Development Environment

The development environment that's best for you depends on your application development plans. If you plan to develop applications using the Messaging API (MAPI) directly, install the software listed in the section Setting Up Visual Studio and Visual C++. The Exchange portion of the Platform SDK comes with libraries, COM components, header files, and samples that can aid your C/C++ development efforts.

If you are interested in developing applications with Exchange using high level languages such as Visual Basic, Java, or scripting languages (such as in an Active Server Pages (ASP) application), the Collaborative Data Objects (CDO) 1.21 provide the primary object model for access to the Exchange Directory and information store. These objects implement a functional subset of the Messaging API (MAPI) through automation-compatible dispinterfaces. If the CDO provide all of the functionality you require for your application, you can go directly to the CDO Platform SDK documentation which is present next to the Exchange Server documentation. That documentation provides the necessary information required to build applications using CDO 1.21. If you have Microsoft Exchange Server version 5.5 with service pack 1, you can take advantage of a new set of sample COM components that complement and enhance the CDO 1.21 and Active Directory Services LDAP provider (ADSLDP) components functionality. With these new sample components, you can create mailboxes, manages distribution lists, and manipulate access control lists and rules on Exchange folders. To build and use these components, the C/C++ development environment listed below is required.