Microsoft has announced that it will bring a small piece of Vista to both the open source Linux operating system and the UNIX based Mac OS X. The Redmond company's partners will work to extend Network Access Protection to Linux and OS X desktops. NAP was developed as a Microsoft initiative designed to protect vulnerable machines from compromising when accessing or communicating on a network. The end purpose of NAP is to safeguard computers that have not deployed the latest patches for the operating system or the last antivirus updates from being compromised. The technology is not restricted to Windows Vista.

Microsoft introduced "key additions to the Network Access Protection (NAP) ecosystem with new third-party products that extend NAP to Macintosh and Linux desktops, as well as the first NAP-powered appliance. The new products will extend NAP, a policy enforcement platform built into the Windows Vista operating system and the upcoming versions of Windows Server 2008 and Windows XP SP 3, to non-Microsoft operating systems in heterogeneous network environments," the company revealed.