Microsoft has also announced that it will be providing full support for HTML5 video in Internet Explorer 9, and will be doing so using the H.264 protocol. Recently Apple has also been throwing support behind H.264 as the HTML5 video codec of choice for Safari. Apple has somewhat famously taken on Adobe in recent weeks saying Flash video is no longer the preferred option for Internet users going forward. Awkwardly, Microsoft agreed.

Ubuntu 10.04 LTS was released on April 29. The latest version is a long term support release, meaning updates will be published for 3 years on the desktop and 5 years on the server versions, compared to only 18 months with standard Ubuntu releases. This makes LTS a great platform for business deployments where doing full release upgrades every 6 to 12 months can be a major hassle. The latest version is lighter on features than normal Ubuntu releases are, but still sports the latest stable and public versions of GNOME, X.org and the Linux kernel. It also features a refreshed theme, ditching the brown and orange for a purple and black theme. There is also a new optional “lighter” theme that has a hint of brown instead of the standard Ubuntu color scheme. Boot times, especially on SSD drives have also been dramatically improved.

Palm is dead. Well, actually, HP purchased Palm for $1.2 billion.  The only hope for the WebOS platform now rests with HP and their commitment to “double down” and release new and improved hardware. Pending regulatory approvals, the deal is expected to close rather quickly in July of this year. Hopefully we’ll start seeing some HP branded WebOS devices starting this fall or winter.

Most of the enhancements center around archiving/discovery, Outlook Web App (OWA) and mobile management. There will be a beta of SP1 for download in parallel with TechEd North America this June, giving administrators a chance to test it in their development environments prior to full production.

In Exchange Server 2010 last November, Microsoft introduced integrated archiving capabilities aimed at helping preserve old e-mail data. In SP1, administrators can now provision a user’s Personal Archive to a different mailbox database from their primary mailbox. This allows admins to separate storage strategies (or tiered storage) for less frequently accessed e-mail. There will also be an update that will enable support to access Personal Archives with Outlook 2007. Also coming are new tools to allow admins to import historical e-mail data from .PST files, directly into Exchange. There are also new console tools to automate common archiving tasks, as well as policy tags to give more flexibility in designing retention strategy, as well as improvements to mailbox search to conduct discovery of e-mail.

Outlook Web App will get major updates, including new interface enhancements. OWA will do a better job of prefetching message content, allowing the OWA reading experience to flow faster. Functions like delete, mark as read, and other interface options will now run asynchronously so that they feel instantaneous to the user. The interface has also been de-cluttered and updated to help find common tasks faster, and easier to read on small screens like netbooks. Microsoft has also improved support for Safari on the Mac. There will also be new themes for OWA allowing the user to customize their experience.

Improvements to Exchange Active Sync include tether-free IRM support, support for send-as, full support for conversation view including the ability to sync only unique parts of the message. They’ve also added a support page inside of OWA that will help guide the user in setting up their device by providing information such as server names for EAS, IMAP, SMTP, etc.

Microsoft will also be revamping the Exchange management user interface. Users who are not as proficient with PowerShell will be able to do a lot of tasks that were previously only available there, in the Exchange Control Panel. A few of these options include:

• Create/configure Retention Tags + Retention Policies in EMC
• Configure Transport Rules in ECP
• Configure Journal Rules in ECP
• Configure MailTips in ECP
• Provision and configure the Personal Archive in ECP
• Configure Litigation Hold in ECP & EMC
• Configure Allow/Block/Quarantine mobile device policies in ECP
• RBAC role management in ECP
• Configure Database Availability Group (DAG) IP Addresses and Alternate Witness Server in EMC
• Recursive public folder settings management (including permissions) in EMC

Exchange 2010 is already a great product, and it looks like Microsoft has a lot of big improvements coming with this service pack.

“It is an exciting time for the MacBU with updates to our current products and the first public announcement about the next version of Office for Mac. For several years we have focused on providing the best Microsoft Exchange client for the Mac, and the Web Services Edition delivers that today for Entourage users,” said Eric Wilfrid, general manager for the Mac Business Unit at Microsoft.

While Office for Mac builds on the work done with Entourage 2008 Web Services Edition, Microsoft says it’s more than just a name change. With full support for Exchange synchronization, Office for Mac will also deliver significant changes to better interface with Mac OS X including a new high-speed file-based database with support Time Machine and Spotlight and fully Cocoa based programming.