March, 2007

Today Microsoft released Windows Server 2003 Service Pack 2 (SP2), which as many know by now is a cumulative service pack that provides the latest updates, security and stability enhancements, and newest features for the Windows Server 2003 and Windows...

It’s great to see the word is getting out about the release of SP2 in Windows IT Pro and many other press outlets. One note regarding some discussion and confusion in the blogosphere about SP2 being pushed onto boxes via Automatic Updates (AU). In fact...

Rapid customer adoption of Windows Server 2003 SP2 continues. In less than a week since release there were more than 400,000 successful downloads! Interesting that some have commented that we "quietly" released SP2. The trade press have certainly covered...

As we've documented on this blog before, sometimes reporters get things wrong when reporting news, and they report inaccuracies. Most often the reporters make amends once they've been shown the facts. I say "most often" ... Yesterday, IT Pro magazine (UK) posted an article about Longhorn and Windows Server virtualization (codename Viridian), and it contained errors about the timing of Windows Server virtualization and Longhorn. In this case, the reporter wasn't aware of the product milestones we announced at last year's WinHEC, and once shown what we announced last year, he admitted the error of his ways. ...

CNET reported that Oracle "quietly cut software prices on some lower-end servers using multicore processors." Un-related to this, if you're interested in the network access control capabilities in Longhorn, check out Adam's post about NAP....

I found these results of this report interesting because Symantec is not always on the best of terms with Microsoft. Despite this fact, Symantec's study found that Windows Server - quoting InternetNews here - "had the fewest number of patches and the shortest average patch development time of the five operating systems it monitored in the last six months of 2006." Read more at Symantec's 11th Annual "Internet Security Threat Report."...

Jeff Woolsey's 5-minute demo of Longhorn and Viridian (the virtualization feature of Longhorn) has been posted to the public site under "Spotlight." Some of you may have seen this demo on MSDN blogs. The demo also showcases Server Core of Longhorn, as well as support to run Linux guest VMs and support for 8 procs....