Using Microsoft Teams could soon be a lot more engaging thanks to a range of updates announced by the company.
With video conferencing calls set to remain a part of everyday work and personal life for many of us, Microsoft is looking to ensure its platform can offer a more personal experience for everyone.
This includes opening up Microsoft Teams to developers, making it easier to craft more enjoyable, richer meeting experiences though personalised apps and services.
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Microsoft Teams for developers
Microsoft Teams saw several mentions in CEO Satya Nadella's keynote address at its Build 2021 event, with the company chief noting that the service now has around 145 million daily active users.
The platform has supported third-party apps for several months, but will now look to encourage more developers to work on "a new class" that it calls collaborative apps.
"To further help you build collaborative apps, we are sharing new integration opportunities and enhanced developer tools for the organizing layer, Teams," Microsoft revealed in a blog post.
This includes the newly-enhanced Microsoft Teams Toolkit for Visual Studio and Visual Studio Code. Supporting React, SharePoint Framework (SPFx), or .NET, the toolkit looks to offer developers a familiar environment with several new updates, including single-line authentication, Azure Functions integration, SPFx integration, single-line Microsoft Graph client, and streamlined hosting to an IDE and CLI.
Once completed, the newly-launched Developer Portal for Microsoft Teams will make it easier for developers to register and configure their apps from a single dedicated app management console tool that is available via web or within Teams itself.
Asides from additional apps, the changes will allow Teams users to create custom scenes in Together Mode via a new scene designer tool in the Developer Portal, adding that extra personal touch to an experience many of us may still associate with long work calls.
Microsoft Teams will also get a new set of media APIs that the company says will "provide real-time access to audio and video streams to build scenarios like transcription, translation, note taking, insights gathering and more".
There's also greater interoperability with Azure Communcation Services for a welcome cloud boost, the ability to build fluid components for greater mobile engagement, and the chance to create apps without needing to write a single piece of HTML or CSS code thanks to using Adaptive Cards as your UI layer.
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