Enterprise Server Rollout Planned for Next Week
Theenterprise servers are coming.
In whatit’s billing as the first step in the release of its .NET platform, MicrosoftCorp. (www.microsoft.com) will unveilthe group of BackOffice related products on Sept. 26 in San Francisco withseven other cities participating via satellite hookup.
While theconnection to Microsoft’s fledgling .NET platform may be little more thanmarketing at this point, the new servers do represent some of Microsoft’s mostcredible enterprise products yet. Released to Manufacturing in advance of theannouncement were Windows 2000 Datacenter Server, SQL Server 2000 and Exchange2000.
Windows2000 Datacenter Server is the final member of the Windows 2000 product set, andthe only one that is completely new. Coming more than six months after the Feb.17 launch of the rest of the Windows 2000 family, Datacenter brings support forup to 64 GB of memory, up to 32 processors, and up to four-node failoverclustering.
Perhaps themost significant feature of Datacenter is that it won’t be sold by Microsoft.Customers will only be able to obtain Datacenter as part of complete8-processor capable OEM systems that are fully tested and supported.
Any updateof Exchange Server is important for Microsoft, but Exchange 2000 is a keyproduct for the company and the Windows 2000 platform because it is the firstmajor application to take advantage of, and depend on, the Active Directory.(See main story this page).
Microsofthas been aggressively benchmarking SQL Server 2000 since well before theWindows 2000 launch. The database’s performance looks impressive, and thelaunch event means it is finally available.
Otherelements of the Enterprise 2000 Launch Event next week include Commerce Server2000, BizTalk Server 2000 and Host Integration Server 2000. For the Web farm,Microsoft will unveil Application Center 2000, a deployment and management toolfor Web applications, and Internet Security & Acceleration Server 2000,which combines a firewall and Web cache server.
One otherlaunch component that does fit more neatly into the .NET theme is somethingMicrosoft is calling the Mobile Information 2001 Server. The product issupposed to help mobile users access information.