Microsoft VP Flattens Expectations For NT 5.0

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June 02, 1998 (7:15 AM EDT)

Microsoft VP Flattens Expectations For NT 5.0

By Ellis Booker,

Although Windows NT 5.0 will address much of the scalability, reliability, and availability of Microsoft's forthcoming business-focused operating system, it will not fundamentally expand Microsoft's component object model (COM), said Steve Ballmer, executive vice president of sales and support at Microsoft, Monday morning at TechEd, the company's developers conference in New Orleans.

"NT 5.0 isn't as much about boldly going where no man has gone before," Ballmer said in Monday's (company profile) opening keynote speech. The sold-out TechEd, which runs through Friday, will host more than 9,000 attendees, according to Microsoft sources.

Ballmer called NT 5.0 the "cost of ownership release" that will reduce costs for IT through its various built-in and integrated facilities -- directory services, IntelliMirror zero administration technology, and security.

Microsoft, based in Redmond, Wash., said it is installing around 1.6 million versions of NT Server every year.

But expectations that Microsoft would announce this week a bundling of its Microsoft Transaction Server (MTS) with COM+ were defused late last week by the company, which made a round of calls saying not to expect such an announcement.

Microsoft did, however, announce an important alliance with one of the leading vendors of Common Object Request Broker Architecture systems. As expected, Microsoft announced interoperability between MTS and the leading CORBA-based object transaction monitor, the OrbixOTM from Iona Technologies.

Microsoft also announced Monday that Visual Edge Software licensed COM on Unix to try and provide better bridging between COM and CORBA, and Digital Equipment would offer additional interoperability between its ACMS transaction monitor for VMS, Unix, NT, and MTS.

Ballmer also gave a sneak peek at various new Microsoft products.

• The next version of Microsoft Office, code-named Office 9. The product has support for Windows Installer and IntelliMirror support, HTML/XML publishing, and expanded connections between the client applications in Office (Access, Excel, and Outlook) and Microsoft BackOffice applications (SQL 7 Server and Exchange Server). Office 9 is expected early next year.
• SQL 7 Server, which includes auto-configuration, auto-tuning, and multisite management. The product is scalable from laptop to clusters and terabyte databases, and it has a built-in online analytical processing server (code-named Plato Server) and replication services. SQL 7 is expected in the second half of the year.
• Site Server 4.0, Microsoft's merchant server for e-commerce applications. The version contains better analysis, order processing, and cross-selling features, as well as improved member management, personalization, and self-service order-tracking. There will also be a wizard for building new stores and sample sites. No release date was given for this next version of Site Server.

Finally, an Exchange 5.5 demonstration showed workflow features in what Microsoft calls its "routing engine," as well as support for the Active Directory feature of NT 5.0.