The release of Exchange Server is rumored to be delayed due to the delays to Outlook 2003 and is now expected to release around the same date as Office 2003, probably between late July and mid-August, with retail availability six to eight weeks later. Of course, OutlookPower will provide you with in-depth coverage when that happens.

If your organization is still using Exchange 5.5, I encourage you to set up a test network for Exchange 2003. If you are considering an upgrade to Exchange 2000, make the leap directly to Exchange 2003. It's not worth upgrading only to Exchange 2000 and waiting a year or more to upgrade to Exchange 2003. The new OWA interface gives users feature rich access to their mailboxes, with many of Outlook's features now available through OWA, including spellchecking and signatures. If you also upgrade your servers to Windows Server 2003 and use Outlook 2003, your users will be able to use RPC over HTTP, allowing you to secure your site behind a firewall and giving your remote users faster access to their mailboxes over the Internet.

If you were unable to attend TechEd, but would like a copy of Exchange Server RC1, download it from http://www.microsoft.com/exchange. The Office 2003 beta is not available for download at this time, however if you already have a copy of the Office beta, the beta refresh is expected to be available for download on Windows Update around the end of June.

Diane Poremsky is the president of CDOLive LLC and a Microsoft Outlook MVP. She's coauthor of Word 2002: The Complete Reference (Osborne, 2001) and Beginning Visual Basic 6 Application Development (for Wrox Press). For questions or suggestions for future columns, write her at outlook@cdolive.com.