Duet is built like a turnip. Scantily leaved at the top, real heavy in the middle, and tapered off root.

Duet connects up with Office at few interfaces - some links with Outlook, some promised ones with Excel, some in workflow - points of connectivity at several places, with a .net client fanning out the leafy fingers at "select" Office interface. And not just any Office - but Office 2003+ onwards.

Duet's middle consists of a stack of really heavy middleware that runs only on Windows servers- Microsoft Exchange, Microsoft .net Server, Microsoft SQL server, Active Directory, SAP Netweaver, SAP Composite Application Runtime...Whoa! That is some middle!

Duets root is what is really really thin. It can talk to only SAP, and that too only for a few transactions. Can't go into any soil, except mySAP ERP 2004+.

How would Duet meet the expectations of a Office user, built this way? Office users need roots like a banyan tree - to all data sources inside their enterprises. Need it to be like a full blown tree at the top, so that it can bring data from all back-ends to all their interfaces and branches. And they want the trunk to be strong, and something that can grow roots of its own.

Have a look at Extensio's desktop connectivity solution. Check out how it compares with Duet on the roots, the middle and the leaves.

What would you, the desktop user, rather have? A turnip or a banyan tree?

- Sangeeta