Microsoft unbundles 'Active Directory'
Posted by Daniel Fleshbourne on 19 July 2002 - 11:25 · 3 comments & 161 views
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The directory technology essentially provides a network manager with a central database to store and manage information about users, computer systems and networking devices. Microsoft competes against Novell and Sun Microsystems in the directory-server software market.
Microsoft's "Active Directory" is included in Windows 2000. A forthcoming version of the operating system, called the Windows .Net Server, will include a new capability called Active Directory in Application Mode
With the application mode, companies can manage access to software that runs on Windows-based networks much easier, said Jackson Shaw, Microsoft's Active Directory product manager. For example, a business can use the directory technology for one specific function, such as a portal Web site for a department, without having to store that information in the main corporate directory, he said.
Chief Financial Officer John Connors said in an interview that sales of the new Windows XP operating system and other desktop computer software remained strong. He said the company was able to increase its sales from corporate customers despite the overall slowing in technology spending.
Microsoft plans to add 5,000 employees to its roughly 50,000 work force, with 30 percent to 40 percent of the new hires in the Puget Sound region. The positions are for research and development, sales and support, Connors said.
Connors said the company currently has no plans to change the way it reports stock options as some are proposing as an accounting reform.
Microsoft said that sales of its new Xbox video game consoles reached 3.9 million for the fiscal year.
For the fiscal year, Microsoft had profits of $7.83 billion, or $1.41 a share, compared to $7.35 billion, or $1.32 a share, in 2001. Revenue for the year was $28.4 billion, up 12 percent from $25.3 billion the previous year.