09/06/2007, 12:05am, EDT
Thursday, September 6th
MS: new 'OOF' feature in Entourage 2008
As part of teaser campaign leading to the Office 2008 launch, Microsoft has announced new features that it will add to Entourage 2008, including new direct access to "Out of Office" ("OOF") features and improved Exchange support in Entourage. The company said that Office 2008, recently delayed until January of 2008, has updated Exchange support as well as will offer improved calendaring support. "We’ve worked closely with enterprise customers to prioritize features and improvements in Entourage 2008," the company wrote in its corporate blog. "As well, we have established an unprecedented level of collaboration between the Entourage team and the Exchange team, and we will continue to invest in strengthening that relationship to ensure that future versions of Entourage work great with Exchange."
The Mac BU said it is committed to delivering a world class Exchange client that delivers on enterprise customer needs in Office 2008 and beyond, including connectivity for Office for Mac with other enterprise level technologies.
Microsoft's upcoming OOF features in Office 2008 will allow any user to configure his Exchange account to automatically reply to incoming messages with a quick note telling the sender that he is not able to respond because he is currently out of the office. Currently, customers must login into Outlook Web Access to both turn on the feature as well as turn off the feature when he signs back on to his account.
Entourage 2008, part of the next-generation Office 2008, will offer the ability to configure "Out of Office" settings without from within the (Universal) application. It will offer option to send separate replies based on who sent you a message and the ability to set begin and end dates for the message. The updated software uses web services to communicate with the server--much the same way Outlook 2007 does. Exchange 2000 and 2003 servers will offer basic functionality; however, the more advanced features under “more options” will not be available.
Microsoft also said it would provide an updated Office Resource Kit as part of its updates for Office 2008 and promised more Entourage-specific articles on TechNet, its public online documentation area.
More information is available on the company's blog.
Filed under: software
Other story tags: business software
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Of course, I didn't overlook this gem "The Mac BU said it is committed to delivering a world class Exchange client that delivers on enterprise customer needs in Office 2008 and beyond, including connectivity for Office for Mac with other enterprise level technologies."
Yet, unfortunately, this is what the MacBU team has always been 'committing' to, but sadly always failed to deliver on.
At this rate, especially after meetings with the MacBU Exchange guy this past MacWorld, where they confirmed not only to be aware of all the Exchange/delegates issues in Office 2004, and that they won't be fixed, but also that they won't address them, for sure, in Entourage 2008 -- so, for all I am concerned, these guys can just talk until they are blue in the face, I'm certainly not going to believe them.
Apple Mail, iWorks' Pages and Numbers certainly works very well. Once iCal joins in Exchange support, there will be no more need for Office 208 - well, except as a pleasure blanket for myopic IT departments.
Who's with me?
I have given up hope on them ever adding MAPI support and making Entourage a proper Exchange client, instead of the half-assed one that it has been since Entourage 10.1.4 was released. Such support is clearly not coming in 2008, if they're reduced to shouting about adding Out of Office.
For my Exchange-using clients running PPC machines, I have a minimal Classic install so they can run Outlook 2001. For the clients with Intel Macs I recommend Parallels or Crossover and the Windows version of Outlook.
You -can- view a calendar when setting up an event, but it's not remotely the same thing. Also, Entourage doesn't view global addressbooks so as new people are added to the company (10 so far this year!) they have to be manually added.
Please MacBU -- make Entourage a first-class Outlook citizen.
Meanwhile I wait (and wait) for someone to develop a new open standard to unseat Exchange.
Uh, what?
MS has every incentive to keep decent Exchange compatibility to their OS's and none to provide support to other platforms.
Tell your IT department to get out of the Exchange Rut and try the better options: Notes Scalix GroupWise Zimbra
Any of them would be a better replacement than the POS Called Exchange.