Ahead of its launch of Windows Server 2008 and Vista SP, Microsoft is planning to ship in late February assessment tools for IT shops so they can get their networks in order and ease any planned migrations. The Microsoft Assessment and Planning (MAP) Solution Accelerator is designed to help IT shops inventory their network, assess the readiness of their infrastructure for a migration and generate reports and recommendations.
The tool is for users planning migrations to Windows Server 2008, Windows Vista, Office 2007 and Microsoft Virtualization technologies (Virtual Server 2005 R2 and the forthcoming Hyper-V), and Microsoft Application Virtualization (formerly SoftGrid). Baldwin Ng, of the Microsoft assessment and planning team wrote in a Jan. 26 posting on the MAP blog that the assessment tool would be released on the Web in approximately four weeks. A beta program is already under way.