In-Depth
Resizing BackOffice Server
Microsoft is repositioning its flagship server suite, BackOffice Server 2000. Should you be concerned that it's being broken up? <b>Contributing Editor Harry Brelsford</b> offers his view.
As you read this, Microsoft has begun filling
the channel with BackOffice Server 2000, the latest
version of the company’s venerable server bundle.
The newest release reflects a shift in Microsoft’s
thinking about the Internet and the enterprise.
On one hand, this move could reflect the end of
the flagship server family as we know it. On the
other hand, Microsoft has repositioned BackOffice
for medium and small businesses, which are better
fits for the bundled product paradigm. However
you look at it, the core design goal — to achieve
synergy between the server operating system and
server applications — is intact.
You could define BackOffice Server 2000 as a
philosophy. By virtue of its unique position in
the software industry, Microsoft can tightly integrate
its underlying operating system with its business
applications. And while such talk might be upsetting
to U.S. Department of Justice officials (and some
consumers), it’s amazingly comforting to business
people and network professionals looking to deploy
stable and secure technology solutions in production
environments. The pendulum rests these days in
the middle between going integrated suite vs.
disparate applications (and will remain there
until Web standards solidify); but I just plain
think it’s better to buy the bundle from a single
vendor than to struggle to integrate distinct
applications from multiple vendors, many of which
don’t especially care for each other’s company.
It’s All about Size
BackOffice Server 2000, more than any of its predecessors,
has a highly focused market. It’s designed to
serve three types of clients, all in the medium-sized
organization strata:
MORG. The
bread-and-butter deployment of BackOffice Server
2000, the medium-sized organization (MORG). These
are organizations ranging from 50 to 1,000 client
computers that don’t necessarily need server farms
to function. The question for these companies
is how to deploy and manage enterprise-level server
technologies without a militia of MCSEs.
Branch Office.
Microsoft discovered that BackOffice is especially
well positioned to serve as a branch office server
on a larger network. In fact, in Figure 1, you
can see that the Microsoft BackOffice Server 2000
Setup Wizard offers the choice of defining your
server as a branch office server that will connect
as a domain controller to an existing Active Directory
forest.
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Figure 1. You can select
Central Server or Branch Office Server on
the Server Location page, allowing you to
define the role for the BackOffice 2000 Server
machine. If you select the branch office option,
you can ship the server machine to the branch
office after setup and then make the actual
network connection over the organization’s
WAN. |
Departmental Server.
Step back in time to the early days of Windows
NT and you’ll recall that Microsoft’s greatest
wins initially involved having its servers act
as application servers at the department level
in enterprises. BackOffice Server 2000 revisits
these roots by offering itself as a departmental-level
application server for organizations that might
not have a perfect fit otherwise. This is a way
for Microsoft server-side solutions to assist
at the enterprise-level.
What
You Get — and Don't Get — with
BackOffice Server 2000 |
BackOffice
Server 2000 Components |
What It
Gains from Version 4.5 |
What It
Loses from Version 4.5 |
• BackOffice Server 2000
Components
• Windows 2000 Server with
Service Pack 1
• Microsoft Exchange 2000
Server (Standard Edition)
• Microsoft Outlook 2000
SR-1
• Microsoft SQL Server 2000
(Standard Edition)
• Microsoft Host Integration
Server 2000
• Microsoft Systems Management
Server 2.0 with Service
Pack 2 (SP2)
• BackOffice Server Deployment
Wizard
• BackOffice Server Management
Consoles
• To Do Lists |
• Microsoft Internet
Security and Acceleration
(ISA) Server 2000
• MultiServer deployment
and Wizard
• Internet Connection Wizard
• Remote administration
with Terminal Services
• Health Monitor 2.1
• Server status reports
and view
• Shared fax and modem services
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• Site Server
• Single-user version of
FrontPage 2000
• Single-user version of
Visual InterDev
• Five-user version of Seagate
Crystal Info |
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Defining BackOffice Server
2000
BackOffice Server 2000 bundles several — but not
all — server-class applications with Windows 2000
Server. It’s oriented to medium-sized organizations,
including departments inside the enterprise and
branch offices (which I’ll drill down on shortly).
The suite includes the following modules:
Windows 2000 Server
This underlying network operating system includes
the Microsoft Management Console 2.1, Terminal
Services, Active Directory, Group Policy, Internet
Information Server 5.0, and many other features.
Win2K Server receives a great deal of ink in this
magazine and is the focus of the revamped MCSE
program.
