Vic Gundotra summed up this deal by reusing the "Two turkeys do not make an eagle" quote. However, I think he is likely channeling some angst over losing it and may be missing the bigger picture that Microsoft and Nokia together may actually amount to the phoenix rebirth of both their mobile strategies that they both desperately need.

In the past week at their own press conferences and at Mobile World Congress in Barcelona, Nokia announced a deep partnership with Microsoft to build Windows Phones. There’s been lot of speculation on why Nokia decided to go this route rather than either adopt Android in a similar strategy or to continue to develop their own platform strategy. The introduction of Steven Elop, a former Microsoft executive, as the CEO is fueling some speculation that the Nokia decision may in part have been based on his former relationships rather than the objective best interest of the company. That seems to me to be a red herring.

I think this was exactly the right move for both Nokia and Microsoft (and Nokia’s employees and customers.) Here are some of my thoughts:

• Magic 8 Ball says "Outlook not so good": Microsoft has had trouble getting back into the mobile space and has needed bolder moves and stronger partnerships for some time. Word is that Nokia’s internal predictions for smart phone market share showed them diving into single digits before too long. Their "platform" (current state strategy) is burning and is taking them in the wrong direction.

• The Android Morass: I see the Android market as alive and vibrant, but also crowded and fraught with peril for anyone trying to differentiate. Android is becoming the mobile platform of choice for not only well executed devices but also for low end barely-smart phones. Nokia jumping on that bandwagon would have the potential to get them lost in the noise very quickly.

• Better Together: Microsoft and Nokia need each other in ways that Google doesn’t. Microsoft sells software and Nokia sells phones. Both of them need the other to make money to be successful and they can compliment each other that way. Google sells advertising and could care less if you have to give your stuff away for free as long as they get they eyeballs. They want a slice of every device out there, good or crappy, and a race to the bottom for hardware makers is just fine. Microsoft has much more to gain from a strong Nokia than Google would and building best in class devices that unite each of their strengths is aligned well with what they both need.

Will they succeed? Signs so far point to MSFT continuing to move too slow and being hamstrung by current partner relationships in some ways. Unless they break that cycle and get their development and engineering velocity higher than both Google and Apple they are going to have trouble keeping up. This is a big challenge for them that they are falling down on so far since the launch of Windows Phone 7. Hopefully a tight partnership with a premier hardware vendor can help them drive reference devices that will push the rest of their partner/carrier relationships forward and drive higher velocity.

Enterprise/Business Perspective

• iPhone is Bad for IT: My thoughts for some time is that iPhone and Android have been bad for business IT. Not because they aren’t capable platforms but because they come from a consumer oriented mindset and a lot of the best talent in the market place is getting tied up right now trying to build the next Angry Birds app. You can get business apps on those platforms but that isn’t where the energy is at right now. That coupled with the fact that the iPhone is not compatible with the development model of most IT departments and it’s a pain to get apps on outside the app store and you have a mobile platform that sets back business IT mobile development by years.

• MSFT Enterprise Roots: MSFT and their mobile platform has at least a little bit of business IT DNA. Microsoft is downplaying that for now, but hopefully not excising it all together. My expectation is that anything better than a total failure of the platform will provide an outlet for real enterprise class mobile application development to flourish once more.
• Calling All IT Devs: Bring on my ERP, CRM, HR applications… why aren’t I interacting with my core business tools via rich custom applications yet? There are a smattering of commercial applications in some of the marketplaces but my IT department should be making its own packaged and custom tools available, driving real business value to their mobile workforces.

Am I missing the mark here? What do you all hope to see from this partnership? What top apps from your IT department do you need on your mobile devices today?

