Bonum Certa Men Certa

What (In)Compatibility Games is Microsoft up to With Exchange 2007?

"You should make sure it [DR-DOS] has problems in the future : )"

--Jim Allchin, Microsoft (RE: dri/novell/ibm)



Story contributed by an anonymous site reader

Tbout a year ago, we got a new President who came from Brown University, which is an Ivy League institution that has switched to MS Exchange for e-mail. He more or less demanded that we offer Exchange as well. We now offer Exchange for faculty and staff. I had to fight pretty hard to maintain my non-Exchange e-mail account. We also have a CIO who is appropriately skeptical of Microsoft and wants to retain a non-Microsoft e-mail alternative.

“They also don't know when the functionality broke and there's no word on when it will be fixed.”That is the background. The crux is that I am now forced to use Exchange calendar if I want to set up a meeting with someone. Since I rarely use the calendar, I just access it via the Web interface using Firefox or Konqueror from my Linux desktop. Until recently, this has worked adequately.

However, they have recently been trying to do an "in-place upgrade" from Exchange 2003 to Exchange 2007. Now I find that when I try to schedule a meeting, the part which shows the availability of the attendees looks like gibberish. When I switched to using Windows XP and Internet Explorer under a virtual machine, everything suddenly worked fine. Out Windows admins claim that they did know about this problem until I raised it. They also don't know when the functionality broke and there's no word on when it will be fixed.

You might be interested in hearing the travails of someone who is trying to keep Windows at least at arm's length but who find it challenging.

[Editor's note: It is a similar situation over here. An Exchange server is very unstable, based on personal experience, but luckily I never use it. I've also come across stories about IE-only features in Sharepoint.]

My instinct tells me that this little upgrade problem is intentionally created by Microsoft. I also remember from a previous job that one of my colleagues was very keen to "upgrade" our Linux mail server, which I had set up, to Exchange. Somewhere along the way, I found out that Microsoft recommended disabling the POP and IMAP protocols "for security reasons." (It's very "deja vu" in light of the recent revelation of a recent Microsoft patch to Office which disables old file formats, again "for security reasons.")

“There is also the truism that, if it only supports a recent version of Microsoft software, that would tend to produce more fiscal security for Microsoft.”I suppose that would be more secure ... for them. There are the truisms that the fewer network ports you open, the less exposure you have or, the simpler the software, the more reliable and secure it should be. There is also the truism that, if it only supports a recent version of Microsoft software, that would tend to produce more fiscal security for Microsoft.

There are some relevant quotes to add here, e.g.:

Joe Wilcox in 14 June 2006:

""When you speak about interoperability do you mean across different platforms, like Windows and Unix, or among different versions of Windows, like XP and 2000." He meant among different versions of Windows."

[Editor's note: This isn't a rare situation. Only about a year ago, Microsoft published articles that speak about "cross-platform" where platforms only include Windows, Windows mobile, and XBox. This is yet another case and also an excellent examples where one is creating confusion. It's almost akin to calling software "open source" when it strictly requires Windows, Sharepoint and other proprietary products merely to be runnable.]

Brad Chase (of Microsoft) once wrote:

"We will bind the shell to the Internet Explorer, so that running any other browser is a jolting experience."

[Editor's note: Yesterday, Slashdot had an item/article about almost the very same issue. Firefox being pushed out of some companies by Internet Explorer-only Web-based software.]

That's not surprising at all. Exchange itself has two Web interface modes: basic and enhanced. "basic" mode is available under all browsers, but "enhanced" is only available under Internet Explorer. Our Exchange upgrade broke "basic" mode while "enhanced" mode continued to work.

Fortunately, in our environment, we do care about interoperability with browsers like Firefox. We're a university, not a corporation, so the attitude here is that "we can't dictate the software our users prefer to use, so we take pains to support reasonably common software." So this upgrade problem will cause the Windows guys to spend some more time on the upgrade and recall the consultant they retained until the non-Microsoft browsers work again.

The problem is generic enough with ample supporting material.

Recent Techrights' Posts

Slopwatch: LinuxSecurity, UbuntuPIT, and Google News
We've also just noticed more slop from UbuntuPIT
 
