The Autodiscover service makes it easier to deploy Microsoft Office Outlook 2007. Earlier versions of Exchange and Outlook required that you configure all user profiles manually to access Exchange. Extra work was required to manage these profiles if changes occurred to the messaging environment otherwise the Outlook clients would stop functioning correctly.

The Autodiscover service uses a user's e-mail address or domain account to automatically configure a user's profile. By using the e-mail address or domain account, the Autodiscover service provides the following information to the client:

  • The user's display name.
  • Separate connection settings for internal and external connectivity.
  • The location of the user's Mailbox server.
  • The URLs of various Outlook features that govern such functionality as free/busy information, Unified Messaging, and the offline address book.
  • Outlook Anywhere server settings.