The release 1.2.003 of the beta is out (.fr users click here).

Beta 1.2.003 is minor release, introducing :

Access to WebDAV remote document stores
Wrong access rights for group documents
Authorization exception while accessing members directory in addressbooks

As we mentioned in a previous post our very own Luc Claes was selected to Speak at JavaOne. The presentation will take place next week May 6-9 in San Francisco.
JavaOne is a leading industry event; a 4-day conference filled with technical sessions, hands-on labs and lots of educational (Bookstore, Java University, …) and networking [...]

Five universities of the South of France have selected the ContactOffice virtual office solution for their students and staff. For ContactOffice, that represents more than 70 000 new users today and 120 000 in 2009.
For more information, you can download the press release (only in French for now)

Today, everyone is talking about the strategic shift Microsoft announced today - which had been coming for a long time - with the introduction of Live Mesh, a new Windows Live platform for syncing files and, eventually, applications across different devices.

From TechCrunch:
“Mesh lets you set up a virtual desktop online, and connect different computers to [...]

ContactOffice recently acquired a 30 TerraBytes storage system. This is the first step towards significantly increasing the space offered to our users. Payings subscribers will see their capacities increase by a factor from 2 to 5 times what they have today. Free subscribers are not left aside and will also benefit from a [...]

Some of you probably noticed that when sending a SMS a strange number appeared as sender number (caller ID). This is fixed now. Your recipients will now see your mobile number allowing them to directly reply to your message. Enjoy !
Norte : please make sure that your mobile number is defined in your profile [...]

IT executives recently converged on Computerworld’s Software-as-a-Service Conference (SaaScon) in Santa Clara, CA (March 25-26), to share their experiences and best practices about implementing SaaS solutions in their businesses.
On day two of the event, research agency Saugatuck Technology presented some preliminary highlights from its most recent SaaS research program, including results from their January 2008 [...]

Did you know that your Virtual Office, ContactOffice, could be personnalised and be used as an Intranet without much investment ?
Kamer van Koophandel in the Netherlands decided to use ContactOffice as an Intranet for their organisation. Kamer van Koophandel is a Dutch organisation that manages the trade register. The Chamber’s other tasks are to provide [...]

The release 1.2.002 of the beta is out (.fr users click here).

Beta 1.2.002 introduces new features and enhancements such as :

Wiki
Info panels
Threading for emails (only for paying subscriptions)
Categories on docs, notes, contacts, bookmarks, …
Right click or Ctrl click for Mac users to access contextual menus
View document as PDF (.doc .ppt .xls .txt + openOffice extensions)
Import [...]

We are pleased to announce a new ContactOffice customer: OpenWeb is a Belgian company specialized in the new technologies of information and communications.
They have chosen ContactOffice in order to add a new service to their customers and prospects. They will sell the virtual office ContactOffice under their own brand name.
Visit their site : http://www.openweb.be

ContactOffice will participate to the Salon Entreprendre the 19th and 20th March 2008, the meeting for SME. ContactOffice is very proud to participate at this event organized by New Bizz Partners. You will have the possibility to meet our staff members and ask for demonstrations, case studies, tests accounts, and simulations for your organization. This [...]

Futurologist predict that by 2038 work will be more flexible and that employees will be more independent. When and where you work becomes less important, as long as you do what you need to do. Telework will be an important factor in this evolution. Not only because of the increasing traffic problems and [...]

The backend of the Beta version has been improved to speed up by a factor 6 the mail interface. Now, big mailboxes containing a large number of folders should get access to their mail dramatically faster. The loading of the account is also improved.

Please note that all services will be stopped this saturday morning around 03:00 CET until 08:30 CET for storage maintenance and upgrade.

The release 1.2.001 of the beta is out (.fr users click here).

Beta 1.2.001 introduces numerous new features and enhancements such as :

Usage indicators
Auto zoom for calendar events
Slightly more contrasted design (still to improve)
Category editor
Categories (colors) are now applicable to an email
Import vCalendar/iCal attachments in the private calendar
Import vCard attachments in the private address book
Access to [...]

