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.
-- -JoeF