JC - as a guy who spent more than 20 years administering Unix systems, I am NOT saying that Windows is becoming more Unix-like - except in the sense that they have come out of the dark ages. But they are also not dragging along 20 years of Unix baggage, and I would suggest that the current state of Windows commercial desktop deployment is way ahead of Unix, and Servers are on a par, but different.
Let me give you some examples and see if you still think it is a "local user based" administration model. On the client side, CPQ has a centralized software distribution product - MSFT has one too but I am more familiar with CPQ's version - which allows you to take a plain vanilla iPaq (or any CPQ desktop) out of the box and have a fully configured, registered corporate desktop, with both standard and custom applications, ready to use in less than 10 minutes. It can be run locally, and that is often how it is done, since someone has to be at the end user's desk to unpack the box and plug it in, but there is also a full-function web-based administration tool which can be used remotely. The only input needed in the installation process is to accept the ever-present EULA, and enter the user ID. Even machine name and directory entries can be defaulted. The machine boots out of the box to a point where it can connect for the remote administration. Hundreds of machines can be configured at the same time, and profiles can be tailored to department, job function, user name, etc. It is pretty clean and VERY fast.
On the server side, the capability is even more deeply embedded, since the remote administrator can even monitor the bootup sequence and access the machine BIOS settings remotely over a web browser. Power cycle too! (although we are assured that this latter capability is no longer required...<G>). Try that with Telnet!!
There is nothing you can do locally that you can't do from across the country, aside from physically swapping parts. And it's all web-based, so connectivity is a snap, assuming that the site supports VPNs or secure connections (presumably you would not want to configure your servers using a standard net connection).
CPQ supports these capabilities for both NT4 and Win2K systems, although the stuff for Win2K is a lot slicker and somewhat faster.
As far as "a pretty big grenade being thrown into the MSFT business model" - I agree completely, and it seems the MSFT management team thinks so also. I attended the Forum 2000 event at which .NET was unveiled, and afterwards we (press, analysts, and some folks like me just looking for a free lunch) got a couple of hours to grill the MS execs on exactly that point. They agreed completely. Ballmer said it was the toughest challenge they had ever faced, and that the "Microsoft DNA" made it hard to change attitudes and practices. Ballmer said there was the old era - the PC era - which he saw as starting to morph in 1995, and pretty well shifted by 1998, and the new "Post PC" era, which was an essentially services based world.
There were a lot of hard questions about MSFT's business model in that new world, and some of the answers were not fully fleshed out, but my sense was that MSFT understood the challenges and had a strategy to address them. Time will tell if they can execute on that plan, but the idea that they are blindly heading to the chopping block is very misguided. They are actively in the game with a plan that could put them back in the driver's seat. |
