Gartner: Exchange Support in New Mac OS Will Create End User Demand

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Gartner: Exchange Support in New Mac OS Will Create End User Demand

Aug
27

By: switchtoamac at: 10:12 AM on August 27, 2009 | Comments (0)

In a August 26, 2009 report, Gartner authors Michael A. Silver and Matthew W. Cain take the stance that native support for Microsoft Exchange 2007 support in Mac OS X Snow Leopard will spur end user demand for Macs in the enterprise. The note however that although Macs will be more easily used in the enterprise, Macs will not necessarily replace Windows-based PCs in many organizations.

Analysis
"From an enterprise perspective, the most important feature is the ability for the Mac e-mail client to access Microsoft Exchange (2007 version only) in a native fashion. The Mac client binds to Exchange Web Services (EWS) via its Web services application programming interface (API), not the traditional messaging application programming interface (MAPI), which is difficult to write to and maintain. We expect that by the end of the year, this ability ó combined with an improved version of Entourage, the e-mail client in Microsoft's Office: Mac ó will result in growing end-user demand for IT groups to grant support for the Mac."

"While native support for Exchange will allow users to run their Macs at work more easily, this does not mean that Macs can more easily replace Windows PCs in most organizations. Apple is not addressing enterprise needs for service or support, and most organizations will continue to require Windows to run a majority of their applications. Furthermore, to the extent Mac users may still require Office, either natively on Mac OS or running in a Windows virtual machine, native Exchange support, which does not support Outlook personal store files (PSTs), will address only part of the user need"

Gartner then goes on and provides recommendations for both enterprises and IT groups. Overall, the indicated that Mac use in the enterprise is likely to increase.

You can read the analysis here (PDF).