Links 09/10/2025: Farewell to Jane Goodall, California Bans Algorithmic Price-Fixing
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Lost Wages and a Saga Of Continuing To Use Palm PDAs
Links for the day
Richard Stallman's Talk in Helsinki is Done. Tomorrow Göteborg.
There are scarce details in Finnish about Dr. Stallman's talk
New XBox Leaks Probably Serve to Confirm XBox's Collapse (Many More Layoffs)
It's very much consistent with what many other sites have reported lately
The Slop Song
The train wreck marches on
LLM Slop/Advanced Plagiarism Flooding the Zone With Capital That Does Not Exist
Many publishers out there still participate in this bubble instead of calling it what it is
Links 09/10/2025: Sacked Microsoft Workers Make "Sackbird", IBM Taps CockroachDB for PostgreSQL
Links for the day
"Happy Hacking Day" Richard Stallman Talk This Afternoon (From 14:00 to 16:00) at Haaga-Helia University in Pasila
Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Finland
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Wednesday, October 08, 2025
IRC logs for Wednesday, October 08, 2025
Links 09/10/2025: Impact of Microsoft Layoffs, More Data Breaches
Links for the day
Gemini Links 09/10/2025: Autumn Blues and C IRC Bot
Links for the day
Slopwatch Appreciated by Real Authors of GNU/Linux Articles
We do try to keep on top of those things
Upgraded R.R.R.R.R.R. Today
The Web of 2025 is full of garbage, not limited to slopfarms
Freedom From Proprietary Prisons
Forking always an option
IBM's Watson Died in 1956, Now Watson Dies Again
IBM is becoming just a reseller of GAFAM and other stuff
Microsoft Says That Constant Mass Layoffs Are Success, the Media Isn't Buying This Microsoft Narrative Anymore
If people in the media feel an obligation to repeat whatever lies Microsoft tells, what point will there be to the media?
Links 08/10/2025: "Mali Puts Free Speech on Trial" And Apple Enforces Dictatorship
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: ‘Death to Spotify’ and Law to Ban Loud Commercials on Streaming (Dis)Services
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Real Innovation and Nina.chat is Dead
Links for the day
Links 08/10/2025: Y2K38 Bug is a Vulnerability, Chat Control in Europe a Threat
Links for the day
Microsoft Windows is No Longer an Operating System, It's Surveillance Project
Why is this even legal to preload on PCs outside the US?
How and Why Once-Legitimate Sites Turn Into Slopfarms
Many sites will go offline and many social control networks will shut down once they realise or even openly admit they spend money and time gardening a bunch of bots and slop
UbuntuPIT Became a Slopfarm and Gnoppix Tarnishes Its Own Brand With Slop
It fits all the characteristics of mildly-edited (if at all) slop
Slopwatch: Linux Journal and Other Slopfarms
GAFAM needs to go the way of the dodo
Gemini Links 08/10/2025: "Seek Seek Revolution" and Gradient Backgrounds
Links for the day
Qualcomm Arduino Takes Aim at Raspberry Pi
Qualcomm is a Microsoft partner
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Tuesday, October 07, 2025
IRC logs for Tuesday, October 07, 2025
Stagnation of the Economy and What Free Software Can (or Could) Do For It
If your economic model is based on a pyramid of lies, it won't last very long
Social Control Media is Sinking
it would rightly seem like the era of centralised "social" sites (they're not social, they're about controlling the users) is ending, not overnight but gradually
Participation in Cancel Culture Detrimental to One's Career
A cautionary tale
Passion Wins
we've increased the number of birds we feed to 100+
How Solderpunk and Sean Conner Started Gemini Protocol (and, Collectively, Geminispace) Back in 2019
Based on the "official" history
Arduino is Now a Patent Bully (Qualcomm)
Qualcomm has just bought Arduino
Many Years of Microsoft Cancellations and Faked (Acquired) Revenue "Growth"
XBox is basically the "next Skype"
The Comment TheLayoff.com Has Just Censored for Criticising a Ridiculous Puff Piece of IBM Management
If comments get censored for their "style" rather than their substance, then society will be worse off
The Power of Writing Down Facts
The more we write and publish, the more people will know what happened
Microsoft's Non-Denying Denial About XBox's Death is Already Being Shattered to Pieces
Like Microsoft's 'open' 'hey hi', heralding meaningless non-committing agreements with AMD is little more than vapourware
Slopwatch: UbuntuPIT Joins the Slopfarms Club
Slopfarms gonna slop
Links 07/10/2025: Privacy at Risk, GAFAM Remains Off the Hook
Links for the day
Gemini Links 07/10/2025: Modern Retro Console Idea and Batch vs Bash
Links for the day
Links 07/10/2025: International Criminal Court (ICC) Convicts Ali Kushayb; Moroccan Imprisoned for 'Offensive' Shirt
Links for the day
Links 07/10/2025: EU' Chat Control is Back, US Cracks Down on Democracy
Links for the day
Techrights Pursues Justice and Truth Because, Without Those, Society Descends Into Chaos
most people reject dogma and pseudoscience
Upcoming Talks by Richard Stallman in Helsinki, Göteborg, and Rome
Join with him and share the software
Something Bad is Happening in the Open Source Initiative (OSI)
The latest OSI blog post is from a Microsoft operative and a few weeks ago the Executive Director left
TLS 1.3 Dominates Geminispace (99% of Known Capsules)
it's nowadays safe to assume almost every capsule can handle TLS 1.3
Why soylentnews.org Has Been Having Technical Difficulties Lately
The network has been going up and down quite a lot this past week
A Statement Against Violence
The facts are on our side
They've Run Out of Things to Rebrand or Label as "AI"
The next few years will be interesting because if Microsoft lays off tens of thousands of workers each year, there won't be much left except mountains of debt and dying brands
The Register MS is Still Being Paid to Participate in the "AI" Ponzi Scheme Which Will Crash the Economy
The Register MS is hoping to get lucky by tricking people into a scam
Richard Stallman Confirms His Talk in Göteborg This Coming Friday
"The hosts say that the list will not be given to the state"
Most of the "Linux" Results This Morning in Google News Are LLM Slop From the Same Slopfarm, Plagiarising Phoronix
The main question is, does Google even care at this point?
Gemini Links 07/10/2025: Civil War and "Goodbye Web"
Links for the day
Over at Tux Machines...
GNU/Linux news for the past day
IRC Proceedings: Monday, October 06, 2025
IRC logs for Monday, October 06, 2025