Who's Doing What with Exchange ActiveSync

A while back, I wrote about how easy it can potentially be toconnect to Microsoft Exchange Server with mobile devices, which is based on how Exchange ActiveSync (EAS) is implemented on the device and how secure the IT department has decided to make their servers. I received quite a bit of feedback on that article, indicating that this is sort of a hot-button topic out there for Exchange admins—and rightly so, considering the security and other risks of letting devices come into your corporate infrastructure all willy-nilly with no proper monitoring.

As has been stated by many people, one of the main problems is that not all mobile device makers implement all EAS policies—or perhaps they include a feature but don't implement it correctly. To help straighten this situation out, at least a little, Adam Glick, a senior technical product manager with EAS, recently posted a link on the Exchange Team Blog to a nice table, Comparison of Exchange ActiveSync Clients. The table covers support for specific EAS polices for the major smartphone OSs—Windows Mobile, iPhone iOS, Android, and a few others—but not specific phones.

As Glick points out in his post, the table has been created on Wikipedia so the Exchange community can continue to add to and update the information. If nothing else, the table provides a nice snapshot of the policy possibilities in the various versions of EAS. I definitely recommend you check it out.

Related Reading: 

And check out these "historical" articles to see how far EAS has come in a few short years!