MS at Macworld 2009

Using Macworld as a jumping point, Microsoft has announced two new pieces of Mac software. The first is the Document Collaboration Companion, a Cocoa-based tool which should simplify uploading and downloading to Office Live Workspaces as well as SharePoint-based collaboration utilities. Users will be able to check documents in and out, cache them offline, and access services such as a Document Library plus the SharePoint and Office Live Workspaces. A private beta is expected to become available in February, followed by a final release later this year.

Microsoft has meanwhile announced that Entourage, its Mac e-mail client, will be switching from WebDAV reliance to Exchange Web Services, for the sake of "better compatibility, performance and reliability." It should also enable support for sync of Tasks, Notes and Categories on servers running Exchange Server 2007 SP1 or better. A public beta of Entourage EWS is due sometime in January, though the completed product will only be delivered through an Office 2008 update later in 2009.

by MacNN Staff