Inside Mac OS X Snow Leopard: Exchange Support
Windows Enthusiasts like to spin Apple's support for Exchange on the iPhone and in Snow Leopard as endorsement of Microsoft in the server space. From another angle, Apple is reducing its dependance upon Microsoft's client software …
Context & Ripple Effects
This is the latest entry in AppleInsider's 'Inside Mac OS X Snow Leopard' series, which has been dissecting what changed under the hood — after pieces on GPU optimization and, alongside CNET's read of an OS geared for a multicore future. Two years on from Leopard's 2007 release, Snow Leopard is being positioned as an internals-and-interoperability release rather than a features splash.
The Exchange angle carries a strategic subtext the piece itself frames: Windows enthusiasts read Apple's native Exchange support in Snow Leopard and on the iPhone as endorsement of Microsoft's server franchise, but the confirmed analysis cuts the other way — by speaking Exchange directly from Mail, iCal and Address Book, Apple shrinks its dependence on Microsoft's own Mac client software.
First-order effects
- Mac users inside Exchange organizations gain direct mail, calendar and contacts connectivity without Microsoft's Entourage client, removing the long-standing reason IT departments cited against Mac deployments.
- Microsoft's Mac Business Unit sees its most defensible product — the Exchange-compatible Office component — lose its monopoly position on the platform it was built to serve.
Second-order effects
- Enterprise evaluations of the Mac change shape: with the server-compatibility objection neutralized at the OS level, Microsoft must compete for Mac business customers on Office application merits alone rather than protocol gatekeeping.
- The same Exchange play on the iPhone extends the effect to mobility, where IT shops choosing handsets weigh native ActiveSync-class support against RIM's and Microsoft's own device ecosystems.
Third-order effects
- If the pattern holds, enterprise client choice decouples from server stack: vendors win desktop and handset share by implementing the incumbent server's wire protocols, eroding the client-license annuity that made Microsoft's cross-platform business durable.
The trend: Platform vendors are adopting their rival's server protocols to win enterprise clients, trading apparent endorsement for independence from the rival's client software.