• Illustration: System Center Product Timeline

During 2008, Microsoft's System Center lineup of system management products will gain new features, including Windows Server 2008 support, cross-platform extensions for Operations Manager, and updates to Configuration Manager and Virtual Machine Manager. Microsoft hopes that the expanding line of enterprise products, particularly the cross-platform additions, can help displace incumbent systems management providers, give customers better management tools, and allow partners to expand their system management offerings.

Configuration, Monitoring, Backup, and More

The System Center line is Microsoft's product set for enterprise systems management and includes products for computer configuration, monitoring, backup, capacity planning, software deployment and installation, and other administrative tasks.

At the Apr. 2008 Microsoft Management Summit (MMS 2008), the company announced plans to update several of the products in the System Center lineup. Updates to support Windows Server 2008 and virtualization will arrive in 2008, while 2009 is likely to be a pivotal year as betas for several System Center products will probably appear prior to major releases in 2010 or later. System administrators will applaud the addition of PowerShell scripting to all the products, while expanded support for virtualization will bring new focus to Microsoft's virtualization initiatives. (For a graphical overview of releases for these products, see the illustration "System Center Product Timeline".)

More broadly, the product line will change significantly in the next two years as Microsoft develops its new analysis, backup, and reporting products and enters the arena of trouble ticketing and problem resolution, as well as virtualization of OSs and applications. In addition, Microsoft is updating its management products to use the Service Modeling Language (SML), an XML-based language proposed as a World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) standard, for defining how IT services and systems are described or modeled, so organizations can more easily manage the services that are built on these resources.

Configuration Manager

Configuration Manager (formerly Systems Management Server, SMS) tracks computer hardware and software and distributes and updates software. The most recent version is Configuration Manager 2007, released in Nov. 2007. Releases for 2008 include the following:

Configuration Manager 2007 SP1. The first Configuration Manager service pack was released in May 2008. Configuration Manager 2007 SP1 is the first version to run on Windows Server 2008 and that is capable of managing Windows Server 2008. It also accommodates changes introduced in Windows Vista SP1 and will be able to manage Hyper-V (Windows Server virtualization) virtual machines.

Configuration Manager 2007 R2. Scheduled for release in the second half of 2008, Configuration Manager 2007 R2 will deliver a new reporting system, based on SQL Server Reporting Services, and improved integration with Application Virtualization (formerly called SoftGrid), a technology that isolates applications from each other to reduce conflicts and allows applications to be streamed from centrally managed servers. R2 will also exploit IP multicast to reduce network bandwidth needed for image deployment and will have improved support for distributing updates and signature files for Forefront Client Security—Microsoft's antimalware product for corporations. A beta version of Configuration Manager 2007 R2 was made publically available in Feb. 2008.

The next major update to Configuration Manager (not formally named, but called Configuration Manager v5 here) is likely in 2010, although Microsoft has not announced any plans. A likely focus is further improvements to desired configuration management, a feature that periodically checks computer configurations against those defined in administrator- or Microsoft-supplied configuration packs (in SML) and notifies administrators of computers that are out of compliance.

Operations Manager

Operations Manager enables administrators to centrally monitor the health and performance of devices, particularly Windows servers, and can take corrective actions automatically based on configurable and customizable rules and scripts. Operations Manager manages devices already in operation; it is not designed to deploy software or modify computer configurations. Management packs from a variety of vendors provide rules and instrumentation for managing specific services, applications, and devices. The most recent full version is Operations Manager 2007, released in Mar. 2007.

Releases through 2009 include the following:

Operations Manager 2007 SP1 update. SP1 for Operations Manager 2007 was released in Feb. 2008 and includes improvements to alerts, search, user interface, and additions to the Audit Collection Services (which provides security audit reporting). However, neither Operations Manager 2007 nor SP1can run on or monitor Windows Server 2008; an update to SP1 for compatibility with the new OS is planned for June 2008.

Operations Manager 2007 SP2. An update is expected for delivery in early 2009. One probable focus: support for monitoring platforms other than Windows. At MMS 2008, Microsoft announced public betas of extensions to Operations Manager 2007 to extend management to non-Microsoft products, including HP-UX, Solaris, and Red Hat and SUSE versions of Linux. Several partners, such as Novell, Quest, and Xandros, announced Operations Manager extensions for managing third-party applications while several other vendors announced additional management packs for Operations Manager that will help manage operations in organizations that use server virtualization. Microsoft also announced that it will join the steering committee for OpenPegasus, an open source project that is developing a cross-platform implementation of the Web-Based Enterprise Management (WBEM) remote monitoring and configuration infrastructure, a close relative of the Windows Management Instrumentation APIs used by Operations Manager. Both the initial cross-platform capability and the OpenPegasus announcement indicate that Microsoft has realized that it cannot compete in enterprise system management without the ability to manage heterogeneous environments.

