Raksasa piranti lunak Microsoft mengumumkan Windows Azure, sebuah versi baru Windows yang lain dari biasanya. Disebut demikian karena Windows Azure adalah sistem operasi yang memanfaatkan konsep cloud computing alias berkomputer dengan memanfaatkan internet.

Apa maksudnya? Dengan Windows Azure, aplikasi akan dijalankan pada data center Microsoft dan bukan pada server sebuah perusahaan. Kemudian, pengguna bisa memanfaatkan aplikasi itu asalkan terhubung ke internet.

"Ini adalah transformasi dari piranti lunak kami dan transformasi dari strategi kami," ujar Ray Ozzie, Chief Software Architect Microsoft.

Pengumuman Windows Azure dilakukan dalam Professional Developers Conference yang digelar Microsoft di Los Angeles, Amerika Serikat, 27 Oktober 2008 waktu setempat. Azure akan menempatkan Microsoft bersaing secara langsung dengan penyedia jasa serupa, seperti Amazon, Salesforce.com dan Rackspace.

Belum ada rincian mengenai harga 'sewa' yang akan diterapkan Microsoft untuk Azure. Saat ini, Ozzie mengumumkan, Azure masih gratis bagi pengembang yang ingin mencobanya.

Microsoft pun berencana memanfaatkan Azure untuk berjualan beberapa piranti lunaknya yang biasanya dijual untuk digunakan pada server kantor. Semua piranti lunak Enterprise Microsoft, termasuk Exchange, dikabarkan akan menawarkan pilihan ini.

Jika sistem operasi 'tradisional' Microsoft seperti Windows Vista atau Windows 7 nantinya ternyata kurang 'laku', bisa jadi Azure akan menjadi masa depan bagi raksasa piranti lunak itu. Mungkinkah? (CNet/detik)

-----------------------------------

Microsoft on Monday announced a version of Windows that runs over the Internet from inside Microsoft's own data centers.

Dubbed Windows Azure, it's less a replacement for the operating system that runs on one's own PC than it is an alternative for developers to write programs that live inside Microsoft's data centers as opposed to on a business's own servers.

"It's a transformation of our software and a transformation of our strategy," said Ray Ozzie, a computing industry pioneer who now serves as Microsoft's Chief Software Architect.

Microsoft first outlined a shift to "Live Services" at an event in San Francisco in 2005. The company has released a few things piecemeal, such as Live Mesh, but Monday's announcement marked the first real discussion of how Microsoft's disparate Internet strategies fit together.

The announcements come at the start of Microsoft's Professional Developer Conference here. On Tuesday, Microsoft plans to go into more detail on Windows 7, the successor to Windows Vista, due out by next January.

With the launch of Azure, Microsoft will find itself in competition with other providers of Internet storage and computing services including Amazon, Salesforce.com and Rackspace.

Ozzie praised Amazon founder Jeff Bezos for innovating the hosted computing model. Amazon "established a base level design pattern, architecture models and business models that we'll all learn from," he said.

Microsoft said that it is making Windows Azure in preview form to developers, with a limited subset of the features that Microsoft plans to have in the product before its final release.

The software maker didn't go into too many details on how it will charge for Azure, saying it will be free during the preview period. Final pricing, "will be competitive with the marketplace," Ozzie said

Microsoft itself plans to offer businesses the option of running over the Internet the kinds of software that has traditionally run on a company's own servers. Microsoft already sells its Exchange corporate e-mail software in this way, but that is just the beginning, said Microsoft vice president Dave Thompson.

"All our enterprise software will be delivered as an online service as an option," Thompson said.