Real-time computing. Real-time news.
May 16, 2005
Sun, Microsoft Increase Interoperability
In outlining
progress between their two companies one year after their landmark
agreement, Sun Microsystems Inc. chairman and CEO Scott McNealy and Microsoft Corp.
CEO Steve Ballmer announced a series of measures to enhance product interoperability, including the development of
new specifications that enable Web single sign-on (SSO) between systems that use Liberty and WS-* Web service architectures.
The measures result from the broad 10-year technical collaboration
agreement, announced in April 2004, that set the framework for
increased cooperation between the companies to enable their products to
work better together. The chief executive officers noted that over the
past year the companies have made considerable progress building a
productive work relationship at various levels and setting the
foundation for a number of initiatives to address customer
interoperability needs.
"Over the past year we have worked to establish great communication at all levels between our companies, from regular executive
meetings to in-depth working sessions with our engineers," said Ballmer. "In the first year, we've moved from the courtroom
to the computer lab. Now we're moving from the lab to the market."
"Sun and Microsoft are working together ... and quite well at that,"
said McNealy. "A year ago, the skeptics doubted that we could agree on
the shape of the table, much less collaborate on solving some of the
industry's toughest problems. Surprise -- we did just that and today
we've taken a huge step forward. Single sign-on experience between the
Solaris-based Operating System, Sun Java Enterprise System and
Microsoft Windows Server has been customers' top request. This
is just the beginning of a long list of projects we're working on."
The companies noted their strong outreach to customers in developing
the relationship as well as identifying key areas and projects. Over
the past year, top executives from both companies have spoken regularly
to customers to get a better understanding of priorities and concerns.
A key area for customers was product interoperability; in addition to
the Web specifications, the companies also announced licensing
agreements and product cooperation that address customer
interoperability needs.
Web Single Sign-On (SSO)
The companies have jointly developed and published two draft
specifications: Web Single Sign-On Metadata Exchange (Web SSO MEX)
Protocol and Web Single Sign-On Interoperability Profile (Web SSO
Interop Profile). These new specifications enable browser-based Web SSO
between security domains that use Liberty ID-FF and WS-Federation.
Products that support the Web SSO MEX Protocol and the Web SSO Interop
Profile will enable companies to provide users with an improved Web SSO
experience from their Web browsers.
As part of the companies' ongoing commitment to improving interoperability across their respective product lines, Microsoft
and Sun also announced plans to support the new specifications within their product portfolios, including Microsoft Windows
Server and Sun Java Enterprise System.
Microsoft and Sun welcome participation in the further development of these draft specifications through the Web services
protocol workshop process, and ultimately will submit them to a standards organization for finalization and ratification as
industry standards. Drafts of the new specifications are available on Microsoft's Web site at msdn.microsoft.com/webservices/understanding/specs/default.aspx?pull=/library/en-us/dnglobspec/html/wssecurspecindex.asp and Sun's Web site at developers.sun.com/techtopics/identity/interop/index.html for anyone to review and comment on.
"The integration of the products of these two companies is critical
to General Motors," said Fred Killeen, director of Systems Development
and chief technology officer for General Motors Information Systems
& Services. "The reduction in integration cost and operational
complexity will be a key enabler in implementing identity management
initiatives for GM and for the industry as a whole."
"Finding ways to improve interoperability and reduce overlap between the Liberty Alliance specifications and the WS-* Web
services architecture is a primary goal of the Liberty Alliance," said Michael Barrett, vice president of Security Strategy
for American Express Co., and president of the Liberty Alliance from 2002 to 2004. "The Microsoft and Sun agreement showed
a great deal of promise as a practical way to achieve that interoperability, and today's announcements go a long way toward
enabling the interoperability that enterprises and vendors both need."
WS-Management Specification
Microsoft and Sun are collaborating on systems management to enable
deep interoperability between their operating systems and management
products. As part of this effort, the companies are collaborating on
the development of the WS-Management a Web services specification,
co-authored by Microsoft, Intel, Sun and other vendors, that defines a
single protocol to meet management requirements spanning hardware
devices, operating systems and applications. Sun will implement
WS-Management in the Solaris 10 Operating System, management service
processors in its x64-based Sun Fire servers and the Sun N1
management software tools, to provide full systems management
interoperability across Solaris and Windows environments. In
addition, Sun has created an implementation of WS-Management in Java
programming language that it plans to release to the open source
community at www.java.net/. WS-Management also is a key component of the Microsoft Dynamic Systems Initiative and will ship as a standard part of Windows
Server 2003 starting with R2.
Windows on Sun
Microsoft and Sun are committed to addressing customer needs in the field of 64-bit computing. The Sun Fire x64 server for
x64 systems and Sun Java Workstation product lines carry the Designed for Windows logo, have passed Microsoft's stringent
compatibility testing suite and are listed in the Windows Catalogs. Sun and Microsoft also have signed an agreement providing
Sun back-line support for Windows on Sun systems.
Systems Integrators
Leading system integration companies including Accenture, EDS and NEC Corp. also support the Sun and Microsoft relationship
and are providing interoperability between Sun and Microsoft products for their customers.
"Accenture is deploying for clients numerous solutions that combine
the Sun and Microsoft environments, which require that the J2EE and
Microsoft .NET platforms interoperate," said Don Rippert, chief
technology officer at Accenture. "Microsoft and Sun are building easy
interoperation into their product sets. This allows the Windows
platform and the Java Enterprise System to communicate to ensure
heterogeneous management, transaction integration and common
authentication. Sun and Microsoft are providing what our clients are
increasingly demanding: best-of-breed options based on proven
interoperability from their technology providers."
"EDS is excited to enhance its relationship with both Sun
Microsystems and Microsoft, which is already strong under the EDS
Agility Alliance," said Charlie Feld, executive vice president of
portfolio management at EDS. "EDS brings considerable expertise in
delivering solutions combining Sun and Microsoft products and is a key
partner in qualifying, delivering and supporting Solaris 10 on SPARC
and AMD Opteron platforms from Sun. EDS also delivers Windows-based
solutions on the AMD Opteron-based Sun Fire hardware platform"
"NEC is a strong partner to both Sun and Microsoft, and has
considerable expertise delivering best-of-breed middleware solutions
and services that help customers deploy and manage Sun and Microsoft
technologies and products in their heterogeneous environments," said
Toshiro Kawamura, senior executive vice president and member of the
board at NEC. "NEC strongly supports interoperability between
Solaris/Java Enterprise System and Windows/.NET and is committed to
expand our expertise to assist customers deploying advanced identity
solutions."
Protocol License for Sun Ray Thin Client Solutions
The companies announced that Sun has licensed Microsoft's Remote
Desktop Protocol and will implement it in its Sun Ray ultra-thin
client product line in the near future. This means that users of Sun
Ray thin clients now can access Windows Terminal Services running on
Windows Server 2003.
