Welcome to the Server Core blog...

Now that Longhorn Server beta 2 is out, I figured I would try this blog thing as a way to share information and answer common questions about Server Core.

 

For my first post I’ll provide a brief summary of what Server Core is and why we are creating it. Server Core is a minimal server installation option for Windows Server "Longhorn". It runs a subset of the server roles included in Longhorn Server, specifically it supports the following:

· DHCP server

· File Server

· DNS server

· Active Directory

Server Core also includes the following optional features:

· Failover Cluster

· Network Load Balancing

· Multipath IO

· Removable Storage

·

Bitlocker Drive

Encryption

· Subsystem for UNIX-based applications

· Backup

 

Server Core is all about letting an administrator run the above roles with less installed, running, and needing to be managed on a server. For example, there is no GUI shell on Server Core, the local interface for managing the server is the command prompt. You can use MMC snap-ins to remotely manage a Server Core installation. All of this provides the following benefits:

• Reduced maintance
• Reduced attack surface area
• Reduced management
• Less disk space required to install

 

If you have questions about Server Core or how to do things with it, please post them in the comments to this and I’ll try to answer them in future postings. I’ll also try to cover some of the more common questions.

 

Andrew

Comments

• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  PingBack from http://beta.amanzi.co.nz/2006/05/31/new-details-of-server-core/
• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  PingBack from http://www.msblog.org/?p=715
• Anonymous
  January 01, 2003
  PingBack from http://halr9000.com/article/306
• Anonymous
  May 25, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  May 25, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  May 25, 2006
  Welcome aboard. I look forward to reading your posts.
• Anonymous
  May 25, 2006
  Will I be able to run PowerShell scripts on core?
• Anonymous
  May 28, 2006
  Powershell requires the .NET Framework which will not be available on Servercore (as far as currently known).
• Anonymous
  May 30, 2006
  Brilliant-Good to see Server Core getting its own blog :D
  Ill post a link on my blog see if we can get some readers :)
  
  Power to the Server Core die-hards!
• Anonymous
  May 30, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  May 31, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  June 01, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  June 01, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  June 01, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  June 01, 2006
  Thanks for all the answers, you've been very helpful.  Your software is pretty much "free" for me, so I don't care about the pricing for myself, but my customers are very conscious of that sort of thing.  It would be interesting to see if servercore will be a part of my future engagements.
• Anonymous
  July 13, 2006
  The comment has been removed
• Anonymous
  August 11, 2006
  If you are in the beta program, there is a Server Core step by step guide that covers a lot of the common commands, the registry script, and other info. I'm checking to see if we can get it posted elsewhere, but so far no luck.
  
  I'll try to do a posting about Windows Remote Shell soon.