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Microsoft Agrees To License ActiveSync To Google
Posted by
kdawson
on Mon Feb 09, 2009 07:13 PM
from the kitchen-sync dept.
from the kitchen-sync dept.
JacobSteelsmith writes "Microsoft agreed today to license ActiveSync to Google. Google is using ActiveSync as part of Google Sync, which enables the synchronization of data between mobile devices and, presumably, Google Calendar and your contacts stored at Google. 'Microsoft's vice president of intellectual property and licensing, Horacio Gutierrez, said in a statement that the Google license is "a great example of Microsoft's openness to generally license our patents under fair and reasonable terms so long as licensees respect Microsoft intellectual property."'"
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Cue Activesync Connector for Android (Score:3, Funny)
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Cue the tiresome overused joke in 3...2... oh, wait, already done...
Oops. Hell freezing over? (Score:2, Insightful)
OTOH, after AAPL licensing it, they would look stupid if they refused GOOG.
And with this step, it *is* the de-facto standard.
Intersting thought, that the only thing being left of MSFT in a couple of years is a protocol to sync wireless clients to a server...
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In some ways, yes. ;-)
But Google has a much wider audience than Apple (which is a niche, though a spacious and comfortable one by now)
Apple, is bigger as a company, but Google is really (in more ways than I like) *the internet*.
Ironic, that if MSFT had started opening up their protocols a couple of years earlier, they would probably be in a much better position than they are now.
Maybe it's too little too late, maybe not.
History (and the stock-market) will tell
Re:Oops. Hell freezing over? (Score:5, Insightful)
Even more at issue is the fact that Google's offering compete directly with Microsoft's server offerings. Apple was just licensing a connector component for handhelds to use MS Servers.
Parent
Re:Oops. Hell freezing over? (Score:5, Insightful)
Actually this is one of the missing pieces in the Google Apps puzzle. They've gained push e-mail and synching on anything that supports ActiveSync which includes Windows Mobile devices & iPhone/iPod Touch.
Once they finish off Google gears for offline gmail, then they have pretty much fixed the problem off offline / mobile access to GMail which makes Google Apps alot more appealing.
Most of the complaints against the use of web services is that you lose out when on the road or internet connection is down.
It's almost the Exchange Alternative everyone has been looking for.
Jason.
Parent
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Re:Oops. Hell freezing over? (Score:5, Funny)
Do you talk in stock symbols to make yourself look smart? Or did you really not realize that using "Apple", "Google", and "MS" would have used only 1 more character than what you did, would have been much more readable, and would have made you look like far less of a tool? (And that completely ignores your effort on the shift or caps lock key.)
Parent
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For the record, Microsoft often refers itself as MSFT even outside stock quotes. For example, on public Microsoft newsgroups and forums, whenever a Microsoftie replies to a thread in his official capacity (typically support guys, but devs come there to help as well), his name will be suffixed with "[MSFT]".
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We should welcome all outsiders to our board (onboard?) no? With the recent market situation it is a case of "poor, hungry, huddled masses"
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The bottom line... (Score:2)
And with this step, it *is* the de-facto standard.
Instead of any open standard, a proprietary protocol controlled by Microsoft is now the standard for syncing.
Thanks a whole hell of a lot, Google and Apple.
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It's not clear at all from the article that Google are actually using the "Microsoft Active Sync" software directly. It says they licensed the "technology".
I expect they made their own "two way" sync product for google that does not interoperate with active sync, maybe?
It's an incredibly obvious idea, just another lame patent locked down by big dollars.
You could argue that two way information sync has been going on since the first two people had an agreeable conversation.
not a standard at all (Score:3, Informative)
And with this step, it *is* the de-facto standard.
No, it's not. It's only a standard for Microsoft and Apple mobile phones, and for Microsoft Exchange. There are a lot of people using those devices, but that doesn't make it a de-facto standard. For it to be a de-facto standard, there would have to be a lot of implementations of the protocol, and there aren't. SyncML may or may not have fewer users, but it has far more implementors.
Intersting thought, that the only thing being left of MSFT in a couple of
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woopee (Score:4, Insightful)
Really this is ...
Okay why can't we have an open standard to sync data with mobile devices?
I mean just how hard would it be? I don't use outlook under windows and I do use Linux. I want some way to sync my phone to all my systems.
