Boston.com / Business / Technology / Microsoft to unveil product to manage Net communications

Boston.com / Business / Technology / Microsoft to unveil product to manage Net communications: "Microsoft Corp. -- there's a name that rings a bell. Soon it may be the bell inside your office telephone.
The world's leading software company is expected to unveil tomorrow a product that will let businesses manage telephones, instant messaging, e-mail, and even video conferencing through a single unified system. Microsoft announced the product, codenamed Istanbul, at an Internet telephony trade show in Boston last October.
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If you want to phone a colleague, Microsoft can handle the task. ''We're enabling Istanbul to control the enterprise phone," said Simnett. The Microsoft server will connect with standard PBX gear -- the equipment used to route phone calls inside large companies. Istanbul can work with VoIP phone networks or traditional phone systems. ''You could actually choose: Do I want to use the phone or do I want to use the PC audio channel?" Simnett said."