Global Launch Trickle Coming!
Well, Microsoft is going to launch at least one new product during its GLOBAL LAUNCH WAVE! As reported by yours truly yesterday, Windows Server 2008, formerly Longhorn, was
RTMed, which means it should be available by the Feb. 27 kickoff date. And did you notice my understated sarcasm with the all caps? It's hard to call something a "Launch Wave" when a total of one product is being released. I guess that's why they replaced the "Launch Wave" hyperbole with the el-lame-o slogan
"Heroes Happen Here".
So, on Feb. 27, they'll announce the existence of three products: Windows 2008, Visual Studio 2008 (released last year) and SQL Server 2008, which was pushed back to much later this year. One has already shipped and one won't be available for months. Kinda lessens the excitement, doesn't it?
On the other hand, Windows 2008 is exciting, for a number of reasons. For my money, the two coolest features are Server Core and the beta version of Hyper-V. Server Core is Microsoft's first effort to control feature bloat, allowing you to install a pared-down version of the OS with only the specific functionality you need. Linux, of course, has offered this ability for years; nice to see Microsoft finally catch up.
And then there's Hyper-V. Contrary to some media reporting out there, Hyper-V is not based on the Xen open source hypervisor; it is a proprietary Microsoft hypervisor from the ground up. But it will interoperate well with Xen, by all accounts. I haven't used it yet, but we will have an in-depth review in our inaugural issue of the magazine. Look for it.
If you're using Hyper-V, I'd love to hear from you on what you think about it. Especially if you're also using another hypervisor.
Posted by Keith Ward on 02/05/2008 at 12:48 PM