
Microsoft Announces Nano Server - mwadams
http://blogs.technet.com/b/windowsserver/archive/2015/04/08/microsoft-announces-nano-server-for-modern-apps-and-cloud.aspx
======
Someone1234
Microsoft has a real hole in their stack in my opinion...

So on Linux you have SSH (for shell) and X11 Forwarding/VNC for GUI remoting.
On Windows you have RDP for GUI and nothing for remote shell.

Now, I know what you're going to say, "WMI" but WMI was never designed for use
over the internet. You have to forward two fixed ports and a dynamic range
(shudder). Plus it isn't security hardened either by design or through fire.

VPN you say? In theory yes. But the reality on the ground is that for most
SMBs they're still using RDP or SSH directly to manage Windows/Linux servers,
and if Windows wants to compete (and they are dropping RDP) they need to have
an "answer" to SSH.

Essentially they need to take whatever WMI is, wrap it into a secure protocol,
and bind it to just a single port, then harden the heck out of whatever
process directly runs on that port (before you hit the WMI interface itself).

Or alternatively write an SSH server (literally), and after login redirect
input to a Powershell process. Nobody would complain about that (plus free
SFTP support!).

PS - I'm totally going to get attacked by "VPN purists" here. But really
everyone knows that SSH and RDP is extremely common for SMBs/private
individuals. Let's quit pretending that it is not and support the client that
actually exists, not the client you wished existed.

~~~
simonjgreen
SSH access to PowerShell would be a game changer IMHO for Microsoft. Also,
have you seen this?
[http://www.powershellserver.com/download/](http://www.powershellserver.com/download/)

~~~
freehunter
I don't know if it exists the other way around or not, but it would be really
nice if Windows had a built in SSH client as well. I can't tell you how many
times I've been working on a client's Windows Server machine and needed to
remote into a Linux server, but neither I nor they had access to download
Putty.

~~~
tracker1
Agreed... I generally wind up with git extensions everywhere which includes
most of the gnu tools including ssh. The only down side is that ssh via
windows command shell, even in conemu doesn't do ansi/drawing properly...
never really investigated as I just try to avoid it all.

------
MichaelGG
My real concern is that figuring out so many things without the GUI is
currently a real PITA. Like trying to make IIS act as a reverse proxy. It's a
huge pain, and most of the docs are telling you to click various things.
Compared to setting up nginx, ouch. Compounding things is the fact that MS
took a cover-our-ass policy to installing things, so even after installing
IIS, you've gotta go explicitly install "dynamic" compression as an extra.
Then to really make it work, there's a file buried in system32 you've gotta
edit, because you can't configure those settings by default at a site level.
Overall, it's just way more complicated.

I know they're working on it, and PS is a great shell overall, even if it is
missing a lot of simple tools by default.

But MS is way late to the party. OpenVZ was in heavy use what, a decade ago?
And MS did nothing to respond, really. But hey, maybe they'll pull it off. I
don't have a fundamental objection to Windows.

~~~
TazeTSchnitzel
Windows has always been super-visual. For many tasks there isn't even a CLI
way to do it short of editing the registry.

~~~
newuser88273
The registry is not very discoverable. However, once you discovered, a lot of
customization can be had from running as little as a single registry script.

As a trivial example, remapping caps-lock to something sane was easier on the
last few windows releases I tried (just run a registry script) than on any of
the 'nixes I used in the same time period.

------
fla
They call it Nano, I call it a server.

Happy to see Microsoft is evolving. Let's hope it will be for everyone's best.

~~~
gbog
> Let's hope it will be for everyone's best.

Anything making MS better cannot be for everyone's best: they have a de facto
monopoly, and of the most dangerous kind.

That's why despite all the bad that can be said against Google and Android, at
the very least they had enough weigth (and talent, and luck) to push MS out of
mobile. Which was the greatest news for our industry since Internet.

Also, I do not agree with Paul Graham
([http://www.paulgraham.com/microsoft.html](http://www.paulgraham.com/microsoft.html)):
sadly, MS is not dead yet. It cannot be dead for real with 9x% of install on
PCs.

------
Uhhrrr
Even if the implementation turns out to be lacking, the goal is good:

> As customers adopt modern applications and next-generation cloud
> technologies, they need an OS that delivers speed, agility and lower
> resource consumption.

I know the kneejerk reply to this is, "Yeah, Linux!", but I can think of at
least 2 Windows-based applications in my company which would benefit from
this. And in general, yay competition.