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It would be very hard.
1) Devise something (spend 4 years getting to version 1.0)
2) Spend 15 years trying to get any handset makers to use it.
3) Defend handset maker in court after Microsoft sues their pants off
4) rinse repeat..
Re:woopee (Score:4, Informative)
Parent
Re:woopee (Score:5, Informative)
We do. It's called SyncML. Google now supports it as well (though calendar sync isn't 100% together yet)
Parent
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Because your mobile devices are proprietary systems, and the companies who sold them to you don't want use every possible piece of functionality as a revenue stream.
If you want to synchronize your files between various devices, using open-source software, try unison [upenn.edu]. It's free, it's open source, it's fast, and IMO it's of very high quality. I use it to sync two desktops, a server, and an ARM-based network appliance (NSLU2). The key
What'd they license? (Score:3, Interesting)
Does anyone actually know what was licensed here? Was there even a patent involved or is this journalist just expecting sense to spew out of the mouth of a Microsoft executive when he should know better?
Re:What'd they license? (Score:5, Funny)
A chair. With a hand-written note saying "Gonna fucking kill you." All very valuable IP.
Parent
Re: (Score:3, Interesting)
An above poster suggested that they licensed the Exchange ActiveSync protocol, which would allow Android phones to grow support for syncing contacts/calendar-events with your exchange server, and receiving push email. I have no doubt that a patent is involved, but the licensing also mostly likely included protocol documentation and permission to implement such a system. That makes good sense to me, so I'd put money on this being what was licensed. This has nothing to do with the PCPhone ActiveSync protocol.
moar plz (Score:3, Funny)
Cool, can you point us to all the other examples?
"Fair and Reasonable" (Score:2)
"Fair and Reasonable" means "terms that only a large company like Google can afford". If you're an open source project, you can suck Microsoft's exhaust.
"Fair and Reasonable" is a term Microsoft uses to fight off any responsibility for letting open standards pollute their precious proprietary protocols.
Re:moar plz (Score:5, Informative)
Cool, can you point us to all the other examples?
Sure. You might want to look at the current list of specs covered by the Open Specification Promise [microsoft.com] (that means no licensing fees, royalty-free, and a patent non-enforecement guarantee) for a start.
Parent
To hell with ActiveSync (Score:2)
After my experience with ActiveSync on my iPaq... to hell with it. I won't use any product that uses ActiveSync, even if it's got Theo, RMS, Linus, Steve Jobs, and the whole FreeBSD core team recommending it.
Let alone mere Google.
The world is not all black and white (Score:3, Insightful)
What does that have to do with this? (Score:2)
A company as big as Microsoft cannot be completely evil.
Licensing a suite of proprietary interfaces and protocols lest Google implement their own and promote open source and open systems is not an example of Microsoft not being "ebil".
Respect needs to be earned... (Score:2, Troll)
...and far from earning respect, Microsoft's thieving, scattergun approach to acquiring patents deserves only disgust and contempt. I know it's really the patent system's fault that Microsoft and others are both motivated and enabled to steal by patenting the trivial, the broad, the already invented etc. in the first place, but if theft and extortion were made legal it wouldn't make calls for respect from professional thieves and racketeers any more palatable, would it?
*yawn* (Score:3)
I just tried it with my windows mobile 6.1 phone (Samsung Blackjack II) and followed the instructions to the letter. No joy. It was good for about 20 minutes of aggravation though. Maybe Google can harness that angst for their next datacenter project. grrrr...
I give one month (Score:2)
before this thing starts to smell bad.
NemusSync? (Score:2)
Does this have any advantage over NemusSync? It doesn't require jailbreaking, but Nemus lets me maintain a calendar on my iPhone that isn't synced or erased when I sync my Google calendar data, which is a feature I do use. What does Google Sync have going for it?
This Benefits Both Companies (Score:4, Interesting)
Google benefits because they can now easily sync to Exchange servers. Before, Google's Exchange synchronization tool required you to keep Outlook as you default Email account and have it installed on your PC and your PC up and running and logged into your account. Even then, it wasn't too smooth.
By licensing ActiveSync, Google can now synchronize their calendar (and gmail) to people's MS Exchange server calenders (and email).