Microsoft Exchange 2000
Server and Microsoft Outlook 2000 Highlights
in this messaging and collaboration solution include
Active Directory integration, Instant Messaging,
and the Conferencing Server component. The latter
allows multicast video streaming-based collaboration
between NetMeeting participants. NetMeeting in
a stand-alone scenario streams unicast video,
allowing only point-to-point video conferencing.
The new and improved Outlook Web Access (OWA)
brings the look and feel of Outlook 2000 to the
Web browser-based OWA client, allowing much faster
retrieval of email, schedules, contacts, tasks,
and public folder contents in your Exchange-based
organization. For more on Exchange Server, read,
“Exchange
2000 Pushes the Messaging Envelope,” in the
June 2000 issue.
Microsoft SQL Server
2000 This relational database solution
is a hidden jewel in the BackOffice crown. In
my experience, SQL 2000 is one of the stealth
purchasing motivations for BackOffice. Why? The
clients I consult for typically are trying to
solve a business problem, not enrich Microsoft
as early adopters of new technology. Few business
clients give a hoot about the underlying OS. But
they’re deeply concerned about the latest release
of their beloved accounting program, such as Great
Plains, which requires SQL Server. Case closed.
To learn more about SQL Server 2000, see Mike
Gunderloy’s article, “SQL
Server 2000: All Charged Up,” in the November
2000 issue.
System Management Server
(SMS) 2.0 This enterprise tool manages
desktops, software distribution, inventory management,
and remote diagnostics and troubleshooting. Granted,
Group Policy and Terminal Services have stolen
some thunder from SMS, but this long-time enterprise-level
management tool still has a dedicated following.
See Mark Wingard’s article, “A
Job for SMS,” in the November 2000 issue.
Installation
Tip |
If you use ISA Server
as your firewall, you need to
configure your VPN access following
the ISA Server VPN wizard configuration
instructions from the Configure
Remote Access link on the To Do
List. This assumes you’re not
using a third-party hardware-based
firewall solution. The wonderful
thing about the ISA Server VPN
wizard is that it configures the
VPN port openings and leaves the
other port openings you might
have configured via the ICW alone.
Contrast that with the VPN wizard-based
configuration available under
Routing and Remote Access Service
(RRAS), which is also discussed
under the Configure Remote Access
link on the To Do List. Using
the RRAS VPN wizard closes all
ports except the port needed for
VPN traffic, the assumption being
that the server you’re configuring
will only be used as a VPN server
and nothing else. Ouch! |
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Internet Security and
Acceleration Server 2000 (ISA) This
software-based firewall and Web caching solution,
which succeeds Proxy Server 2.0, is considered
a significant upgrade. ISA Server provides firewall
security using a variety of techniques, including
NAT with a two-network adapter DMZ and dynamic
port filtering. Caching allows you to store recently
accessed Web pages locally so that users can download
them at LAN speeds, not over a slower Internet
connection. Publishing allows safe public access
to a Web server hosting your Web page on the inside
network (behind the firewall). Roberta Bragg recently
penned an article on the firewall aspects of ISA
Server in November 2000’s “Security
Advisor.”
Host Integration Server (HIS)
2000 This host system gateway component facilitates
mainframe and midrange connectivity. It serves
as the entryway for BackOffice into many medium-sized
organizations with heavy metal hardware. For example,
HIS facilitates robust connectivity between SQL
Server 2000 and IBM DB2. Historically, this component
hasn’t been a major area of concern for MCSEs.
If that’s the case, why include it at all in BackOffice?
Early on, Microsoft offered a connectivity component
(in the form of SNA Server) in order to give the
sense that it was addressing large enterprise
concerns — and to provide a comfort level to companies
that were being wooed away from a reliance on
their “big iron.” In the inimitable way that Microsoft
has of learning from its experiments, HIS continues
that tradition. And now that Datacenter Server
is a reality, it could prove an interesting training
ground for NT- and Win2K-oriented administrators
who want to move into a liaison role with the
mainframe staffers.
Shared Modem, Shared
Fax These communications solutions
were taken from Small Business Server (SBS) 2000
(see “Baby
BackOffice” in this issue). Essentially these
components provide adequate modem pooling and
computer-based faxing capabilities. Developed
at Microsoft’s Israel research facility, they’ve
been completely recoded to provide much greater
stability than they’ve shown in previous releases
of SBS.
Health Monitor 2.1
This powerful real-time server monitor tool allows
in-house IT professionals and consultants to constantly
monitor network performance. I cover more on this
later.
