Microsoft News Tracker

Press Release:

Microsoft Corp. today introduced controls and new sample code for Microsoft® Office Live Communications Server 2005, designed to make it easier for developers to combine presence and real-time collaboration capabilities with line-of-business applications. Software providers, such as BrightWork, K2.net, Meridio Inc., OSIsoft Inc., Siebel Systems Inc. and Singularity Ltd., are integrating presence and real-time collaboration features into their productivity and line-of-business applications to help make workers more productive and help people communicate more efficiently across organizations of all sizes.

Tightly abstracting:

Controls and new samples include these:

- Presence Controls for Microsoft Office Communicator 2005 (previously called Real-Time Collaboration Presence Toolkit) enable developers using Microsoft Visual Studio® development system to easily insert presence icons into applications to provide status information of contacts.

- Role Agent Sample for Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005 provides a sample implementation of role-based instant messaging and presence.

- Custom Alerting Application Sample for Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005 shows how to build an application that allows team members to determine whether other team members are online, and to send an instant notification to those members.

There are also details on what each of the partners is doing with “presence.”

Microsoft blogger “NathanA” has the details:

WSE 3 Beta has been released on MSDN here. It requires the VS2005 August CTP. As always, we love to hear your feedback.

For some background see the paper by Mark Fussell titled What’s New in Web Services Enhancements (WSE) 3.0.

Almost overlooked with the buzz over the the announcement of Google Talk and MSN Messenger 7.5, Skype also released IM developer tools:

VoIP giant Skype is now letting Web sites and other Internet applications tap into the pool of people using the Luxembourg-based company’s instant-messaging service.

The company on Wednesday unleashed its SkypeWeb and SkypeNet developer tools. By doing so, the company says, it’s opening up its platform to people who wants to integrate Skype Instant Messaging–a lesser-known feature of Skype–into their applications.

Gene Koprowski has some analysis of the whole IM scene.

(Via InsideMicrosoft) John Mello Jr. reports at TechNewsWorld that Microsoft Tests Rent-a-Game Market

Renting entertainment could be the wave of the future, and Microsoft isn’t about to miss it.

The company that brought us “Janus,” the digital rights management (DRM) scheme that allows subscription music services like Napster On The Go to exist, has announced a deal with Exent, of Bethesda, Md., a provider of “games on demand” technology.

Under the agreement, Microsoft will allow six of its most popular personal computer games to be delivered to online gamers through Exent’s on-demand technology, which is used by broadband providers such as Comcast , Yahoo , Bell Canada, Turner Broadcasting and RCN.

Licensed to the on-demand service — which costs from US$4.95 to $14.95 a month for access to anywhere from 50 to 300 titles — are Microsoft’s “Age of Empire,” “Age of Mythology,” “Dungeon Siege,” “Mechwarrior,” “Rise of Nations” and “Zoo Tycoon” product lines.

More details and analysis by following the link, but the key question is whether or not this is a hit on retail sale of PC games. Opinions vary.

According to a note from Doug Girard at the BPID Customer Response Team’s Blog, you can apply for the open beta program to try it out. You may recall that BizTalk Server 2006 is scheduled for launch on Nov. 7.