TechAgility

This has been posted at James O’Neill’s blog regarding Viridian. This is quite a neat balancing act where it would appear that on the surface of it Microsoft are prepared to seriously back this and throw some heavy support behind anyone signing up for this, but at the same time they will be expected commit full time resources, participate in conference calls, pay for consulting AND run pre-release code in Production !!!!

Well if that doesn’t put you off, I’m sure it will put your Boss/CIO off? but if you still have a green light, read on…

Windows Server Virtualization (2008) Rapid Deployment Programme (RDP)

We are getting ready to take nominations for this programme: It’s not an open beta program (it is expected to have only about 40 places) so most people will be turned away. There is a second programme called the Momentum programme which provides a lower level of support. If you’re looking to evaluate Virtualization on Windows Server 2008 either programme may be of interest, so please send me a mail. If you are in the UK I will help the process along for you. If you are located somewhere else I’ll try to put you in contact with someone local that can help. Please note that nominations  close on November 16, please don’t ask after then.

Here’s a summary of what the RDP is about.

Our Goals

• Build closer relationship with customers to get deployment feedback
• Understand and document best practices
• Develop Case study evidence and customer references for the product launch

We will provide

• Early Access to Pre-Release Code and information
• Technical Support - providing an escalation contact and access to Premier support 
• Access to application compatibility and test teams
• Part payment of consulting costs associated with the project

Customer Requirements:

• Commit to deploying Windows Server Virtualization and / or System Center Virtual Machine Manager (we expect to see Executive sponsoring participation, a project manager and other staff allocated to the programme)
• Participate in regular status conference calls and training, and provide Provide ongoing status updates and surveys 
• Pay part of consulting costs (Yes. You have to spend money to be on this programme)
• Install pre-release code into a production environment (unlike most beta programmes, we will support RDP participants running pre-release code in production)

more at source… James O’Neill’s blog

written by dcaddick