SJVN is not buying claims that the Microsoft antitrust consent decree has done its job. Of course, that’s his opinion. Personally, I think Vista may do what the consent decree couldn’t… but that’s just me.
VMware’s very own conference, VMworld, is being held this week in San Francisco. And the company has some big news, including an announcement that its VMware ESX Server 3i virtualization software will be embedded in servers from Dell, HP, IBM, NEC, Fujitsu, and other hardware vendors.
But Microsoft is never happy letting someone else get all the attention, so the company has created some news of its own, announcing that it will be previewing its own virtualization technology later this month, when it pushes the first release candidate for Windows Server 2008 out the door.
The Community Technology Preview (CTP) of the virtualization technology, code-named Veridian, is a trimmed-down version of Microsoft’s attempt at keeping up with the VMwares. And it won’t be a real product until at least six months after Windows Server 2008 ships — which, if Microsoft sticks to its latest roadmap, will be in February.
But wait, not enough? Microsoft also announced that the next version of its virtual machine management software, System Center Virtual Machine Manager 2007, will nice with VMware and Xen–when it is released sometime next year. The first beta will be released sometime in the first quarter of 2008.
So, really, there’s not much news there. But it’s the promise of news, and enough to at least momentarily distract some from all the VMware hype in the wake of the company’s IPO.
(Apologies for the headline to anyone who hasn’t watched Mel Brooks’ History of the World, Part I. It’s good to be the king.)
Microsoft MVPs are revolting. They’re petitioning for redress of sins against VB6. There aren’t tires burning in the streets of Redmond yet, but it’s clear that some very loyal MS developers are truly torqued.
I did a lot of development in VB 4, 5, and 6, once upon a time. A set of applications I wrote in VB once for a couple of customers earned me loads of software maintenance work that got me through some tough financial times. I can understand the source of frustration that VB programmers who have a big installed base feel now that the tool they’ve built their empires with is no longer being supported.
But.
The conversation going on over at my old friend Rich Levin’s blog shows that there’s definitely more than one side to the story. And, in all honesty, I can watch this argument with total neutrality because I’ve moved on to PHP, Python and other dev tools for my programming work. (By the way, VB’rs, PyCON is coming up soon…maybe you should go.) VB.NET is pretty powerful, and VB6 makes me feel all warm and fuzzy with nostalgia, but I like to deploy things on the Web on any platform, and Python and PHP just work. They work on the Mac, which is now my primary Unix desktop. And they work on Windows.
Speaking of Windows, VB’rs, I wonder what Jim Hugunin is up to these days. I know that he went to work for Microsoft on the CLR… looks like he’s giving the keynote at PyCON. I may have to figure out a way to get down to it despite the dicey logistics of my daily life these days.