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Windows Server 2003
Server Roles
Windows Server 2003 is a multipurpose operating system capable
of handling a diverse set of server roles, depending on your needs,
in either a centralized or distributed fashion. Some of these server
roles include:
- File and print server.
- Web server and Web application services.
- Mail server.
- Terminal server.
- Remote access and virtual private network (VPN) server.
- Directory services, Domain Name System (DNS), Dynamic Host
Configuration Protocol (DHCP) server, and Windows Internet Naming
Service (WINS).
- Streaming media server.
Windows Server 2003 Core Technologies
Windows Server 2003 contains core technologies that build on the
strengths of Windows 2000 Server to deliver a superior and cost-effective
server operating system. Learn about the many new features and
technologies that make Windows Server 2003 an ideal server platform
for organizations of any size.
Dependable
Windows Server 2003 has the reliability, availability, scalability, and security
that make it a highly dependable platform.
- Availability. The Windows Server 2003
family provides improved availability through enhanced clustering
support. Clustering services have become essential for organizations
deploying critical e-commerce and line-of-business applications,
because they provide significant improvements in availability,
scalability, and manageability. Clustering installation and setup
is easier and more robust in Windows Server 2003, while enhanced
network features in the product provide greater failover capabilities
and high system uptime. The Windows Server 2003 family supports
server clusters for up to eight nodes. If one of the nodes in
a cluster becomes unavailable because of failure or maintenance,
another node immediately begins providing service, a process
known as failover. Windows Server 2003 also supports network
load balancing (NLB), which balances incoming Internet Protocol
(IP) traffic across nodes in a cluster.
- Scalability. The Windows Server 2003
family provides scalability through scale-up, enabled by symmetric
multiprocessing (SMP), and scale-out, enabled by clustering.
Internal tests indicate that compared to Windows 2000 Server,
Windows Server 2003 delivers up to 140 percent better performance
in the file system and significantly better performance in various
other features including the Microsoft Active Directory® service,
Web server and Terminal Server components, and networking services.
Windows Server 2003 scales from single processor solutions all
the way up to 32-way systems. It supports both 32-bit and 64-bit
processors.
- Security. Businesses have extended
the traditional local area network (LAN) by combining intranets,
extranets, and Internet sites. As a result, increased system
security is now more critical than ever before. As part of the
Microsoft commitment to reliable, secure, and dependable computing,
the company has intensely reviewed the Windows Server 2003 family
to identify possible fail points and exploitable weaknesses.
Windows Server 2003 provides many important new security features
and improvements including:
- The common language runtime. This
software engine is a key element of Windows Server 2003
that improves reliability and helps ensure a safe computing
environment. It reduces the number of bugs and security
holes caused by common programming mistakes. As a result,
there are fewer vulnerabilities for attackers to exploit.
The common language runtime also verifies that applications
can run without error and checks for appropriate security
permissions, making sure that code performs only appropriate
operations.
- Internet Information Services 6.0. To
increase Web server security, Internet Information Services
(IIS) 6.0 is configured for maximum security out of the
box. IIS 6.0 and Windows Server 2003 provide the most dependable,
productive, connected, and integrated Web server solution
with fault tolerance, requesting queuing, application health
monitoring, automatic application recycling, caching, and
more. These are among the many new features in IIS 6.0
that enable you to conduct business securely on the Web.
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