Oh dear, this is a most unfortunate bombshell, and I imagine was a really tough call to make.  Mike Neil has just posted that Viridian (aka:  Windows Server Virtualization) won’t ship with Live Migration and Hot Add Hardware.  You can read more in his post Viridian features update; beta planned for Longhorn RTM, and a snippet is below:

…with all this progress comes the occasional tradeoff. Earlier this week we had to come to grips with some universal truths about product development:

  • Shipping is a feature, too.
  • The quality bar, the time you have, and the feature set are directly correlated.
  • The mythical man-month - resources are not infinite and even if you could add more it does not help get more done faster.

So we had some really tough decisions to make. We adjusted the feature set of Windows Server virtualization so that we can deliver a compelling solution for core virtualization scenarios while holding true to desired timelines. Windows Server virtualization is a core OS technology for the future, and we chose to focus on virtualization scenarios that meet the demands of the broad market – enterprise, large organizations, and mid-market customers. We continue to offer great technology and successful strategies for enterprise customers by broadly investing in the several areas.

So we are making the following changes, and postponing these features to a future release of Windows Server virtualization:

  • No Live migration
  • No hot-add resources (storage, networking, memory, processor)
  • Support limit of 16 cores/logical processors (e.g., 2 processor, quad-core systems is 8 cores; or 4 processor, quad-core system is 16 cores)

I wanted to share this information this week with partners and customers so that no one is surprised at WinHEC when we demo all the other innovations in Windows Server virtualization.
 

Hmmm.  Well, this announcement of this leaves me in a head spinning quandary.  …and it’s nothing to do with coffee I’ve just finished drinking.  So I thought I’d take a few moments to jot down my thoughts.

Mike Neil, is right, “shipping is a feature“.  The (now reduced) feature set of Viridian is [still] such a huge leap forward compared to the current offering on Virtual Server.  …and the most fantastic feature set means absolutely bugger all if the product doesn’t ship. 

However, with an announcement such as this, and I help but find myself thinking about “features” and “value”.  Just because a product is free doesn’t immediately make it the best value.  If you’ve ever used or architected a solution around VMware’s VMotion you’ll know exactly what I mean.  When you’re in a tight spot, and VMotion saves the day, you know it was worth every last penny, and then some. :)    Rrosenkoetter nails it beautifully in his discussion forum post (second one down) — if your environment is architected accordingly, the value is in the solution.

As I write this post I find myself thinking “Where will Viridian deliver the most value?“  I guess it’s more than a question of “When will we see the missing features?“, but rather “How will we see the features?”.  How/will Viridian look to compete in the same enterprise space as Vmware VI3?   …or will it be more focused on the end-to-end management of the platform and server lifecycle?  Will the extra features eventually come in a service pack, or SCVMM, an R2 release, WSV version 2.0 or something else?  After all it does say “postponed” not “dropped completely”

The announcement certainly raises many good questions?!  I’ve had so many emails this morning, from assorted people I know (and didn’t) all asking some very good questions.  I don’t know the answers, and I’m as surprised as everyone else.  So I’m not going to think too much about it just yet.  Unfortunately I’ll just have to wait and see what announcements and guidance WinHec will bring next week.