Microsoft Delivers Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005

Microsoft Delivers Microsoft Office Live Communications Server 2005: "Live Communications Server 2005 Standard Edition builds on this foundation by extending these benefits beyond the firewall:
* Federation. With Live Communications Server 2005, two or more organizations can share IM and presence awareness in real time in an encrypted, authenticated and managed environment. Live Communications Server 2005 users also can share presence information and IM with suppliers and customers using MSN?, AOL and Yahoo! public IM networks,* creating a channel for bringing geographically dispersed people together.
* Remote user access. End users now can connect to presence and IM capabilities when they are outside the corporate network, whether working from home or on the road, or visiting customers or partners. Access is provided in a more secure and authenticated manner through the use of standard firewall ports, without the need to establish a virtual private network.
* Increased scalability. Active user capacity can expand to allow up to 15,000 active IM users per server. This increase of 30 percent to 45 percent in capacity over the previous version of Live Communications Server will provide most organizations with ample space to house their active users and the ability to easily accommodate more as their business expands.

In addition, Live Communications Server 2005 Enterprise Edition customers will appreciate enterprise-grade architectural enhancements such as the following:
* Improved architecture. An advanced, tiered architecture using Microsoft SQL Server (TM) benefits customers by substantially improving reliability, availability and scalability to mitigate the risk of unplanned downtime and deliver a higher level of availability. Deeper management options and administrative tools help reduce overall management time while increasing the level of administrative control.
* Increased capacity. Enterprise-grade active user capacity allows organizations to pool Live Communications Server 2005 Enterprise Edition servers to support up to hundreds of thousands of users as their enterprise grows."