Coming up on the show we take a look at the evolution of Windows Server.
From the new semi-annual channel release cadence,
starting with version 1709
and advances for nano server for containers.
To native support for Linux containers and workloads on Windows Server.
And a first look at the new html5 based admin experience
Microsoft Mechanics
I'm joined today by Jeff Woolsey from the windows server engineering team, welcome.
Hey thanks for having me on the show, Matt.
So your team is responsible for the direction of Windows Server
and we're here to talk about the evolution.
But before we go there we made some pretty foundational changes
in Windows Server 2016 that are worth recapping.
Oh that's totally right.
So the work we did in Windows Server 2016 gave us the foundation to build
a consistent hybrid cloud.
There are three areas I want to highlight.
So with security with shielded VMs we make a virtual machine a black box
to protect against rogue admins
or that VM that accidentally gets out into the wild.
Then of course we have application innovation with Windows Server containers,
which provide application isolation through process and namespace isolation.
And of course software-defined data center that gives you massive scale.
For example Windows Server 2016 supports the largest physical servers and VMs in the industry.
Flexible hyper-converged deployments are now supported.
We have a Azure inspired networking
which is where we took our learnings from Azure and brought them on-premises,
such as the Azure data plane, software load balancer, distributed firewall and a lot more.
So lots of big foundational changes there.
How is window server evolving?
So going forward Windows Server is evolving to deliver innovation through two channels.
The long term servicing channel.
And, the semi-annual channel.
The long term servicing channel, that's business as usual with five years of mainstream support
and five years of extended support.
You'll have the option to upgrade every two to three years.
The same way you've been doing the last 20 years.
Now for those of you who want to innovate faster
and take advantage of new features sooner,
we're adding the semi-annual channel.
The semi-annual channel is a Software Assurance benefit
and it's fully supported in production.
The difference is that it's supported for 18 months
And there will be a new version every six months.
Finally I want to point out that for whichever model you choose,
you're still in full control of patching your servers.
Now I've noticed that you're calling this release semi-annual channel version 1709.
What's the meaning of that?
Well to make versions easy to identify,
we refer to it by the year and the month.
So in this case 1709 refers to the year 2017 and the 9th month September.
Very straight forward.
So switching gears tell us what we're doing to make it easier for folks watching
to get their developers on board with new app innovation?
Well let's start with nano server.
In 2016 nano server had two roles.
The first was to run on hardware for bare metal roles like hyper-v and storage.
Second was to run within a container.
Now folks you gave us your feedback and the overwhelming majority of you
are using nano server within containers.
So we are refocusing nano server to be the best container image possible.
So nano server that shipped as part of Windows Server 2016
was just over a gigabyte on disk.
Nano server version 1709 is less than a fifth the size
at a hundred and ninety five megabytes
resulting in faster deployment and startup times making it the ideal OS for new cloud apps.
And that's cool for developers but can IT pros help with application modernization?
Absolutely.
So we know that organizations have lots of apps deployed today that they'd like to modernize.
for those apps server core within a container
provides the compatibility needed for existing apps
and IT pros can lift and shift these apps into containers.
So let's take a look at this.
So here we've taken a sample CRM application.
This is simply running on .net4 framework and SQL server.
And move these into a couple containers.
Now one is running IS server and the other is running SQL server.
Both using server core.
The most important being that this application just works without any code change.
Now you can see I'm launching the browser
and it's just refreshing for just a moment.
And what you see is here's our CRM application it just works without any code change.
So an IT pro can easily do this.
Now that's awesome for Windows workloads, but what about Linux workloads?
Yeah so we're taking the hyper-v isolation that we introduced in Windows Server 2016
to the next level by bringing Linux containers to Windows Server.
So can we take a look?
Oh absolutely.
So you can see here that we have the official docker repository with Apache tomcat.
From here we downloaded this docker container to run.
I want to point out that I'm running this Linux container without any code change.
This is literally as is from the docker repo
and I'm running this using the simple docker run command.
I also want to highlight that I'm running this Linux container
on the same host as the Windows container just using a different port, Port 88
and using hyper-v isolation.
And you can see we're refreshing right now and there it is!
Here's the tomcat application server running in a container
side-by-side with the windows CRM app.
No more spinning up dedicated VMs to run Windows or linux.