This post is the third in a series on virtualization: Introduction, Platform (Servers and PCs), Desktop, Application, and Cloud

A special case of platform virtualization is the ability to run a server or desktop operating system in a virtual environment on a PC or Mac. Running Windows on a Mac via Parallels is a key example and represents one of the common uses of this. The main categories of uses include:

1. Alternate OS for Access to Apps: Since software is typically OS specific there are often cases where the right or required piece of software for a particular job just doesn’t run on the primary OS you may be running on your desktop. Windows-based business software in a Mac environment or Linux-based network tools in a Windows environment are examples. In these cases it may be useful to host a virtual OS to run these specific tools.
2. Legacy OS Versions for App Compatibility: A related example of this may be the need to run applications that don’t run on your current OS but do run on a previous version. Many business are running into this today with old Windows XP compatible applications that don’t run on Vista or Windows 7. "XP Mode" in Windows 7 is a built-in virtual platform feature in some versions of Windows for solving this specific problem.
3. Development/Testing/Support: This is the same as one of the reasons I described for server virtualization. For specific development or testing scenarios it is often useful to run a specifically configured OS environment on a developer/tester workstation. This gives you the flexibility of switching on and off these specific environments and even resetting them to a baseline state as needed.
4. Demonstrations: I and many of my colleagues have used desktop/laptop hosted virtual machines for product or solution demonstrations. I’ve run multi-server virtual environments on a laptop to show off enterprise solutions this way. Many software vendors are even beginning to distribute test and demonstration versions of their latest software products as virtual machines, making this very useful. Microsoft has done this recently with SharePoint 2010, as an example.

Vendor Round-Up

Microsoft – Virtual PC/Server

• Windows offering that will run current version of Windows as guests as well as some others (OS/2, Linux), though they may not be officially supported.

• In most versions of Windows 7, Virtual PC is offered free as XP Mode (with a Windows XP license) for running older Windows software, or as a full Virtual PC solution. This is well suited for running Windows guests.

Oracle/Sun – VirtualBox

• Runs on Mac, Linux, Windows to provide workstation virtualization

• Originally developed by Innotek and bought and distributed by Sun until their acquisition by Oracle, this is a full featured desktop solution that provides good performance and compatibility

Parallels – Desktop

• Although they offer both Mac and PC virtual machine software they are best known for their Mac support, allowing Mac users to run needed/favorite Windows software in their Mac OS sessions.

• Similar to VMWare’s offerings there are trials available but the full versions must be purchased.

VMWare – Workstation

• VMWare offers this full featured virtual PC solution for either Windows or Linux hosts. The Fusion version of their workstation product is available for Macs.

• This solution officially supports over 200 types of guest operating systems including most Windows and many Linux variants. However, beyond a 30 day trial, VMWare charges for the product and is the most expensive of the offerings.

Anyone else have interesting uses for desktop-based virtualization? Any new key vendors I missed off this list?

Of my four rough categories of virtualization, platform or server virtualization is usually what comes to mind first. I use the term platform since this can be done in special situations with PC operating systems, not just server, but I’ll cover those in my next post.

Typically, instead of running a server operating system like Linux or Windows Server on its own hardware, you instead run it inside an already running server. Usually this is done on a special server set up to run many virtual servers on a single box. This can also be done on a PC or laptop, but usually with only one guest operating system running inside the main operating system.

So why would you do this?

1. Consolidation/Cost: Typical IT datacenters have many, many servers but many of those servers don’t work very hard. There’s lots of spare processing cycles to go around. Consolidation of these servers into less physical boxes saves hardware cost, power, and space. In large datacenters this can add up to huge cost savings for a company, if the profile of the servers being consolidated is right.
2. Flexibility/Dynamic Capacity: Sometimes servers don’t need to be around all that often. A company may need to add capacity only occasionally (like during tax season) or may keep special application servers around only for particular projects. Virtual servers   can be moved around much more easily than physical servers and can be stored as images in large data storage. Some companies keep a virtual library of special use server images that can be set up when needed.
3. Development/Testing/Support: Sometimes a PC user may have a need for a special use operating system on their own PC. I’ve done this often for demo purposes, even running a virtual server OS on my laptop at times to show of some scenario or capability. This is also often used to host special development or testing environments. Finally, some critical or interesting pieces of software may not run on your main operating system and so a virtual guest environment may be useful (e.g. Windows on a Mac or Linux on a Windows PC.)

