Microsoft last week unveiled its forthcoming live communications client, Microsoft Office Communicator 2005, and announced a new service pack for its Live Communications Server that promotes federation with public instant messaging networks.
Communicator provides an integrated client for IM, voice, video, telephony and Web conferencing and is Microsofts preferred client for Live Communications Server. The service pack for Live Communications Server will let that product connect with public IM networks such as MSN, AOL and Yahoo, as well as add new filtering capabilities to block unwanted messages and IM spam, known as “spim.”
Communicator is scheduled to be released to manufacturing within the next 90 days. Pricing for the software has not yet been determined. The Live Communications Server service pack and PIC (public Internet connectivity) licenses will be available next month.
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