I am just itching to start work on BackOffice development, but I have a couple of questions. When will the tools necessary to develop good BackOffice applications be available on MSDN? What is the plan for the BackOffice SDK?
A BackOffice developer wannabe
An itch, eh? Have you tried a good moisturizer or some baby powder? How about some of that Gold Bond Medicated Cream for that itchy, itchy rash? Well, not being a real doctor, I'm not sure that I can help with the itch, so an answer to your two questions will have to suffice.
If by tools you mean products such as Visual Basic and Visual C++, those are not available from the Developer Network. However, your question is timely (unlike my office hours!) because the Developer Network has just announced the availability of Level 3. This new level features the BackOffice Test Platform, which will include all the BackOffice server components you've come to know and love—SQL Server, Systems Management Server, Windows NT Server, SNA Server, and Mail (or Microsoft Exchange) Server.
In other relevant news, my nursing staff informs me that the BackOffice SDK was shipped to Level 2 members in late August with Windows 95 and the Win32 SDK. Whew! That was a lot of info to impart. Now I have a headache. I'm going to take two aspirin and call myself in the morning.