Microsoft today used day one of its Ignite 2016 conference to announce GA of Windows Server 2016. More specifically, the company says the service will launch alongside System Center 2016 next month. The move to general availability is no surprise, neither is the location of the announcement.
Back in July, Microsoft confirmed it would use the event to launch Windows Server 2016. Unfortunately, the company did not say exactly when in October is will arrive to all users. During the Ignite keynote, Microsoft pointed out its advantage in hybrid cloud services.
Preview users have been playing with Windows Server 2016 for some time. It has been in Technical Preview for most of this year. The service comes in three versions: Datacenter, Standard, and Essentials. The headless server component, Nano Server, will also be included.
The latest edition of Windows Server will have multi-layer security built into the operating system. It is an optimized application platform. As for Nano Server, Microsoft recently said customers will need Windows Volume License Agreement with Software Assurance.
Hybrid Cloud Advantage
Microsoft used the Ignite 2016 keynote to point out why it is the leading hybrid cloud service provider. The company announced a partnership with Docker Inc. The pair will make the Commercially Supported Docker Engine part of Windows Server. Any Docker product will run as native on the OS. Microsoft says this integration will be at no extra cost
New Azure monitoring capabilities were announced during day 1 of the conference. The Operations Management Suite is seeing an update to help create a smooth hybrid cloud service. Microsoft also made the next Technical Preview of Azure Stack available.