Server Virtualization – Industry Roundup

Here’s a rundown of some of the main players in platform virtualization and a high-level analysis of each:

Citrix – XenServer

• Was focused on the open-source Xen project but now provides Hyper-V management
• Base, relatively full featured version available free as Xen
• Enterprise support and advanced management provided at enterprise cost
• Seen as enterprise class and a viable competitor to VMWare and MS Hyper-V (as well as a MS partner against VMWare) especially at lower price points, but requires Citrix management tools to be used effectively

EMC – VMWare

• Market leader with majority market share and high penetration in large businesses
• Known for unique (for now) advanced enterprise features like memory overcommit
• Free starter-style version available as ESXi
• Seen as the market leader though costs can be high and alternatives may have strengths in specific circumstances

IBM – z/VM

• Traditionally a mainframe based OS virtualization technology

• Based on deep history of OS virtualization development dating back to the 1960s
• Focused on UNIX/Linux OS support

• Seen as a strong UNIX/Linux solution for datacenters already managing large IBM platforms or datacenters outsourced to IBM but not typically considered for new implementations

Microsoft – Hyper-V

• Second place in market share and gaining on VMWare
• Near feature parity with all other vendors, requires MS management tools for full capabilities
• Free console managed version and full version available with Windows Server
• Seen as a strong contender for leadership in virtualization in the future and often wins on price but still lacks some of the enterprise capabilities of competitor offerings

Open Source – Xen

• Capable, open-source virtualization offering
• Feature parity at the hypervisor level with other enterprise offerings
• Lacks management tools and support needed in most enterprise environments
• Seen as a strong hypervisor platform but mostly adopted through enterprise vendors building solutions around it, like Citrix and Oracle

Oracle – VM Server

• Xen based offering targeted at Oracle solutions
• May be a stronger offering in the future with the integration of Sun multi-OS solutions
• Seen as a follower in this space but a viable alternative for heavy Oracle shops

With that roundup I’ll break for now and cover PC level platform virtualization in my next post. Until then let me know if you have any comments or see any gaps. Enjoy!

With that in mind, we were very pleased to have our assessments validated by the April 3rd publication from Gartner of their CRM “Magic Quadrant” for customer service contact centers. For those not completely familiar, Gartner has long been a thought leader in evaluating enterprise IT platforms and solutions. One of the key tools they use to evaluate markets of related solutions is their Magic Quadrant model which compares competing solutions against each other in reference to two key characteristics in a 4×4 graphical model.

This round, the market of CRM solutions was evaluated for fitness across 15 variables summarized in two major axis: “ability to execute” and “completeness of vision”. As you can see here, Microsoft Dynamics CRM has moved into the all important upper right quadrant.

This “Leader’s Quadrant” rating for Microsoft is a strong, independent validation that Microsoft continues to be on the right track with CRM. My personal assessment agrees and I continue to be amazed by the business value we are able to quickly deliver to the businesses we work with.

Congratulations to Microsoft and the Dynamics CRM team!

I started to compile a list of public web sites on SharePoint to illustrate the “is it possible” questions and found this section of one of my favorite SharePoint demo sites that has already compiled a list of over 500! I’ve been pointing people to Hawaiian Air for years but as you can see on that site and in these screenshots the list of high profile sites built on SharePoint continues to grow.

So why are The Library of Congress, UK Department of Health, Viacom, etc. choosing SharePoint for their public sites and why might you consider it? These are a few of the reasons:

Content Management

As of MOSS 2007 Microsoft has rolled its former Content Management Server product into SharePoint, making it a very capable content management solution for large web site. Support for master layouts, staged content and approvals, multi-language variations are just a few of the features that drive site owners to SharePoint for their site platform.

Enterprise-Class Search

For those web sites that are a source of large amounts of content, the value of that content is often limited by how accessible it is to the site visitor. Advanced, enterprise-class search available via SharePoint, especially enhanced with Microsoft acquisition of FAST, provides dynamic access to deep content repositories that would otherwise not be accessible.