Microsoft has not announced future releases of Operations Manager, but the next major release (called Operations Manager v4 here) is likely in 2010.

Other Management Products

Microsoft has several products that aid analysis or configuration of systems.

Virtual Machine Manager enables management of virtual machines running on Microsoft's virtualization products. Virtual Machine Manager 2007 was released in Oct. 2007 and supports management of virtual machines running on Microsoft's Virtual Server 2005 R2. A new release, Virtual Machine Manager 2008, is planned for the second half of 2008. (An initial beta was released in Apr. 2008.) It will support Microsoft's Hyper-V virtualization for Windows Server 2008 and also allow management of virtual servers running under VMware's ESX hypervisor. Management of VMware products signifies Microsoft's emphasis on the heterogeneous, virtualized enterprise and makes Microsoft management products better able to displace incumbent systems management or virtualization vendors. This will probably continue with the next new version (called Virtual Machine Manager v3 here) in 2010.

Data Protection Manager. Data Protection Manager enables network backup to disk-based storage, including direct-attached, network-attached, and storage area network drives. The most recent version, Data Protection Manager 2007, was released in Nov. 2007. A rollup release is expected in mid-2008 and will accommodate tape library sharing between Data Protection Manager Servers, as well as enhancements for handling storage media. The SP1 release will likely add support for SQL Server 2008 and Hyper-V when they are released in the second half of 2008. Possible features for a future release include backup of Hyper-V virtual machines, the ability to back up and restore individual SQL Server file groups and checked-out SharePoint documents, and an API to enable backup and restore of databases managed by third-party applications. No future releases have been announced, but a full release (called Data Protection Manager v3 here) is likely in 2010.

Mobile Device Manager. First released in Apr. 2008, Mobile Device Manager 2008 helps IT administrators manage Windows Mobile-based smart phones by simplifying the process of adding the devices to the corporate network, providing automatic application installation and inventorying, and preventing data loss when devices are stolen or lost. However, customers may need to purchase new devices: to date, Microsoft has indicated that only two devices, both from AT&T, are able to receive a software update that allows them to work with the product. Microsoft has not announced whether the product will be compatible with Windows Server 2008. A service pack is planned for 2009 to support the future Windows Mobile 7 device platform.

Capacity Planner enables planners to model an existing or planned Exchange e-mail system or SharePoint installation and identify performance bottlenecks, predict the effects of changes, and optimize hardware resources when planning. Capacity Planner 2007, released in Dec. 2007, adds support for modeling some new Exchange Server 2007 SP1 server roles, for 64-bit servers, and support for Windows Server 2008, among other improvements. New features for modeling SharePoint Services and SharePoint Server were added in Feb. 2008 and support for modeling Operations Manager 2007 SP1 arrived in Apr. 2008. Capacity Planner 2007 is free; the product formerly required a TechNet Plus or MSDN (Microsoft Developer Network) Premium subscription.

Service Manager Still Planned

At MMS 2008, Microsoft reiterated its plans for Service Manager, a product due no earlier than 2010 that will support trouble ticketing and problem resolution and will integrate with Operations Manager, Configuration Manager, and other System Center management products. Code-named Service Desk, Service Manager will have three major modules: incident and problem management, asset life-cycle management, and change management. All modules will share a common database, workflow engine, and console and will support user self-service through a Web interface. Companies will be able to deploy customizations (e.g., for security vulnerability assessment and patching processes) through solution packs similar to Operations Manager management packs. Service Manager is also likely to include capabilities of Reporting Manager 2006, which can extract data from Operations Manager 2005, SMS 2003, and Active Directory installations, consolidate it into a data warehouse, and generate canned and custom reports using SQL Server Reporting Services.

Service Manager has been in closed beta testing since 2006 and release had been planned for the second half of 2008. However, Microsoft says that testing revealed performance and scalability problems and it now plans to redesign Service Manager, with a new beta at the end of 2008 and release scheduled for the first half of 2010.

Resources

The roadmap for System Center is described in the "Systems Management and Security" chapter on page 34 of the Apr. 2008 Enterprise Software Roadmap.

The Microsoft Management Summit 2008 Web site is at www.mms-2008.com.

The Service Modeling Language is discussed in "Modeling Framework Key to Microsoft's Management Strategy" on page 6 of the June 2007 Update.

System Center products are described at www.microsoft.com/systemcenter.

Updates to systems management products for Windows Server 2008 are described in "Management, Security Products Need Updates for New OS" on page 21 of the Apr. 2008 Update.