Platform without a Framework

Before the Windows Server 2003 on Itanium platform can be described as fully baked, a number of supporting side dishes must emerge from Redmond’s oven: messaging (Exchange Server), business-to-business/extranet (BizTalk Server), legacy platform integration (Host Integration Server), and collaboration functionality (SharePoint Portal Server).

Although these gaps are understandable (after all, each server platform must be individually ported to 64-bits), the absence of the .Net Framework is less forgivable. It’s not just that .Net provides critical application server plumbing — such as the language-neutral CLR (Common Language Runtime) environment — developers have also invested so heavily in learning and applying Microsoft’s vision of programming nirvana. 

The lack of a 64-bit implementation of the .Net Framework means that the hard work many Windows developers have put into migrating to the .Net development model is for naught on Windows on Itanium. This includes time spent mastering the intricacies of ASP.Net, ADO.Net, and the C# language, all of which will remain missing in action until Microsoft ships a 64-bit Framework implementation in the second half of 2004.

In the meantime, IT shops that wish to employ 64-bit Windows as an application server or Web services platform will be forced to revert to the older, Windows DNA (Distributed Internet Applications) environment. For veteran Windows developers, it will be a trip down memory lane to the time of the Component Object Model, ASP, and legacy ADO (ActiveX Data Objects) programming models — in other words, everything that made coding for the pre-.Net Windows platform such a chore.

For now, Windows Server 2003 and SQL Server 2000 for 64-bit Itanium systems should appeal primarily to those who view the world in terms of SQL tables and queries. The absence of .Net not only limits what companies can do on the new platform, it also limits the platform’s appeal to those who can help lift it off the ground. Until developers get a 64-bit version of .Net, an otherwise promising new platform will remain immature.