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Microsoft Agrees To License ActiveSync To Google
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."'"
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
Help Brendan pay off his student loans
We do. It's called SyncML. Google now supports it as well (though calendar sync isn't 100% together yet)
"I think an etch-a-sketch with an ethernet port would beat IE7 in web standards compliance."
Alternately, use SyncML, which is already available on a large number of non-Microsoft handsets with plugins available for Windows Mobile, Outlook, Exchange and other non-compliant software.
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 (that means no licensing fees, royalty-free, and a patent non-enforecement guarantee) for a start.
No. Google licensed Exchange ActiveSync, 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.
I use scheduleworld.com and have pretty much given up of synchronizing with Gmail because every time I do it, Gmail complete mess up the first-name/middle-name/last-name of the contact because gmail assume that the display name is in the form of firstname lastname. Is this a nonissue with English-speaking world? Where I live, I want different display format for different names. F-L for Western names and L-F for Asian names. To me, Gmail contact is pretty feature-limited.
The only possible interpretation of any research whatever in the 'social sciences' is: some do, some don't
Push e-mail is still not available (at least for a WM phone).