Microsoft Plows Under 'Kodiak' Name, Parses Out Promised Features

Now the plan is to parse out promised capabilities, better security, spam control, etc., in a more incremental release next year called Exchange Edge Services, company executives said Tuesday.

The Kodiak game plan had been bruited about for years now, and the cornerstone was to be a relational store based on SQL Server technology. Cracks started to appear in that game plan last year, as reported by CRN . Delays to the WinFS file system and Kodiak's dependency on that were an issue, sources said.

Kim Akers, senior director of Exchange Marketing, said the Longhorn/Yukon delays played a role in the decision but that the smaller-step approach was really mandated by customer demands for faster, incremental updates.

Microsoft first discussed the Exchange Edge Services concept at the annual RSA Conference earlier this year

The post Exchange Edge Services plan calls for updates to support the Longhorn operating system and 64-bit chips, as well as continued antispam and security improvements, Akers said. The company said it will also bulk up support for mobile devices.

Analysts have said Exchange is mired in a hard-fought battle for e-mail dominance with Lotus Domino with incursions from very inexpensive messaging options from Oracle and other insurgents.