The news has been spreading like wildfire all over the web: online media, blogs, Twitter, Facebook are all buzzing about the public $ 44.6 billion bid by Microsoft to acquire all of Yahoo!’s assets (or $ 31 per share).
While everyone is wondering what to name the married couple - Mahoosoft, Microsoft!, Microhoo, Yahoosoft!, Yasoft, [fill [...]

Our public beta release has been significantly improving in quality and performance the past few weeks, in large part thanks to the great feedback we’ve had the pleasure to receive from our many users. The new ContactOffice is now more than stable enough to justify a permanent switch for the majority of our users, which [...]

We’re thrilled to announce Luc Claes, ContactOffice Partner and Head of Research & Development, has been selected to speak at the JavaOne Conference.

JavaOne is a leading industry event; a 4-day conference filled with technical sessions, hands-on labs and lots of educational (Bookstore, Java University, …) and networking opportunities. The conference will be held 6-9 May [...]

Yesterday at 22:24 - 23:54 CET a routing problem occured between Sprint and Level3 Amsterdam.
Since the ContactOffice service is hosted on servers at the Brussels Level3 site this routing problem might have caused access problems to our service for certain users. We do apologise for any kind of inconvenience you might have experienced.
It was [...]

Patrick De Schutter, co-founder and CEO of ContactOffice, was interviewed by web enthusiast Philippe Nieuwbourg. As of this morning, the audio interview is up at Econotique (French only).

These are some of the articles that captured our attention this week:
ReadWriteWeb - The Danger of Free
TechCrunch - Salesforce.com To Offer DaaS Service, New Pricing Model, Competition
David Overton’s blog - We may live in the Web 1.5/2.0/3.0 world, but most of our customers don’t - Online office suites barely register with public, says study

The winners of the Yulbiz competition are known and have received their ‘advanced’ accounts. They seem to love our virtual office as can be seen in this post (french).
If you ever organize a internet or blogger event don’t hesitate to contact us. We love to support interesting initiatives.

The Belgian TNT Airways airline company relies on the virtual office ContactOffice for more than four years.
For more information, you can download the press release.
TNT Airways chooses ContactOffice

ContactOffice allows you to check your e-mail with your favorite e-mail client with POP3 and/or IMAP4. So if you’re still using Microsoft Outlook for mail, you might want to take a look at Xobni (it’s a weird name, but it’s basically just ‘inbox’ spelled backwards).
Xobni is an Outlook plug-in that creates a sidebar in Outlook [...]

Check out this video of Joel Webber, co-creator of GWT.
If in lack of time, go to the 32nd minute.

It’s a nice endorsement of our work here at ContactOffice and a nice way to start this wonderful new year.
Congratulations to Luc and his team and best wishes to all our readers.

The release 1.2.000 of the beta is out (.fr users click here).

Beta 1.2.000 introduces the group management, account preferences, stack panel parking, … and tons of enhancements and bug fixes. Enjoy!

Very interesting: Mail.ru, which has been around since 1998, is apparently the first billion-dollar company in Russia. South-African media & internet group Naspers have acquired a 2,6 % stake in the company for $ 26 million, thus valuing the company at a whopping 1 000 000 000 dollars.

Congratulations!
Next up: Mail.be? ;)
Other ‘mail’ properties:
Mail.com - IDPG
Mail.org [...]

Organised by Vincent Battaglia, Yulbiz is a regular ‘blog & biz’ meeting, mostly for the French speaking blogosphere.
The second edition of the meetup will take place in Café Belga (Brussels) on Saturday the 15th of December. ContactOffice is sponsoring this cool meetup and is giving away 10 advanced editions free of charge.
The event is also [...]

We have officially released the Spanish version of ContactOffice after soft-launching a test version earlier this Summer.
ContactOffice can now be used in English, French, Dutch and Spanish, and the interface itself is also available in Finnish and Swedish. We’re working on adding more languages soon, stay tuned!
Adding more proof to the international nature of [...]