------
mc32
92 % fewer security bulletins and 80% fewer reboots. One can hope that's not
just promise.

~~~
e40
_80% fewer reboots_

Still many times more frequent than w/Linux. The 2008 R2 development system we
have needs to be rebooted every two weeks, on average, due to Windows Updates
that require a reboot. Updates come in almost every day for CentOS and I only
need to reboot once ever couple of months for new kernels.

Can't wait for the no-reboot kernel patches planned for a future Linux kernel.

~~~
Someone1234
> The 2008 R2 development system we have needs to be rebooted every two weeks,
> on average, due to Windows Updates that require a reboot.

Uhh they literally don't release updates that often, so you'll have to explain
that one to us...

> Updates come in almost every day for CentOS and I only need to reboot once
> ever couple of months for new kernels.

Windows doesn't support hotpatching, Linux does, it really is as simple as
that. Linux has more people working on it than the Windows kernel does, and is
just a more advanced kernel in general at this point.

But for what Microsoft has to work with Windows Server is darn stable and
requires very few restarts in my experience (approx. 4/year in my experience
with 2008 and 2008 R2).

~~~
trentnelson
> Windows doesn't support hotpatching, Linux does, it really is as simple as
> that. Linux has more people working on it than the Windows kernel does, and
> is just a more advanced kernel in general at this point.

Actually, hotpatching is easier on Linux because it has a technically inferior
virtual memory subsystem to Windows.

The Windows kernel is technically superior in numerous areas: virtual memory,
thread synchronization primitives, and I/O (specifically, overlapped I/O),
just to name a few.

~~~
girvo
Where's the best place to get details on the internals of the Windows kernel
regarding things like that?

~~~
nbevans
@trentnelson Don't forget I/O Completion Ports (IOCP) :)

~~~
trentnelson
Good grief how did I not even mention them! They are literally my favorite
thing ever. I've got like, 30 slides on them here:
[https://speakerdeck.com/trent/pyparallel-how-we-removed-
the-...](https://speakerdeck.com/trent/pyparallel-how-we-removed-the-gil-and-
exploited-all-cores?slide=47)

;-)

------
mattbillenstein
What is the use-case for this? Modern Linux distros have all the tooling,
libraries, utilities already - is the idea to use this for hosting .Net stuff?

~~~
recursive
Running stuff that requires Windows.

~~~
mattbillenstein
Well obviously - this just seems to be creeping into the space where Linux is
an incumbent anyway and I can't see anyone who's running common OSS stacks
wanting to use this in favor of Linux based platforms.

~~~
cwyers
If you have servers that need to run Windows, even if they can't run on Nano,
you can have fat Windows Server boxes and Nano boxes and configure them using
the same tools, rather than having a mixed Windows/Linux shop?

------
scott_karana
I'm interested in what the licensing will be like, compared to "larger"
editions.

~~~
brixon
I hope it will cost a lot less. Might interesting for the C# people to use
non-Azure clouds more if the costs are more inline with Linux based systems.

~~~
Someone1234
With MVC moving to a Linux compatible infrastructure in the next version, it
may be too little too late, and C# people might just use Linux for real.

Literally the only C# "thing" which won't run on Linux is Visual Studio
itself. Heck we might even see a Linux Powershell version here in the next few
years.

~~~
algorithmsRcool
Not quite, WPF and winforms are still out in the cold along with some other
things.

But for sever-side code, .net core + asp.net will get the job done.

------
EvanAnderson
If Microsoft would break out the old Interix
([http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interix](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Interix))
code and throw it on here I'd be ecstatic. (Interix was pretty great, back in
the day. I think MSFT made a mistake deprecating it. A lot of FLOSS tools
built on Interix just fine, back in the '99 timeframe, and if it hadn't been
put out to pasture it could have definitely served as a sell into the POSIX
world.)

------
dekhn
I've set up cygwin with an OpenSSH server on Windows before (to run remote
MinGW compiles). Echoing Bill Gates, "In a weak sense, it [NT] is a form of
Unix."

That doesn't really cover remote management, though.

------
ComputerGuru
I'm guessing this is going to be very similar to what Microsoft has in mind
for the Raspberry-Pi?

~~~
jjmiv
I think it leans more toward CoreOS and Kubernetes.

~~~
Zikes
Yeah, I believe their RPi version is a lightweight consumer-facing version of
Windows 8, not intended for use as a server.

~~~
tdicola
No, there's a lot of confusion from bad messaging with the Pi 2 and Windows 10
announcement. By all reports Win 10 on the Pi 2 is a system to run services
that have no GUI, desktop, or other UI.

