Maxim has found Niobe on GotDotNet. One should however not focus on that project anymore. There is more to come next year providing .NET developers extension points for Microsoft Outlook. Very exciting stuff! I have been aware of this for a few months now (there was even a workshop some months ago) but kept it quiet (under NDA ssshtt..). I was just reading Maxim's posting and tried out a Google search for the new thing to come and I found this interesting Webcast talking about it in all languages. I especially like the code-names. I am currently in a Dan Brown mode so Elixir and Alchemy are much better names then Whidbey or Yukon :-)

The Webcast is about Integrating Outlook with Siebel and the description is the following:

This session will explain how Microsoft has integrated our recent Siebel 7.5.3 deployment with Microsoft Outlook to create a powerful new productivity tool for our 8,000 member enterprise sales force. For years the Microsoft field had been requesting a CRM client that would be seamlessly integrated into their normal workflow so that customer interactions stored within Outlook, such as email or calendar items, could be easily captured within Siebel. In addition, the field expressed a need for a "360 degree view" of their customer, available both online and offline. Both of these goals were achieved through the development of our "Project Alchemy" Web Service and "Project Elixir" Customer Explorer Outlook 2003 plug-in. We will show a demonstration of the Outlook-integrated CRM plug-in and provide a detailed technical description of how the smart client application was built. Although the project began simply as an internal IT initiative within Microsoft, we have recently decided to turn the solution into a "best practice" and will be providing a combination of code and prescriptive architectural guidance to customers and partners interested in developing similar integrations between Outlook and their Line of Business applications. During the session we will discuss the "Project Elixir" Managed Code SDK for Outlook and how customers and partners can utilize it and our sample code to expose and capture Siebel data from within Outlook. 
 
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