Free! How Customers Buy Microsoft Products: Newly revealed information about Microsoft's sales channels shows why financial considerations may impact decisions about release dates
Connors, Strategist Take on Linux: Linux could slow Microsoft's expansion into servers and emerging markets; the company is fighting back with focused software packages and stepped-up government sales
OEM Patent Clause Cancelled: Microsoft will remove a clause from OEM contracts that prevents them from suing if Microsoft infringes on patents on technology they included in PCs
Eolas Reprieve Leads Legal News: Regulators will reexamine a controversial patent on Web browsing technology, meaning that Microsoft won't have to make disruptive changes to Internet Explorer, for now

Server Products

BizTalk Server Engine Reworked: BizTalk Server 2004’s new architecture improves Web services support, performance, and scalability, and allows nondevelopers to manipulate business logic. However, BizTalk 2002 applications will not run on the new platform
BizTalk 2004 Prepped for Healthcare: A new accelerator gives BizTalk Server 2004 support for HL7, a key healthcare standard, but also illustrates some limits to the role of partners on the BizTalk Server platform
E-Business Roadmap Shifts: Application integration, portal, and e-commerce products from Microsoft will proceed on parallel tracks rather than ship as an integrated bundle, according to the company's latest announcements
ISA Server 2004 More Flexible, Secure: The next version of Microsoft’s firewall and content caching product is now in beta for a mid-2004 release and contains improvements that should make it competitive with products from industry leaders CheckPoint and Cisco
SQL Server, Visual Studio Out to 2005: The next major releases of the SQL Server database management system and Visual Studio integrated development environment have been delayed to the first half of 2005

Windows and Mobile

Gates Outlines Future Security Efforts: Bill Gates used his RSA Conference keynote speech to explain Microsoft’s future plans to improve computer security and privacy
Source Code Leak Raises Issues: The illegal posting on the Internet of Microsoft’s source code for legacy versions of Windows raises many issues for Microsoft and its customers, including the potential for new security vulnerabilities

Business Applications and Services

MapPoint Web Service Offers More Coverage, Mobile Support: Version 3.5 of the MapPoint Web Service contains modest improvements, but the basic business and security models remain unchanged, preventing its use directly by desktop applications
InfoPath to Support Managed Code: Updates to InfoPath and Visual Studio .NET, due in June 2004, will allow developers to use Visual Studio .NET and the .NET Framework to build InfoPath solutions
Axapta Gets FrX Reports: Integration with the FRx financial reporting and analysis package will improve reporting in Axapta and signals Microsoft’s intent to consolidate financial reporting across its ERP product line on FRx
Outlook Vulnerability Raised to Critical: The roundup of security bulletins for March originally contained no critical updates, but Microsoft subsequently raised the Outlook vulnerability to critical

Sales and Support

Software Assurance Approaching Critical Deadline: As the deadline for renewing upgrade rights approaches in mid-2004, customers have many factors to consider in making a renewal decision
Building a Presence in Retail: Microsoft is trying to expand its role in retail by positioning key products as tools for store management, business intelligence, and supply-chain management



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