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New Entourage version goes to public beta!

petvas

petvas

macrumors 603
Original poster
Jul 20, 2006
5,479
1,809
Munich, Germany
I don't know about you guys but I am excited! This new version supports Exchange 2007 SP1 with Rollup 4 or later natively! Autodiscovery, Tasks sync, notes sync and categories sync is also fully supported. The best thing is that when ready it will be available to all Entourage customers for free (Standard or Media Edition of Office)
http://www.officeformac.com/.59b6a217

"Say hello to Exchange Web Services; The future of Entourage!

I’m excited to tell you about the future for Entourage connectivity to Exchange Server! We’ve transitioned away from WebDAV, and today we are announcing the public beta of the Entourage for Exchange Web Services client. With this new client, not only are we taking advantage of the Exchange Web Services connectivity, but we are also delivering some new user features such as:

* Tasks, Notes, and Categories now sync with the Exchange Server
* Resolving names against the Global Address List now works via EWS/HTTP. This means you no longer need to be connected to your corporate network via VPN to resolve names when addressing an e-mail or meeting invitation
* Improved Autodiscover. In Entourage for Exchange Web Services Beta, the Autodiscover service keeps user account settings up-to-date after the account setup.
• It runs in the background every time that you start Entourage.
• It also runs at a server-defined interval, typically every hour, to make sure that the Exchange Server settings are always kept up-to-date"

You will need to registert to get the new beta. Acceptance to the beta can take up to 48 hours..I am still waiting to be accepted to the beta. I cant wait..

http://www.microsoft.com/mac/itpros/entourage-ews.mspx

EDIT: It is not a new Entourage but a client that runs as a daemon on Mac every time Entourage starts!
 
I'm not sure what you mean when you say "It is not a new Entourage but a client that runs as a daemon on Mac every time Entourage starts!" We haven't made any changes to the UI of Entourage for this beta, that's true. However, under the covers, the whole back-end for how we talk to Exchange 2007 has been changed. In Entourage 2008, we talk to Exchange via WebDAV. Now, in this beta, we talk to Exchange 2007 servers via Exchange Web Services (EWS). EWS is faster than WebDAV, and gives us the ability to implement features that we couldn't via WebDAV. (Actually, we began to introduce EWS features in Entourage 2008. Support of Ex2007's OOF, for example, is done via EWS.)

If you're on Exchange 2007 (SP1, RU4 or later) and are willing to check out beta software, give it a go. If you're on an earlier version of Exchange, do not download it -- it won't connect to your Exchange account. If you use POP or IMAP, you can check it out if you want to, but it won't make a difference because we haven't touched the code there.

I've posted a bunch of details about this to my blog, including the following:
top Entourage questions at Macworld today (this was right after we announced the beta, so we got lots of questions at Macworld about it)
Q&A: Should I participate in the Entourage public beta? (if you're not sure whether this beta is for you)
Entourage EWS beta available now (more details about what's in the beta)

Regards,
Nadyne.
 
nadyne said:
I'm not sure what you mean when you say "It is not a new Entourage but a client that runs as a daemon on Mac every time Entourage starts!" We haven't made any changes to the UI of Entourage for this beta, that's true. However, under the covers, the whole back-end for how we talk to Exchange 2007 has been changed. In Entourage 2008, we talk to Exchange via WebDAV. Now, in this beta, we talk to Exchange 2007 servers via Exchange Web Services (EWS). EWS is faster than WebDAV, and gives us the ability to implement features that we couldn't via WebDAV. (Actually, we began to introduce EWS features in Entourage 2008. Support of Ex2007's OOF, for example, is done via EWS.)

If you're on Exchange 2007 (SP1, RU4 or later) and are willing to check out beta software, give it a go. If you're on an earlier version of Exchange, do not download it -- it won't connect to your Exchange account. If you use POP or IMAP, you can check it out if you want to, but it won't make a difference because we haven't touched the code there.

I've posted a bunch of details about this to my blog, including the following:
top Entourage questions at Macworld today (this was right after we announced the beta, so we got lots of questions at Macworld about it)
Q&A: Should I participate in the Entourage public beta? (if you're not sure whether this beta is for you)
Entourage EWS beta available now (more details about what's in the beta)

Regards,
Nadyne.
Click to expand...

So it is a completely new Entourage? I thought it was only an addon. If you read the official announcement it seems like that. Anyway I am excited and awaiting acceptance to the beta.
 
petvas said:
So it is a completely new Entourage? I thought it was only an addon. If you read the official announcement it seems like that. Anyway I am excited and awaiting acceptance to the beta.
Click to expand...

It's a new version of Entourage. When you open it up, it'll look the same as Entourage 2008 -- we haven't made any changes to the UI. However, we ripped out the entire back-end for how we talk to Exchange. Under the covers, that's all brand-spankin'-new code.

Since we have such specific requirements for Exchange in this beta, we're approving applications to the beta programme manually. It's taking us 24-48 hours. If it's been more than 48 hours since you applied, check your spam folder, or simply go back to Microsoft Connect and check your dashboard there.

