Mobile Server Goes Into Exchange, ISA

Mobile Information Server (MIS) 2002 Enterprise Edition will be the last release of Microsoft’s gateway product for connecting mobile devices to applications running on Windows networks. The decision is part of a strategy to integrate mobile device support into established server products, which could make it easier and cheaper for companies to support mobile users and help Microsoft and its partners compete in the wireless arena. The most-used feature of MIS-the Outlook Mobile Access connector to Exchange-will become part of Exchange. The product’s other major function, wireless log-on to Windows networks, will be taken over by Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server, Microsoft’s proxy and caching server, or by an as-yet-unnamed network security product. Both the new release of Exchange and the wireless log-on solution should be available in beta form in the first half of 2003.

MIS 2002 Enterprise Edition was released in Feb. 2002 and is still available. Its most important new feature is server synchronization, which enables Pocket PC users to use Pocket Outlook to store and edit e-mail and other Exchange data locally while offline, then synchronize their local data with an Exchange server when they come back online. (See “Pocket PC 2002 Targets Corporations“.) Also continuing is MIS Carrier Edition, a product that service providers (currently, Vodafone and MobileSys) use to offer enhanced notification services such as encrypted notifications to companies that have MIS Enterprise Edition.