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By Joe Wilcox, 10 December 2002 15:29

NEWS Microsoft has issued five guides to help businesses with a range of Windows-related tasks, including patch management and enterprise-wide application rollouts. Michael Emanuel, senior product manager for Microsoft's Management Group, said the guides - known as Microsoft Solutions for Management (http://www.microsoft.com/solutions/msm ) - will help large businesses with scenarios they might encounter on an ongoing basis. Truncated versions of the guides are free, while customised versions with additional services are available from systems integrator Avanade or through Microsoft Consulting. In addition to helping businesses, Microsoft is trying to narrow their focus to Windows and other Microsoft technologies. With IT budgets shrinking, more companies are focusing on total cost of ownership. By defining some best practices to give companies a jumpstart, Microsoft wants IT managers to think of Windows as the best way to lower total costs. In a survey of 75 US and 25 European chief information officers, released on Friday, Merrill Lynch found that "almost two-thirds are trying to reduce their IT spending as a percent of company revenue. We think this puts a lid on improvement next year". In theory, by working with tested scenarios for which costs already have been estimated, companies can lower the total cost of ownership by reducing mistakes or waste when deploying Microsoft software in the enterprise. "They're trying to get the word out that their stuff can be managed," said Michael Cherry, an analyst with market researcher Directions on Microsoft. "When you buy any product, you get almost no... documentation anymore. These documents are attempts to get essential information out there." The guides are not the first issued by Microsoft. The company has released similar blueprints for Unix and SQL Server migration, among others. Several scenarios in the new guides may benefit Microsoft in some ways more than they do the customers. One blueprint, Critical Path Deployment, establishes practices and means for using Microsoft System Management Server or Software Update Services to get out critical updates, bug fixes or security patches. Some businesses, for example, have complained about problems created by the Windows XP software update feature, which can create headaches when individual PCs automatically fetch patches or security fixes. At the same time, one of Microsoft's biggest problems is widespread security breaches or virus epidemics that exploit software bugs the software giant has already fixed. The actual problem is that many customers fail to install the fixes. Solving this situation could help Microsoft diminish the perception that its software is not as secure as products from its rivals. "Obviously they've picked topics that are beneficial to Microsoft and their customers," Cherry said. "And I almost can't blame them for that." Emanuel noted that the blueprints could easily be customised for companies using products other than Windows. He also emphasised the benefits of working with pretested scenarios that reduce the risk of failure. "These solution-based guides try to reduce the risk (of customers) doing anything wrong," he said. "These are all tested and proven in the lab." In a related move on Tuesday, Microsoft also released the System Architecture for the Enterprise Data Center. The documentation offers a guide of pretested scenarios for creating and managing data centers using Windows 2000 Server and .Net Enterprise Server software. Joe Wilcox writes for News.com