For Microsoft, it takes a bit of pressure off of businesses who are finding Exchange's proprietary technology confining.
Microsoft's Exchange Server is one of the major components that tie businesses to Microsoft based solutions. This monopoly is beginning to fray. Non-Windows portable devices keep on multiplying, and employees are demanding to be serviced by the IT department. In order to prevent companies from abandoning Exchange Server, Microsoft is allowing non-Windows devices some access.
By allowing non-Windows devices access to Exchange, Microsoft hopes to keep their Exchange monopoly alive. Windows systems are still first class Exchange citizens, but by allowing basic synchronization with non-Windows devices, Microsoft has relieved the pressure on companies to abandon Exchange.
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P-P-PowerBook [zug.com]?
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All the "Activesync Protocol" is, is good old PPP.
Umm what? It looks like he's just using ppp to connect the device up to his computer. ActiveSync is as much PPP as email is ethernet.
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"a great example of Microsoft's openness to generally license our patents under fair and reasonable terms so long as licensees respect Microsoft intellectual property"
I translate this as: "we bought this thing ages ago, we used it to drive somebody we didn't like out of business, it no longer provides us with any competitor advantage, and the code base is a mess anyway."
Isn't industry moving to SyncML? This guy was watching ActivSync creep up 3 years ago [funambol.com].
Phillip.
Who's using SyncML? (Score:2)
Isn't industry moving to SyncML?
With Microsoft, Google, and Apple behind ActiveSync, apparently not. Who's using SyncML?
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All Nokia smartphones?
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I think you're completely misunderstanding what he was setting up there... it looks like he's using PPPD to "bridge" the iPAQ across his Linux box to his Windows box, just so he can sniff the ActiveSync traffic.
From the page you reference:
"You can use your device as if it were *directly* connected to the Windows box, and you can spy the traffic between the Device and the Server !
The protocol seems to be needing a TCP server on the ActiveSync side, on port 5679. "
That, er, doesn't mean ActiveSync is PPP.
Re:Hah! That's a joke (Score:4, Informative)
I suspect I am not the only one who now feels dumber having read your comment.
Your saying that Active Sync is just PPP is like claiming that... DNS is just ARP... one (can and in the case of Active Sync) may use the other... but is not absolutely required to... and even when such a low level protocol is used, it is the higher level data that matters to applications.
If it was that simple... don't you think there'd be more FOSS implementations of ActiveSync than there is if it was just PPP... oh right, it's not!
To recap... PPP: Layer 2 protocol, Active Sync: (likely) Layer 3-5 protocol
Parent
Hrmpf (Score:2)
It can connect over ppp but so can a lot of other things. This is sort of like saying that because Firefox connects over TCP/IP, the html protocol is just TCP/IP or that a Porsche is just old plain asphalt because it gets somewhere by road.
Re:Hah! That's a joke (Score:5, Informative)
No. Google licensed Exchange ActiveSync [microsoft.com], a protocol runs on top of http(s) to provide calendar and contacts synchronization and push email for mobile devices. It only requires an internet connection - unlike BlackBerry, which requires special network support.
On the client side, Exchange ActiveSync is implemented by the iPhone (since firmware 2.0), Windows Mobile devices, and some Sony Ericsson and Nokia devices. Microsoft Exchange is the most popular server, but other closed- (Zimbra) and open-source (Z-Push) implementations exist.
Parent
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when company B is becoming a major competitor to A in several key areas you don't often see A give B a nice advantage in terms of functionality and compatibility.
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Due to the global downturn, I can no longer afford to distribute and maintain my TRON fanzine on my Dunegons and Dragons web sight, you insensitive clod!
Re:See? (Score:4, Funny)
We're not evil! Honest injun!
Fucking racist whiteys.
Parent
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They didn't license the software, they licensed the protocol for emails, contacts, calendar to be pushed to devices. MUCH different than the software you are complaining about.
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...It often has to be reinstalled...
...I just bought a CF card reader/writer for my HP PDA (compare 15 minutes to transfer an mp3 with ActiveSync to 10 seconds directly)...
It sounds like you're mistaking the Desktop ActiveSync program (now called WMDC) with Exchange Server ActiveSync (the protocol) that Google licensed. The ActiveSync protocol is one of the few things about Windows Mobile that Just Works.