Virtualization wrap from TechEd IT Pro

First published on TECHNET on Jun 10, 2008
I'm NOT in Orlando this week attending TechEd IT Pro conference. That means I get to enjoy http://weather.cnn.com/weather/forecast.jsp?locCode=WAKI&zipCode=98052 and not http://weather.cnn.com/weather/forecast.jsp?locCode=ORL&zipCode=32801 hot/humid thunderstorms. For those of you also NOT in Orlando, you can follow along with the happenings at a few spots:

• http://blog.scottlowe.org/ , focus on virtualization (and expect comparisons to VMware's tools)
• Margie Semilof from http://searchwinit.techtarget.com/news/article/0,289142,sid1_gci1317021,00.html# will be publishing articles
• Go http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/events/teched/itpros.mspx for blog roll and a bunch of news sources from the conference

I'll point out a few cool items from today's http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/events/teched/itpros.mspx :

• You can now get cooperative technical support from Microsoft and four (initial) vendors [Citrix, Novell, Sun, Virtual Iron] when running Windows Server 2008 (or 2003, or 2000). How so? Microsoft's http://www.windowsservercatalog.com/svvp/ is now operational and vendors have begun validating their configs. So you'll soon see additional vendor names added to http://support.microsoft.com/kb/944987/ . This program is only intended for the dozen or so vendors that make/sell their own Type 1 or Type 2 hypervisor, and want their customers to receive technical support from them and Microsoft.
• MS Application Virtualization (formerly SoftGrid) 4.5 Release Candidate will be available by the end of June. And interestingly enough it's been almost 2 years since the Softricity acquisition. http://www.brianmadden.com/blog/TimMangan/Softricity-Purchase-Year-2-and-beyond about this over at BrianMadden.com.
• Double-Take, an ISV partner, announced that their http://doubletakesoftware.wordpress.com/2008/06/10/double-take-announces-hyper-v-product-line/ once the latter is released. GeoCluster works with Windows Server 2008 failover clustering, and offers somethign that VMware can't.
• Forefront Client Security is adding host and guest VM support for Hyper-V upon its release. See more http://blogs.technet.com/forefront/archive/2008/06/10/forefront-client-security-will-offer-broad-support-for-windows-server-2008-including-hyper-v-nap-and-server-core.aspx .

Enjoy,

Patrick