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The post lifts the lid on the underlying protocols of Microsoft Office 2007, Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and Microsoft Exchange Server 2007, revealing how the products communicate with each other. The information was previously only available to select partners through a Trade Secrets Licence.

The move is an attempt by the company to satisfy European regulatory concerns, by publishing information that will better allow rivals to integrate with its major products such as Windows and Office.

Microsoft says it will offer more complete documentation for these products in June, after collecting feedback from developers.

However, while Microsoft may have released the information there is a snag, as the protocols covered by a patent can only be used by non-commercial open-source developers - commercial developers looking to implement the protocols will have to pay the software giant royalties.

Microsoft claims the release represents "another step toward putting our interoperability principles into action with the public availability of these protocol specifications".