Preface and Acknowledgments

For a few years preceding the release of Microsoft Application Center 2000 (Application Center), the people who started the Application Center team have been dreaming of making deployment and operations of Web-based and component-based applications an asset of the Microsoft Windows 2000 Server platform. We dreamt of a world where people could focus on their creativity, not on ensuring servers are running well, making deployments happen, and achieving the level of scale their success demands. In mid-1999, we formed the Application Center group to build the first step in that dream, Application Center 2000. This book is your definitive guide to this product.

Dan Wesley's perspective on the Application Center product is unparalleled. As a member of the product team, Dan sat with the developers, testers, writers, and program managers who built the product. He worked with them daily to ensure he was writing the best material possible, and everyone on the team is very proud of this book. Our thanks to him, and my thanks to the entire Microsoft Application Center product group!

Quentin Clark

Product Unit Manager

Microsoft Application Center 2000

Acknowledgments

Writer: Dan Wesley

Contributing Writers: 

Bill Laing (Appendix A, "A Blueprint for Building Web Sites Using the Microsoft Windows DNA Platform"); Bill Bain (Appendix B, "Windows 2000 Network Load Balancing"); Benjamin Curry, Hallvard Kaldestad, and George V. Reilly (Appendix C, "The Art and Science of Web Server Tuning with IIS 5.0"); James Morey (Appendix D, "Application Center Status Events")

Resource Kit Program Manager: Phil Naranjo

Documentation Manager: Marta Fortin

Lead Editor: Marian Carlson-Ranum

Tester: William Partridge

Production Lead: Bruno Josset

Indexer: Richard Shrout

Graphic Artist: Matthew Pinkerton

Technical Consultants: 

Saji Abraham, Ori Amiga, Jason Andre, Richard Ault, Sandra Brown, Carl Carter-Schwendler, Philippe Choquier, Rory Clark, Quentin Clark, Tom Cox, Satheesh Dabbiru, Bill Devlin, Michael Fanning, Chris Furlin, Federico Garcea, David Glance, Justin Grant, Sonali Gururaja, Eddy Hahn, Chris Hallum, Bohr He, John Heaton, Michael Howard, Scott Jordan, Omar Kouatly, Glenn LaVigne, John Ludeman, Andrey Maleshko, Alex Mallet, John Messec, Jeff Miller, Phil Naranjo, Matt Odhner, Peter Okonski, Joel Pereira, Sandy Phadke, Chris Rees, George Reilly, Kent Schliiter, Martin Sleeman, Alex Sutton, Ivan Tashev, Michael Thomas, Dan Travison, Todd Wanke, Max Webber, Brent Whitlow, Rich Wilson, Xin Yan, Allen Yeargin, Giedrius Zizys, and Zhengping Zuo