Server Status Reports
and View These tools allow you to receive
computer system logs via email. For example, a
network administrator could receive a tape backup
log each morning. I discuss these components in
greater detail elsewhere in the story.
Console and Wizards
Another SBS concept borrowed by BackOffice is
the Management Console, which provides an administration
dashboard for common network functions such as
adding a user to the system. Numerous configuration
wizards — above and beyond those found in Windows
2000 Server alone — facilitate ease of implementation
and administration. One example of this is the
MultiServer Planning Wizard, which I discuss later.
A Business Strategy
It can’t be denied that if you type in the old
trustworthy URL, www. microsoft.com/ backoffice,
long the Web address for the BackOffice family,
you won’t learn much about the new suite. For
that, you need to go to www.microsoft.com/servers.
The BackOffice family as you’ve known it — a Microsoft
bundle of server applications being sold with
a network operating system — has been effectively
unbundled and rebranded. Let me explain.
In its push to penetrate the enterprise market,
Microsoft learned that enterprise software purchases
don’t occur in the linear pattern imposed by the
BackOffice bundle. For example, an enterprise
might purchase only a single copy of ISA Server
to use for its caching capabilities because it
relies on hardware-based firewall solutions for
protection from Internet intruders. This same
enterprise might purchase six copies of SQL 2000
to support a wide range of business applications.
Perhaps it needs two copies of Microsoft Exchange
Server to set up an efficient messaging infrastructure
and no copies of SMS. Add countless copies of
Windows 2000 Server, and you get the picture.
The bundled solution, which sells one copy of
each component per BackOffice stock keeping unit
(SKU), doesn’t implicitly work well for the enterprise.
So far, so good. This makes a lot of sense if
you’re a technology purchasing manager.
The downside to the Microsoft Servers strategy
for you, the MCSE, and others who fund software
purchases from their technology budget, is that
the new products have the potential to cost you
a great deal more money. The cost model changes
when you look closely at the difference between
Microsoft servers and BackOffice. Remember that
BackOffice was always positioned as a bargain
as well as a bundle. For the price of the underlying
OS and just one major component such as Microsoft
Exchange, you could purchase the full BackOffice.
Purchasing individual applications in the software
has historically cost more than the bundle. Remember
in the late 1980s when WordPerfect 5.x was more
than $300? Along came Microsoft Office, which
sold for roughly the same price and offered not
only a word processor but also spreadsheet and
presentation programs. It killed the stand-alone
word processor category.
What
About .NET? |
Microsoft launched its .NET
initiative in the summer of
2000. It encompasses all of
the company’s efforts in creating
solutions that enable the delivery
of software as a service, available
on any device at any time from
any place — in a customizable
format. It currently includes
the following servers:
- Application
Center 2000, in beta
two at the time of this writing,
is a deployment and management
tool for high availability
Web applications. Its primary
focus: to allow an administrator
to manage a group of servers.
- BizTalk
Server 2000 Enterprise Edition,
in beta two at the time of
this writing, provides an
XML-based infrastructure for
integrating, managing, and
automating business processes
and Web services between organizations.
- Commerce
Server 2000, in final
beta in mid-November, is the
successor to Site Server 3.0,
Commerce Edition. This program
provides a platform for building
e-commerce applications.
- Exchange
2000 Server. Released
at the end of 2000.
- Host
Integration Server 2000.
Released as part of BackOffice
2000.
- ISA
Server 2000. Expected
release by the time you read
this.
- Mobile
Information 2001 Server,
under development, will enable
users to access network services,
like email, the calendar,
and other intranet line-of-business
applications from mobile devices.
- SQL
Server 2000. Released
at the end of 2000.
Learn more about these products
at www.microsoft.com/servers.
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To some extent, BackOffice has been a category
killer, relegating bundles from Novell (NetWare,
GroupWise, ManageWise, Border Manager, and Btrieve),
IBM (IBM Suite for Windows NT 1.5), and Oracle
(Internet Application Server 8i, Integration Server,
and E-Business Suite) to “also-ran” status. Category
conquered, Microsoft can increase revenues by
selling its servers and applications individually
while legitimately meeting the needs of its sought-after
and much-prized enterprise customers. Smart!
So Microsoft has shifted its thinking in product
placement when it comes to its server family.
Does that spell the death of BackOffice? No. True,
BackOffice is no longer the flagship term used
in the Microsoft style guide to refer to everything
it provides customers for the air-conditioned
server room. Rather, BackOffice now refers to
an individual bundled product primarily aimed
at MORGs, the focus of this article. I predict
BackOffice will be around for several more releases.
