Identifying Mobile Devices to Be Supported

With the release of Exchange 2003, organizations no longer have to purchase add-on products to support access of emails, calendars, contacts, and other Exchange information from Pocet PC or mobile phone devices. As long as a mobile device is supported by Exchange 2003, it just needs to be configured properly and the device will connect to Exchange.

Over the past few years , however, there have been many different versions of the Windows CE and Pocket PC operating system and dozens of different mobile phone/mobile Web access standards. Those supported by Exchange 2003 and highlighted in this chapter include

• Pocket PC 2002 (using ActiveSync)

• Pocket PC 2003 (using ActiveSync)

• Smartphone 2003 (using ActiveSync)

• xHTML used in WAP 2.x devices (using Outlook Mobile Access)

• cHTML (using Outlook Mobile Access)

• HTML browser-based (using Outlook Mobile Access or Outlook Web Access)

Windows CE 2.0 or CE 3.0 devices supported Outlook synchronization, but the operating system supported only cradle-based synchronization. An option that was added in the Pocket PC 2002 and Pocket PC 2003 operating system was a tab that enabled the user to enter the IP address or DNS name of an Exchange server to access. Windows CE 2.0 and 3.0 devices associated with only a PC connection. A user who has an Internet-connected Windows CE device or a CE device that has network or wireless connectivity, however, can access Exchange 2003 using the HTML browser-based access. The user with those devices performs a real-time lookup and view of email messages, calendar appointments, contacts, and other Exchange information. The difference is in the ability to synchronize the information for offline access that is built in to the Pocket PC 2002 and 2003 versions of the operating system.

Other organizations might have devices running on the Palm operating system, such as Palm PDAs, Sony Clie, or Handspring devices. The Palm OS devices do not directly synchronize with Exchange 2003, although third-party gateway products have existed since Exchange 5.5 and Exchange 2000; these gateway products connect to an Exchange 2003 environment for synchronization of the Palm OS devices. Just like the support for the Windows CE 2.0 and 3.0 devices, Palm OS devices can access Exchange 2003 email, calendar, and contacts using the Outlook Mobile Access or Outlook Web Access functionality. Using the Web access “based methods to communicate, a Palm OS device can have real-time access to Outlook information; however, the information is not synchronized for offline access.