Wikis, Blogs, and Discussions

Though not necessarily best of breed out of the box SharePoint does provide a starter set of social and collaboration features required by most web communities. These are further enhanced by 3rd party solutions layered on top of this base functionality where extra power is needed.

Collaboration

Many organizations are finding they need their public web presence to provide a true collaboration environment for a subset of their user population. Document storage and management, shared calendars, business workflow, etc. are all core aspects of SharePoint that it makes sense to leverage in the right scenario.

SharePoint can be a bit heavyweight for small sites and certainly isn’t recommended in all cases, but when the above types of features come into play, using the enterprise server infrastructure of SharePoint can deliver significant value.

Thanks again to the WSSDemo site for the compilation of public sites built on SharePoint and thanks to Mike Gannotti and his blog where I found some other interesting public site links.

Found any other interesting reasons for going with SharePoint on public facing web sites? I’d love to hear about it.

On the heels of that SKU announcement, Microsoft last week announced the features that will differentiate the “Enterprise” edition from the lower editions. This is of particular interest to businesses who will need to determine if the upgrade is worthwhile.

My thoughts at first glance are that BranchCache, VDI, and Network Booting are all aimed at specific uses that typically only a large, distributed enterprise would be interested in. On the other hand, some medium and even small business are probably going to end up with a need for one or more of the features on this list. DirectAccess has the potential to lower infrastructure complexity for remote workers. BitLocker will be key to any business with very high data security needs at the PC level. AppLocker will be cherished by any operations team.

Overall, I expect “Enterprise” edition uptake will be primarily in large, complex, distributed corporations, but medium and small businesses may also adopt it to pull in one or two of the specific features on this list. For example, I’ll be looking at DirectAccess in particular for our office and disconnected workforce.

The feature list additions for “Windows 7 Enterprise” include:

• DirectAccess: Windows 7, along with the network technologies in Windows Server 2008 R2, provides this network technology that enables the user to seamlessly access corporate network resources when on the Internet, without having to create a VPN connection.
• BranchCache: Windows 7 together with Windows Server 2008 R2 offers an alternative to alleviate the problems of slow connectivity, delivering increased network responsiveness of applications and giving users in remote offices an experience more like working in the head office. When BranchCache is enabled, a copy of data accessed from an intranet web site or a file server is cached locally within a branch office.
• Enterprise Search Scopes: allows IT administrators to populate links to the commonly used internal sites — for example, SharePoint sites – to the Windows Explorer UI or to the Start menu or in Windows 7, using Group Policy. These links simplify access to the target internal data sources on the network for business users.
• BitLocker & BitLocker To Go: protect data on PCs and removable drives, with manageability to enforce encryption and backup of recovery keys. Windows 7 extends BitLocker protection to USB storage devices while making the original functionality even easier to use. Note: BitLocker for PCs and BitLocker To Go for removal hard drives such as external USB drives.
• AppLocker: is a flexible, easy-to-use mechanism that enables IT professionals to specify exactly what is allowed to run on user desktops. It restricts unauthorized software while allowing applications, installation programs, and scripts that users need.
• Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) Optimizations: delivers desktop functionality in Windows 7 using virtual machines hosted on servers—a solution known as Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI). VDI enables users to access their desktops remotely as well as the ability to reuse virtual machine (VHD) images to boot a physical PC. Windows 7 provides for better user experience in VDI scenarios, with better graphics, audio and local device support.
• Multi Lingual User Interface: the Language Packs in Windows 7 Enterprise enable you to support up to 36 different languages using a single Windows master image, rather than creating a separate image for each language used in the organization. 
• Subsystem for UNIX-based Applications (SUA)
• License rights to run up to four additional copies of Windows in virtual machines
• License rights for network booting of Windows

What are your thoughts on “Windows 7 Enterprise”? Is your company going to end up with “Enterprise” eventually or are the lower versions going to do the job?