The only wild card in the BackOffice picture
is the Microsoft .NET strategy. As of this writing,
there’s no product bundle called BackOffice.NET.
In fact, if you visit the .NET Web site at www.microsoft.com/net,
you’ll observe that all .NET components are sold
separately.
Any bundling discussion you find on that Web
page is presented in the context of Microsoft’s
Digital Network Architecture (DNA) strategy, not
BackOffice.
Mastering BackOffice
Server 2000
Let’s drill deeper into those parts of BackOffice
Server 2000 I think you, as network genius, will
want to master.
Setup After
you set up Windows 2000 Server on your machine,
the BackOffice installation process commences
with its own setup wizard. This wizard gathers
organizational identification information such
as address, telephone, and fax number before proceeding
to an Office 2000 installation page. Here you
elect to install different BackOffice applications.
By default, SQL Server 2000, Host Integration
Server 2000, and SMS 2.0 are not installed. The
assumption is that not all MORG sites will appreciate
or need these applications. If for some reason,
you start the BackOffice setup process on an existing
Windows 2000 Server machine, which is entirely
acceptable, any missing Win2K components are added
before the BackOffice applications are installed.
This might include Windows 2000 Service Pack 1,
Terminal Services, Active Directory, or the DNS
or DHCP services.
The Console
To facilitate easy and effective administration
in BackOffice 2000, two management consoles are
included. For in-house IT staff or consultants,
the BackOffice Server Management Console exposes
the full set of management tools in a single portal
(see Figure 2). This is similar to, but much stronger
than, the grouping of tools offered by the Computer
Management MMC in Windows 2000 Server.
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Figure 2. The BackOffice
Server Management Console offers a slew of
management tools specifically for the IT professional
within the organization.(Click image to view
larger version.) |
For trusted parties, such as power users, branch
managers, and people new to networking, there’s
a lower-level console, seen in Figure 3.
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Figure 3. My BackOffice
Server Console lets power users handle specific
network management tasks, such as resetting
passwords. (Click image to view larger version.) |
The MyBackOffice Server Console is meant to facilitate
decentralized IT management at the MORG-level
by relieving an overworked and often-unavailable
MCSE from routine network management tasks.
Wizards So
you want wizards? Boy, does BackOffice Server
2000 have wizards, only adding to the plethora
of those present in Windows 2000 Server. One of
the more interesting ones is the MultiServer Planning
Wizard (see Figure 4).
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Figure 4. The MultiServer
Planning Wizard lets you burden multiple servers
with the job of running BackOffice Server
2000. |
Accessed from the Microsoft BackOffice Server
program group from the Start menu, this wizard
allows you to distribute BackOffice Server 2000
on up to three server machines. This lets you
distribute different components across different
machines to lessen the load based on your network
design, administration roles, performance, reliability,
or server tasks. (Note, however, that you’ll need
a server license for each machine running the
software; the default is a single license.) Given
the power needed to run the applications in BackOffice
Server 2000, you can look forward to getting to
know the MultiServer Planning Wizard intimately.
To Do
Lists Perhaps you had the same reaction
I did when I first installed Windows 2000 Server:
What next? Microsoft created the To Do List (see
Figure 5) to guide you.
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Figure 5. The To Do List
walks you through the final details of your
installation in a presumably sensible order.
(Click image to view larger version.) |
Common tasks are presented in a suggested completion
order. For example, the Internet Connection Wizard
(ICW) allows you to configure your Internet connection
for a number of scenarios, including modem dial-up,
router, and broadband connection. You’ll also
find a page to elect your ISA Server firewall
settings (for example, allow FTP).
Server Status Reports/View
Imagine having all of the servers in your management
responsibility area send you critical status reports,
such as the event logs, tape backup logs, and
virus detection logs, on a regular basis. In my
case, I’ve built a fee-based business providing
this service to my clients. Each morning, over
my first few cups of coffee, I observe the logs
from my customers’ servers to look for reporting
exceptions. I can then advise the client on an
appropriate remedy. Server Status Reports are
easily configured from the Configure Report link
on the BackOffice Server 2000 homepage in the
BackOffice Server Management Console. You may
receive these reports via fax or email.
The Server Status View is the snapshot of critical
system information displayed as part of the BackOffice
Server 2000 homepage (which you can see in Figure
2). You can configure what information displays.
