with our PM and engineering teams to ensure the documentation and communication process is followed.


 


In Development/What’s New FAQ:




  • Does every What’s New item get it’s own Message center post? No, we do a single message center post to inform customers of the latest What’s New release where you can then go and read about each new feature. A good way to think about the distinction between the Message center and What’s New is that we prefer to use the Message center more for targeted service changes, especially where action may be required in a specific time period. New features are updated on What’s New.




  • I saw something on In Development but now it’s gone. What happened? Rarely items are pulled out of our pre-production, but it does happen from time-to-time. Or the item released and moved to What’s New.




  • How do I know when In Development/What’s New updates? Three options – follow @IntuneSuppTeam out on Twitter, check your Message center for a notice that they’ve been updated, or follow the docs RSS feed on those pages.




 


Service Health Dashboard


You can see service incidents for Intune over in Microsoft Endpoint Manager admin center. They are in the same spot as the Message center on the Tenant Administration > Tenant Status > Service health and Message center.


 


Screenshot of the MEM admin center - Service health and message center bladeScreenshot of the MEM admin center – Service health and message center blade


 


Service health notices will stay active on the Microsoft Endpoint Manager admin center for 5-7 days after the incident closed. Over in the M365 admin center, you can see archived notices for up to 30 days.


 


How to check Microsoft 365 service health – Microsoft 365 Enterprise | Microsoft Docs


 


Email notifications for Message Center and Service Health Dashboard posts


If you prefer to receive notifications via email, you can opt in through the M365 admin center. Navigate to the Service Health blade and click Preferences > Email and check the box to receive email notifications. Enter 1-2 email addresses that you’d like notifications to be sent to and select your preferences. You’ll likely want to pick advisories and incidents. You can read more on the distinction here: How to check Microsoft 365 service health – Microsoft 365 Enterprise | Microsoft Docs.


 


Screenshot of the M365 admin center - Message center email preferences paneScreenshot of the M365 admin center – Message center email preferences pane


 


For Message center posts, repeat these steps on the Message center blade. If you select the Send me a Weekly Digest > Microsoft Intune you’ll get a once-a-week summary of everything posted for Intune into your Message Center.


 


Note that email is a onetime setup and the only sign-up for Intune service change emails today is from the M365 admin center.


 


Using the M365 Admin app on your phone


You can see notices from the M365 Admin app. When you open the app, the Home page will automatically show the Health dashboard where you can tap into the Message center or Service Health notices. You can also access both Message center and Service health from the hamburger menu.


 


M365 Admin app - Home screenM365 Admin app – Home screen M365 Admin app - Message center optionM365 Admin app – Message center option


 


Turn on push notifications for both Service Health and Message center by going to Settings > Notifications and tapping the toggles to green for all notifications or tap the arrows next to each and turn on notifications for specific services or notices.


 


M365 Admin app - Notifications screenM365 Admin app – Notifications screen M365 Admin app - Notifications screenM365 Admin app – Notifications screen


Office 365 Communications API


You can use Office 365 Communications API to access incident and message center posts from Microsoft Intune. The API relies on Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) and OAuth2 so you will need to register and configure your application within Azure AD before being able to access the API. The following steps will walk you through the process of registering your application and running the PowerShell script to call the API.




  1. Navigate to the Azure Active Directory admin center.




  2. Click Azure Active Directory > App registrations > New registration.




  3. Fill out the fields and click Create. Copy the Application ID for later.




  4. Note: Make sure Web is selected for URI, the domain will be used later.

    Azure Active Directory - Registering a new applicationAzure Active Directory – Registering a new application



  5. Click on the newly created App > API Permissions > Add > Office 365 Management APIs.

    Adding the O365 Management API to the newly created app registrationAdding the O365 Management API to the newly created app registration


  6. Click Delegated permissions and select “ServiceHealth.Read”, repeat with Application permissions and click “Add permissions”.

    Adding the ServiceHealth.Read permission to the newly created app registrationAdding the ServiceHealth.Read permission to the newly created app registration



  7. Next, click Certificates & secrets > New client secret > Enter name and select expiration > Add.




    1. Copy the “Client secrets” Value for later.

      Certificates & Secrets - Highlighted ValueCertificates & Secrets – Highlighted Value





  8. Download and save this PowerShell script. Update with your tenant ID (How to find your Azure Active Directory tenant ID, application ID (step 3), and the Client secret value (step 6).

    Editing the PowerShell script to include tenant ID, app ID, and client secretEditing the PowerShell script to include tenant ID, app ID, and client secret


  9. Run the PowerShell script to receive all Intune related messages from the O365 admin center.


 


There are multiple ways to receive message center notices, whether it’s in the admin center, email, M365 app, or using the service API’s — choose the one that works best for you.


 


As always, we want to hear from you! If you have any suggestions, questions, or comments, just let us know through comments on this post or tagging @IntuneSuppTeam on Twitter.

Brought to you by Dr. Ware, Microsoft Office 365 Silver Partner, Charleston SC.