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Last Visited: 7/4/2009
Takes the Windows Server System and it puts those products through testing scenarios," says Mark Jewett, product manager for the hosting group at Microsoft.
"We document the configuration and how to use those products, we add to it different management packs and scripts.
What we are doing is saying 'here is a Windows Server system and here's how to use it in a hosted environment.
In its fourth update since being launched five years ago, the solution consists of eight integrated modules, including server and service provisioning, centralized management, monitoring and reporting, and update management, along with components for Web, data and Windows SharePoint Services hosting.
Microsoft says version 3.5 is designed to lower operational costs and increase revenue per user through improved management capabilities.
The solution was developed with feedback from its hosting provider customers, whose main concern was reducing operational costs while still maximizing the number of customers housed on a single shared server, says Jewett.
"They asked us in this release … to make sure that we really focused on the economics around Windows Server 2003 as a shared Web hosting platform.
Lowering costs and generating more revenue is also achieved by adding new features to Web hosts' offerings, Microsoft says, and was another area that hosts asked Microsoft to focus on.
"[Hosts asked us] to make sure that we were providing rich alternatives on the Windows platform so that they could add those to their offers," says Jewett.
In response to the requests, Microsoft worked with its developer community partners and added Web Site Starters for Windows, a set of third-party applications hosts can add to their Windows-based offerings.
The two applications introduced are DotNetNuke (dotnetnuke.com) and Telligent (telligentsystems.com) Community Server.
DotNetNuke, produced by Perpetual Motion, is an open source portal Web site builder, with over 200 integrated modules.
Tellignet Community Server provides blog, forum and photo album applications.
Go Daddy (godaddy.com) has tested the applications and is offering them to its Windows hosting customers.
Jewett says Microsoft is doing everything it can to offer rich hosting offerings, ultimately helping hosts generate revenues.
"We are enabling people to launch new services or make their existing services more compelling, so they get new customers.
And the solution is equally well suited for hosts working in dedicated hosting environments, he says.
The other side of the update, says Jewett, is support for the latest Microsoft product releases.
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Jewett says there have seen 2,000 posts since its launched last November with participation growing rapidly.
Version 3.5 builds on the momentum of version 3.0, which was released just last November.
According to Jewett, there are now approximately 400-450 deployments of the solution.
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