This is incredibly efficient and optimized.
And of course if that isn't cool enough, Matt
I brought a little special surprise.
For those that like cool console apps,
here's nyaned cat running in another Linux container.
Thanks Jeff and what a lovely cat.
Thank you.
But what are we doing for infrastructure and management?
Well there are a number of things we're doing in this area.
To go hand-in-hand with Linux containers,
we're introducing the windows subsystem for Linux.
Also known as Bash on Windows.
You can use the same scripts and tools that you've been using for Linux containers
now on your Windows server.
We're also making it easy to use your Windows File server for containers
by adding support for mapping SMB volumes to containers.
Of course we're going to continue to support next generation
hardware with things like NVdimms
and we're bringing deduplication to ReFS volumes and a whole bunch more.
But really we need to get to management.
So if you think about how you manage a server today,
you're probably used to using a variety of tools.
Task manager, device manager, event viewer, server manager, disk manager and more.
There are a number of console to use to troubleshoot and regular use.
So today I'd like to show you how we're making it easier
to manage your servers with a new Windows Server management solution.
So this new server management solution
is an html5 based UX that provides an intuitive way
to manage your servers where ever they reside.
On-premises, in the cloud, in a VM, you name it.
In addition it makes remote management easier than ever.
For example if you're taking a quick look at a server,
you probably want an overview of resource utilization.
Here in the overview I can see the server name, processors, the operating system, memory
disk space, its resources, and so much more.
If I'd like to make sure that my hardware is configured properly,
whether it's physical or virtual Hardware
I can take a look at it by clicking on device manager.
Click on a resource for example like this acpi based PC.
Click on driver, get version information and other details.
Suppose I'd like to review the security logs in the Event Viewer.
No problem.
Click on the Event Viewer and while it's loading the event providers here you're going to see
it's probably a few items here.
So I don't need to see for example all of this verbose information.
So if I want to take a look at my security logs I can click on filter,
filter out the information in verbose filters,
and now we only see the critical errors and warnings.
And you can see there are a couple of items I need to check out for later.
If I want to clear that, just click on the clear filter and it's really that simple.
Now suppose I need to create a new temp folder on this remote server.
No need to login, simply click on file explorer
and right now it's giving me a list of the disks.
And if I need to add that temp directory, not a problem.
Simply select the disk, create a new folder, call a temp, click OK.
And you can see there's my temp folder.
Real simple.
What if I'd like to review network settings?
Again, not a problem.
Click on networking settings.
It's going to load the networking settings and I can see the details.
In fact there's a really simple system here it's just got a single network adapter.
But I can see the name, the link speed, the description and more.
If I'd like to configure and make changes to IPv4 and IPv6 settings,
I can again do all of this remotely.
Well what if I need to do something like add a role like say hyper-v?
Well click on roles and features.
and you can see it provides a full list of all the roles and features available.
So if I want to add hyper-v
I simply find the role and select it.
I click on install roles and features and move on.
Finally, what if I need to do something like configure storage,
replication, VMs, or even Windows Update.
It's really that simple.
And I hope I've made my point it's really just a click away.
Finally, one last thing I didn't mention.
This is all managing a server core system.
So imagine I have servers running in Azure IaaS or I roll some servers in your office.
Now I can hand you a surface
or you can install this management tool on your Windows client.
And you can easily manage your servers.
Awesome stuff.
But does this management solution require Windows Server version 1709
And how much does it cost?
No, our goal is to manage down level to Windows Server 2016.
And we're investigating being able to manage back to Windows Server 2012 r2.
And this new management will be available at no cost.
So does this new Windows Server manager ship with Windows Server version 1709?
No, this new server management is shipping in parallel
so we can again listen to customer feedback and iterate real quickly.
We think it's a great way for you to start working with Windows Server version 1709.
So how can people try out the new capabilities for themselves?
Well keep current and download the semi-annual channel released today.
Download of course this awesome new Windows Server management preview.
And keep in mind that the way that we are delivering Windows Server moving forward
offers more opportunities than ever to help influence our product direction.
So please sign up to the windows insider program today.
Thanks very much Jeff for walking us through the evolution of Windows Server.
This truly is awesome stuff.
And keep watching Microsoft Mechanics for the latest updates.
See you next time.
Microsoft Mechanics
www.microsoft.com/mechanics