Entourage 2008 and Exchange...

I

Ian Robinson

Do we have a definitive answer yet to the question about Entourage 2008
and Exchange 2007 servers and services? Will the Entourage 2008
application be able to natively access an Exchange server like an
Outlook client? Will Entourage 2008 be a "native" client application
for Exchange like Outlook (and not use POP3 or SMTP access, unless you
want it to)?

Ian
 
W

William Smith

Ian said:
Do we have a definitive answer yet to the question about Entourage 2008
and Exchange 2007 servers and services? Will the Entourage 2008
application be able to natively access an Exchange server like an
Outlook client? Will Entourage 2008 be a "native" client application
for Exchange like Outlook (and not use POP3 or SMTP access, unless you
want it to)?
Click to expand...

Hi Ian!

What's your definition of "native"?

Microsoft has already confirmed new Exchange specific features in
Entourage 2008, so we know it will interact with an Exchange server as a
client. But Entourage 2004 is already an Exchange client that can access
mail, contacts and calendars.

If you're asking whether or not Entourage 2008 will have feature parity
with Outlook then you'll probably have to wait on that.

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
 
A

Alan Septoff

I'm specifically interested in knowing if Entourage will support RPC
over HTTP. Does anyone know about that?
Thanks,
Alan
 
W

William Smith

Alan said:
I'm specifically interested in knowing if Entourage will support RPC
over HTTP. Does anyone know about that?
Thanks,
Click to expand...

Hi Alan!

No announcement has been made about that but I would say "highly
unlikely" since it already accomplishes the same result using WebDAV,
which also works over HTTP
<http://entourage.mvps.org/exchange/exchangeathome.html>.

Hope this helps!

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
 
I

Ian Robinson

What's your definition of "native"?

Microsoft has already confirmed new Exchange specific features in
Entourage 2008, so we know it will interact with an Exchange server as a
client. But Entourage 2004 is already an Exchange client that can access
mail, contacts and calendars.
Click to expand...

Can it send and receive mail from an Exchange 200x Server by directly
talking to the mailbox server using the same protocol as Outlook? Not
via SMTP and POP3.

Ian
 
W

William Smith

Ian said:
Can it send and receive mail from an Exchange 200x Server by directly
talking to the mailbox server using the same protocol as Outlook? Not
via SMTP and POP3.
Click to expand...

You mean MAPI then. If that's your definition of "native" then even
Exchange Server itself may not be native at some point in the future.
The MAPI protocol is one of the items that has been "de-emphasized" in
Exchange Server 2007, which means it may potentially be phased out in
some future version.
<http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa997614.aspx>

Any limitations in functionality that you're attributing to the lack of
the MAPI protocol are more likely attributable to a smaller development
staff with much more limited resources working on Entourage.

Also, Entourage 2004 connects to an Exchange Server via WebDAV. That's
not MAPI but it's also not POP3/SMTP and it's not IMAP.

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
 
I

Ian Robinson

You mean MAPI then. If that's your definition of "native" then even
Exchange Server itself may not be native at some point in the future.
The MAPI protocol is one of the items that has been "de-emphasized" in
Exchange Server 2007, which means it may potentially be phased out in
some future version.
<http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa997614.aspx>
Click to expand...

I know that. That's why I didn't write MAPI. But anyway, I'll probably
be at the launch day event on 14th January at MacWorld. I'll find out
then :)

Ian
 
W

William Smith

Ian said:
I know that. That's why I didn't write MAPI. But anyway, I'll probably
be at the launch day event on 14th January at MacWorld. I'll find out
then :)
Click to expand...

I was lucky enough to attend my first Macworld back in January. What an
event! 2008 should be a great show for a lot of products but it will be
quite some time before any product steals the show quite like the iPhone
did.

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
 
J

Jeff Clayton

Come to that, I note with concern that WebDAV is also on the list of
"de-emphasized legacy protocols" for Exchange 2007. If Entourage 2008 will be
dependent on WebDAV as before, then (in the eyes of an Exchange Server admin)
the new Entourage is a legacy client before it's even code-complete.

The disparity between Entourage and Outlook could be getting worse, not
better. What good is a sexier Calendar if Exchange ignores your client
altogether?
 
W

William Smith

Jeff said:
Come to that, I note with concern that WebDAV is also on the list of
"de-emphasized legacy protocols" for Exchange 2007. If Entourage 2008 will be
dependent on WebDAV as before, then (in the eyes of an Exchange Server admin)
the new Entourage is a legacy client before it's even code-complete.

The disparity between Entourage and Outlook could be getting worse, not
better. What good is a sexier Calendar if Exchange ignores your client
altogether?
Click to expand...

Very astute observation. Yes, Entourage's current and announced Exchange
support for Exchange Server 2007 and beyond will have to change to
some other mechanism. Keep in mind that de-emphasized does not
necessarily mean "dead in the next version" but I personally wouldn't
write any code against de-emphasized methods or protocols.

To play devil's advocate, the fact that Exchange is changing in this
manner may also mean that writing Entourage to connect may become
easier. We'll see...

--

bill

William M. Smith, Microsoft Interop MVP - Mac/Windows
Entourage Help Page <http://entourage.mvps.org/>
Entourage Help Blog <http://blog.entourage.mvps.org/>
 
J

Jeff Clayton

Naturally hoping that Entourage and Outlook/Exchange evolve together just as
you say. If the news on this is going to be good, I think it odd that I
haven't heard a whisper of it anywhere.

From my POV, the only thing wrong with Entourage using WebDAV would be that
it might annoy administrators who already resent Macintosh "exceptionalism."
When actually, if the Mac client needs special handling, that is only due to
unfortunate internal issues at Microsoft.

-- TNX/jc
 
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