Climbing the Windows 2000 Ladder - News Briefs

ENT, Feb 23, 2000 by Brian Ploskina

Microsoft Corp. has taken great pains to ensure that now that Windows 2000 Server is on the shelves, there are applications available to run on the platform.

Internally, Microsoft (www. microsoft.com) tested what it views as the top software applications available for Windows 2000. "About seven months ago we started a very proactive program to make sure the wide array of applications available today would be available for Windows 2000," says Peter Ollodart, group manager for the Microsoft Windows 2000 certification program.

Ollodart says Microsoft tested 500 desktop applications and 86 server applications. What they discovered as the latest betas of Windows 2000 were released, is that those top software programs worked well. For applications that weren't up to par, Microsoft brought the ISV to its Windows 2000 lab in Redmond to find a way to make the application work.

ENT interviewed several top software vendors that have products running on Windows NT Server. It seems their enthusiasm and commitment to the new platform are mixed.

Much of the contention comes from vendors that rely on other platforms, especially their own, for revenue, such as Hewlett-Packard Co. (HP, www.hp.com). Brian Dean, solutions manager for HP OpenView Express, says certification is still in flux for the OpenView team. "There's still a lot of discussion as to what it means to be Windows 2000 certified," Dean says. "[Microsoft] put a lot of requirements in that the rest of the ISV community is really questioning."

Dean says certain Windows 2000 certification requirements demand "core architectural changes that would have to be made to the software product. That was asking too much too soon." Dean says HP has done its own testing at a Windows 2000 lab; that is how HP will decide which products support Windows 2000.

Problems with some ISVs were troubling enough that Microsoft held a meeting of software makers in Redmond two weeks before W2K's launch. The griping and negotiating was held under a nondisclosure agreement, so ISVs are mum about the details.

One company that has problems with Windows 2000 Server certification is Novell Inc. (www.novell.com). Since Microsoft requires Active Directory support, and Novell focuses its support on its own directory service eDirectory -- formerly Novell Directory Services (NDS) -- the GroupWise team is in a bind.

"It's kind of a Catch-22," says Terry Ulanch, marketing manager for Novell collaboration products. "I want to make sure I'm taking advantage of NDS, that would later integrate with Active Directory. We don't want customers to have to go through so many hoops." Novell will support GroupWise version 5.2 and up on Windows 2000, Ulanch says.

Some software vendors are climbing the Windows 2000 Server ladder with a smile. Baan Co. (www.baan.com) is taking advantage of several new operating system features. David George, senior development manager at the Microsoft-Baan lab in Redmond, says Baan ERP uses the Windows Installer, group policies, the MMC, the Active Directory, and roaming profiles.

"There's complexity in finding a way to exploit the Active Directory in a meaningful way," George says. "Don't just do it for certification but actually offer a service that would benefit customers."

Chris Justice, product manager of platforms for Tivoli Systems Inc. (www.tivoli.com), says parent company IBM Corp. is centralizing certification efforts. Big Blue is building unified components that all IBM products can use.

Oracle Corp. (www.oracle.com) is getting into the Windows 2000 certification act, too, taking advantage of the Kerberos security model to allow the storage of database objects in Active Directory, says Bob Shimp, senior director of product marketing for Oracle Internet platforms.

Oracle also will use the Windows 2000 address windowing extensions, which will enable Oracle8i to access 64 GB of memory instead of the 4 GB limit on Windows NT. "You'll be able to bring very large amounts of database buffer into memory," Shimp says.

                        ISV Plans for Windows 2000
Vendor              Product           Going for
                                      Windows 2000
                                      certification?
ERP
Baan                Baan ERP          Baan ERP 5c w/porting set
PeopleSoft          PeopleSoft        60-90 days after release
SAP                 SAP R/3           Version 4.6B
Messaging
Lotus               Domino            Next full feature release
Microsoft           Exchange Server   Mid-2000
Novell              GroupWise         No plans yet
Database
Microsoft           SQL Server        SQL Server 2000
Oracle              Oracle8i          Oracle8i Release 2
Network Management
Computer Associates Unicenter TNG     Unicenter TNG 2.2
Hewlett-Packard     OpenView Express  No plans yet
Tivoli              Tivoli Management Sometime this year
                    Framework
Vendor              Current versions           Current Windows
                    supported on               2000 level [*]
                    Windows 2000
ERP
Baan                Baan ERP 4c and up         Not identified
PeopleSoft          None                       Not identified
SAP                 4.OB and up                Not identified
Messaging
Lotus               5.03, due out this quarter Planned
Microsoft           Exchange Server 5.5 w/SP3  Ready
Novell              GroupWise 5.2 and up       Not identified
Database
Microsoft           7.0, SQL Server 2000       Ready
Oracle              Oracle8i Release 2         Not identified
Network Management
Computer Associates Unicenter TNG 2.x and up   Ready
Hewlett-Packard     Current release            Not identified
Tivoli              3.61 and up                Planned
(*.)As of Feb. 9, 2000
These are selected Windows 2000 Server applications and how the software
vendors are approaching Windows 2000 support.