Server Core: Windows Without Windows

Via Redmondmag.com -

One of the most innovative features coming in Windows "Longhorn" Server isn't really a feature as much as a whole new version of Windows. It's called Server Core, and it will only take one-sixth of the disk space of a normal Longhorn installation. It's not expected to need anywhere near as many patches and hotfixes as Windows 2000. It's a version of Windows that does not, in fact, use windows. It's breaking Microsoft's long-standing reliance on graphical interfaces and shaking things up in several of Microsoft's product groups.

Server Core reflects a changing view of servers. "Administrators are accustomed to thinking of servers by their role. That's my file server, that's a domain controller, that's an Exchange server," says Andrew Mason, a Microsoft program manager for Server Core. Some of those roles really don't use much of what is built into Windows.

Server Core also recognizes -- based on painful experience -- that fewer "moving parts" in an operating system equates to fewer vulnerabilities, stability issues and maintenance points. Reducing the amount of code can help reduce the amount of bugs. That's what Server Core is all about.

Server Core can only act as a file server, domain controller, DNS server or DHCP server. As such, it's far from being a full-fledged Windows operating system (although Microsoft is considering other roles for future versions). Besides these four core roles, Server Core also supports Cluster Server, Network Load Balancing, the Unix subsystem, the new Windows Backup in Longhorn, Multipath I/O, Removable Storage Management, BitLocker drive encryption and SNMP. Server Core also supports Remote Desktop administration, although you'll only get a command-line window when you connect.

That's about it. There's no Internet Explorer, no Outlook Express, Calculator or Windows Paint, no Wordpad, Windows Messenger or Media Player -- just the basics. Microsoft did add Windows Notepad to Server Core at the request of several sneak-preview customers, but even that's a stripped down version. You can't, for example, use the "Save As" function, because Server Core doesn't have dialog boxes for functions like Open and Save As.

There's also no Microsoft .NET Framework. This means you can't run any managed code on Server Core. Mason says his development team wants to add the .NET Framework to Server Core, but they first need the Framework team to modularize the code so they can add just the essentials. The Framework's absence in Server Core is significant. For example, you can't run Windows PowerShell, Microsoft's vaunted new management shell, on Server Core. That doesn't mean you're out of remote management options, however.

Server Core will come in Standard, Enterprise and Datacenter editions for i386 and x64 platforms. Most companies will probably opt for the Standard edition because most of the differences found in the Enterprise and Datacenter editions of Longhorn won't be present in Server Core. The Enterprise Server Core does, however, get you more processor and memory support, as well as clustering. Datacenter adds the whole Datacenter hardware program and 99.999 percent reliability -- although the current Datacenter isn't exactly flying off the shelves.