Regards,
Nadyne.
 
nadyne said:
It's a new version of Entourage. When you open it up, it'll look the same as Entourage 2008 -- we haven't made any changes to the UI. However, we ripped out the entire back-end for how we talk to Exchange. Under the covers, that's all brand-spankin'-new code.

Since we have such specific requirements for Exchange in this beta, we're approving applications to the beta programme manually. It's taking us 24-48 hours. If it's been more than 48 hours since you applied, check your spam folder, or simply go back to Microsoft Connect and check your dashboard there.

Regards,
Nadyne.
Click to expand...

I was accepted to the beta program but couldnt install Entourage. More on the connect website...
 
Although I applaud the effort to improve Entourage, I suspect that with the upcoming native Exchange support in Snow Leopard Mail and iCal this may be too little, too late for a lot of people.
 
alFR said:
Although I applaud the effort to improve Entourage, I suspect that with the upcoming native Exchange support in Snow Leopard Mail and iCal this may be too little, too late for a lot of people.
Click to expand...

Yes, maybe but at the moment Entourage is our only option
 
nadyne said:
It's a new version of Entourage. When you open it up, it'll look the same as Entourage 2008 -- we haven't made any changes to the UI. However, we ripped out the entire back-end for how we talk to Exchange. Under the covers, that's all brand-spankin'-new code.

Since we have such specific requirements for Exchange in this beta, we're approving applications to the beta programme manually. It's taking us 24-48 hours. If it's been more than 48 hours since you applied, check your spam folder, or simply go back to Microsoft Connect and check your dashboard there.

Regards,
Nadyne.
Click to expand...


Man,
Someone had the stupid idea of messing with the Exchange Server at my company, which rendered all out Macs useless since yesterday, and it's making me have the lousiest weekend.

Can you somehow hurry up the beta acceptance ?
 
This is good news and a step in the right direction, however we'll be dropping Entourage for 10.6 as soon as it's out.
 
Sky Blue said:
This is good news and a step in the right direction, however we'll be dropping Entourage for 10.6 as soon as it's out.
Click to expand...

Let us first see if the Apple applications will natively support Exchange. Exchange 14 is also coming this year and I would very much like to know if it will be supported in Snow Leopard.
 
nadyne said:
Since we have such specific requirements for Exchange in this beta, we're approving applications to the beta programme manually. It's taking us 24-48 hours. If it's been more than 48 hours since you applied, check your spam folder, or simply go back to Microsoft Connect and check your dashboard there.
Click to expand...


Do you mean 24-48 working hours ?
I'm really needing this.
 
Man I have really had some hit and miss issues with entourage and exchange. we use remotely hosted liveoffice.com I've got 4 systems running entourage, one of them worked, no problems, the other 3 want nothing to do with it, all the settings are exactly the same so it makes no sense. Maybe the new version will work better, let's hope.

I know I will get shunned for this, but I actually like entourage I like the integration of the calendar, contacts and email.
 
nadyne said:
It's a new version of Entourage. When you open it up, it'll look the same as Entourage 2008 -- we haven't made any changes to the UI. However, we ripped out the entire back-end for how we talk to Exchange. Under the covers, that's all brand-spankin'-new code.

Since we have such specific requirements for Exchange in this beta, we're approving applications to the beta programme manually. It's taking us 24-48 hours. If it's been more than 48 hours since you applied, check your spam folder, or simply go back to Microsoft Connect and check your dashboard there.

Regards,
Nadyne.
Click to expand...


Any news regarding the acceptance of beta testers ?
I requested it on Thursday, and I haven't got any feedback since then.
 
Have both versions on the same computer?

Nadyne, or anyone who's installed it so far,

Is it possible to have both the beta and the shipping version installed on the same computer? While I'm excited for the new version, naturally I'm a little gun shy.

I know that being a little gun shy is typically red flag #1 for someone wanting to install beta software, but I can deal with it if need be. Having both would just be the best of all worlds until I'm sure of it's performance.

Thanks,

Paul

PS- Though I sense an undercurrent of anti-MS sentiment in some of the posts, I just want to say thanks for doing this to the MS folks!
 
tafinho said:
Any news regarding the acceptance of beta testers ?
I requested it on Thursday, and I haven't got any feedback since then.
Click to expand...

It takes a couple of working days for applications to be processed. Check your spam folder, or your dashboard on the Microsoft Connect site, if you haven't received a response within 2 working days.

Regards,
Nadyne.
 
paulyras said:
Is it possible to have both the beta and the shipping version installed on the same computer? While I'm excited for the new version, naturally I'm a little gun shy.
Click to expand...

Sorry, but you can't have both the beta and Entourage 2008 on your computer at the same time.

Before installing the beta, make sure that you have done a complete back-up of your Microsoft User Data folder (regardless of whether you're gun-shy about betas or not!). That way, if you decide to reinstall Entourage 2008, you can go back to it without a problem.

Regards,
Nadyne.
 
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