Health Monitor 2.1
For continuous, real-time server health reporting,
you’ll be interested in Health Monitor 2.1, which
is accessed via the Health Monitor link in the
BackOffice Server Management Console. You may
create a sophisticated server monitoring system
that alerts you via email when an execution condition
(system state reading) is OK, at the Warning level,
or Critical. You have complete control in defining
these execution conditions for whichever performance
thresholds you desire. You can also use the Health
Monitor sample monitors that ship with BackOffice
2000. Figure 6 displays the sample monitors for
memory management.
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Figure 6. The pre-configured
Health Monitor settings included in BackOffice
Server 2000. (Click image to view larger version.) |
So how do you correct the problem identified
by both the Server Status Reports and Health Monitor?
Easy. Terminal Services is installed automatically
in Remote Administration mode, which allows the
in-house IT staff or consultant to remotely administer
and repair the BackOffice 2000 Server. Branch
offices are just going to love that!
Pricing |
At the time this article went
to press, Microsoft hadn’t yet
released pricing details for
BackOffice Server 2000. But
pricing for individual components
is beginning to shake out, so
we’ll share those. For this
pricing exercise, assume the
following:
- Your organization needs
10 client access licenses
(CALs).
- The company is upgrading
from version 4.5 of BackOffice
Server.
- The company will use three
dual-processor-based servers
to support the software.
- You have no need for host
integration.
Component |
Price |
Small
print |
Windows 2000
Server |
$1,797 |
$599 per server
license; one license required
per machine. |
Exchange
2000 Server |
$689 |
Includes
right to install and use
Outlook 2000. Exchange runs
on one server. Price includes
10 CALs at $34 apiece and
Exchange 2000 Server at
$349. |
SQL Server
2000 Standard Edition |
$2,249 |
Server/per
seat CAL licensing vs. per
processor. 10 CALs included. |
Host Integration
Server 2000 |
Not needed |
The retail
price is $2,499 per processor;
upgrade $1,249 per processor. |
Systems Management
Server 2.0 |
$569 |
Upgrade price
with 10 CALs. |
ISA Server
2000 |
$2,998 |
$1,499 per
processor. |
Total |
$8,302 |
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BackOffice Opportunities
for the MCSE
So what’s BackOffice mean for the MCSE? Several
things come to mind, ranging from ease of administration
to sampling Microsoft’s family of server applications.
If you work as an in-house employee, it’s likely
you’ll appreciate administration improvements
such as the Management Console. Performance monitoring,
while cool, is still something you’ll likely never
have enough free time to devote to as a harried
salaried employee with too much other stuff to
do. But clearly those tools, such as Health Monitor,
are there for your use. However, the in-house
network administrator still has access to the
best performance monitor of all-time: the user
who will alert you immediately to any network
abnormalities.
The outside consultant clearly benefits from
BackOffice in a few different ways. With one purchase,
you can sample several Microsoft server products.
Perhaps the world of messaging lights your interest
professionally and you discover that fact while
working with Exchange 2000 Server. Or possibly
you’ve mastered Windows 2000 Server and are seeking
another billing zone as an MCSE consultant. Discovering
SQL Server 2000 in your journey with BackOffice
might just be the premier act of your next consulting
niche. And when it comes to the server status
reports and Health Monitor, there exists a billing
opportunity to provide monitoring services for
your client base. Not only can you charge for
this type of service — typically under a service
contract — but also you can serve your clients
better by proactively managing their BackOffice-based
technology infrastructure.
Predicting The Future
Will future releases of BackOffice Server be positioned
as rock-solid infrastructure support or foreground
“change the world” bundle of awesome applications?
By all indications, BackOffice Server as a SKU
is here to stay. Clearly its marketing message
(and bundling options) will change to reflect
the ebbs and flows of Microsoft’s emerging .NET
strategy. For example, it might be that the modem-sharing
component won’t be present in a future release,
reflecting the use of broadband and router-based
Internet connections.
It’s impossible to predict how the BackOffice
development team will fit as part of the Windows
operating system group, a recent organizational
change at Microsoft that resulted in the disbanding
of the BackOffice business unit altogether. Under
any future scenario, the good news is that BackOffice
Server in some way, shape, or form should enjoy
a long life. I attribute this to its focused middle-tier
product placement and its having reached critical
financial thresholds at Microsoft, making it a
welcome addition to the bottom line.
It’s also a safe bet, given the typical three-
to five-year lifecycle of an information system
deployment, that an MCSE, be it an in-house IT
professional or a technology consultant, can confidently
select and implement BackOffice Server 2000 as
appropriate for duty.