Update 2202 for the Technical Preview Branch of Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager has been released. In this release, Admins will be able to organize packages and update groups in a much better way using folders. This feature helps to enable folder support for better categorizations and management of software updates.
Role-based access control (RBAC) role permissions are required to access the feature. Only Full Administrator and Operations Administrator system roles can only manage the folders. Whereas Software Updates Manager role can access and view the existing folders but cannot perform any operations.
This preview release also includes:
Delete collection references - Previously, when you would delete a collection with dependent collections, you first had to delete the dependencies. The process of finding and deleting all of these collections could be difficult and time consuming. Now when you delete a collection, you can review and delete its dependent collections at the same time. A new Details window shows more information about the relationship types, and lets you view collection relationships in a graphical chart.
There are several reasons why the site can't delete a dependent collection:
- Assigned to user: For more information, see Modify the administrative scope of an administrative user.
- Used by cloud attach: For more information, see Enable cloud attach for Configuration Manager.
- Use for upload to Microsoft Endpoint Manager: For more information, see Make Configuration Manager collections available to assign Endpoint security policies.
The details window lists collections that can't be deleted with the reason why.
Pre-download content for available software updates - Admins can now pre-download content for software updates that are included in available deployments. Required deployments already pre-download content by default. Enabling this new setting reduces installation wait times for clients since installation notifications won't be visible in Software Center until the content has fully downloaded.
The Pre-download content for this deployment setting is available in the following locations:
- The Deployment Settings page of the Deploy Software Updates Wizard for manually created software update deployments
- The Deployment Settings page of the Automatic Deployment Rules Wizard for update deployments created with an automatic deployment rule
- The Deployment Settings tab in the Properties page for a deployment created manually or with an automatic deployment rule.
New client health checks - Based on your feedback, there are two new Client health checks in this release:
Configuration Manager client functionality can be limited when the disk is full. These checks help you maintain healthy clients, which help you better manage the devices.
This release also includes performance improvements to the Client health dashboard.
Improvements to implicit uninstall - If you deploy an application or app group to a user collection that's based on a security group, and you enable implicit uninstall, changes to the security group are now honored. When the site discovers the change in group membership, Configuration Manager uninstalls the app for the user that you removed from the security group.
Improvements for sending feedback
- You now have the ability to connect feedback you send to Microsoft through the Configuration Manager console to an authenticated Azure Active Directory (Azure AD) user account. User authentication will help Microsoft ensure the privacy of your feedback and diagnostic data.
- Currently, Azure AD authentication for government clouds isn't available.
- The feedback button is now displayed in additional console locations.
- The following keyboard shortcuts for opening the feedback wizard have also been added to more locations in the console:
- Send a smile: ALT + SHIFT + 7
- Send a frown: ALT + SHIFT + 8
ADR scheduling improvements for deployments - The Software available time and Installation deadline for deployments created by an automatic deployment rule (ADR) are now calculated based on the time the ADR evaluation is scheduled and starts. Previously, these times were calculated based on when the ADR evaluation completed. This change makes the Software available time and Installation deadline consistent and predictable for deployments.
Improvements to Management Insights - A new management insights group was added to Management Insights. The Deprecated and unsupported features group contains the following new rules:
- Site system roles associated with deprecated or removed features: This insight checks for installed site system roles for deprecated features that will be removed in a future release.
- Check if the site uses the asset intelligence sync point role: This insight checks for installation of the asset intelligence synchronization point role.
- Configuration Manager client for macOS end of support: This insight lists the clients running macOS. Support for the Configuration Manager client for macOS and Mac client management ends on December 31, 2022.
- Certificate registration point is no longer supported: This insight checks for installation of the certificate registration point site system role. This feature is no longer supported as of March 2022. Configuration Manager versions released before March 2022 will still be able to install and use certificate registration points.
- Company resource access policies are no longer supported: This insight checks for company resource access policies. These features are no longer supported as of March 2022. Company resource access includes email, certificate, VPN, Wi-Fi, and Windows Hello for Business profiles. Configuration Manager versions released before March 2022 will still be able to use company resource access policies.
Console improvements - In this technical preview we've made the following improvements to the Configuration Manager console:
- Added a search filter to the Products and Classifications tabs in the Software Update Point Component Properties
- You can now exclude subcontainers when doing Active Directory System Discovery and Active Directory User Discovery in untrusted domains
- Added a Cloud Sync column to collections to indicate if the collection is synchronizing with Azure Active Directory
- Added the Collection ID to the collection summary details tab
- Increased the size of the Membership Rules pane in the Properties page for collections
- Added a View Script option for Run PowerShell Script steps when using the View action for a task sequence
PowerShell release notes preview - These release notes summarize changes to the Configuration Manager PowerShell cmdlets in this technical preview release.
For more details and to view the full list of new features in this update, check out our Features in Configuration Manager technical preview version 2202 documentation.
Update 2202 for Technical Preview Branch is available in the Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager Technical Preview console. For new installations, the 2202 baseline version of Microsoft Endpoint Configuration Manager Technical Preview Branch is available on the Microsoft Evaluation Center. Technical Preview Branch releases give you an opportunity to try out new Configuration Manager features in a test environment before they are made generally available.
We would love to hear your thoughts about the latest Technical Preview! Send us feedback directly from the console.
Thanks,
The Configuration Manager team
Configuration Manager Resources:
Documentation for Configuration Manager Technical Previews
Try the Configuration Manager Technical Preview Branch
Documentation for Configuration Manager