~~~
algorithmsRcool
Is that actually true? MS has demoed Windows IoT with a UI on minimal devices
already. Both ARM and x86. I don't know if the dragonboard 410c is in a
different class than the pi2 however.

Take a look on Don Box's presentation at WinHEC from last month. Device talk
stats about ~40 mins, device demo starts at ~44 mins.

[http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/WinHEC/2015/Developing-
for-t...](http://channel9.msdn.com/Events/WinHEC/2015/Developing-for-the-
Windows-10-Device-Platform)

~~~
tdicola
See Ben from the Raspberry Pi foundation's response here:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8983801](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=8983801)
Sadly there really hasn't been any update or good info on what Win 10 on the
Pi 2 will be yet.

------
bovermyer
A new shell-only Microsoft operating system in 2015 makes me happy for reasons
I can't identify.

------
chebum
The main question is pricing. If it will be cheap or free (who knows?), it
will be an option for hosting micro-services on myriad of VPSes. A probably a
resurrection of interest for ASP.NET framework.

------
faragon
Oh. Microsoft reimplemented Unix, at last. Congratulations :-)

~~~
robert_nsu
Umm... Haven't you ever heard of Xenix?

~~~
faragon
Yes. Xenix was not a reimplementation, but a port.

------
andreser
[https://github.com/andres-erbsen/dename](https://github.com/andres-
erbsen/dename) uses a less flexible federated consensus to build a namecoin-
like system without proof of work (or stake, or anything).

~~~
manigandham
I think you're on the wrong thread, maybe you're looking for this:
[https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9341687](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=9341687)

------
rjurney
Have they embraced and extended?

I can't tell from a quick read.

------
kefka

        --92 percent fewer critical bulletins
        --80 percent fewer reboots
    

Compared to what a barebones Linux install (Say... a Docker instance)?

I can easily shut off a service in Linux. And I can turn it on. The only
reboot needed is for the Kernel itself, and that is soon changing.

What I'm reading here is that MS is most of the way there to Linux.

~~~
mkr-hn
net start [service name]

net stop [service name]

~~~
darklajid
Actually I tend to use sc start/stop for that, but .. should be the same.

Important utilities:

\- findstr ('grep') \- sc (control services) \- taskkill (kill/control
processes) \- netsh (everything network) \- wevtutil (windows event log)

~~~
mkr-hn
I figure there's probably a reason Microsoft uses net for this on their help
page.

~~~
Intermernet
The difference is in synchronicity. Using SC START on the help page should
properly be followed by SC QUERY in order to check that the service started.
NET START won't return until the service starts, errors, or times out.

> "SC sends the control to the service and then returns to the command prompt.
> This typically results in SC START returning the service in a state of
> START_PENDING. NET START will wait for the service it is starting to come to
> a fully started state before it returns control at the command prompt."

From [http://cbfive.com/command-line-service-management-net-v-
sc/](http://cbfive.com/command-line-service-management-net-v-sc/)

------
cies
From this announcement:

[http://azure.microsoft.com/blog/2015/04/08/microsoft-
unveils...](http://azure.microsoft.com/blog/2015/04/08/microsoft-unveils-new-
container-technologies-for-the-next-generation-cloud)

I read:

> Nano Server provides just the components you need – nothing else

And that's exactly what I do not trust MS with.

With a well documented history of backdoor ridden bloat ware products it is
not quite the company that I accept any non-opensource release to have "just
what I need and nothing else".

Though I must admit that the opensource train they are riding lately allows me
to look at them them from a very new perspective. But still, MS if you are
listening: if it is not opensource, I do not trust you!

~~~
kefka
That's fine. Then this release (and frankly, any MS product) is not for you.

But some enterprises use MS software, and this is a much needed option.

ObVote: I downvoted your complaint imaginary internet points has no bearing on
the discussion at hand.

~~~
cies
> Then this release (and frankly, any MS product) is not for you.

I've certainly re-considered dotNet after it got open sourced recently! It
(finally) seemed like a reasonable proposition -- as I explain in my post BTW.

But indeed, Windows, and especially Windows-closed-source-on-a-server, is not
my cup of tea. And I don't understand how it could be anyone's tea.

> But some enterprises use MS software

Sure, and this is a start-up forum. :)

Anyway, I upvoted your post for taking the trouble to explain your downvote.
Thanks.

~~~
MichaelGG
Microsoft is super friendly to startups. I can't say details, but they've
given us a ton of support. BizSpark Plus ($5K a month free Azure for a year)
is great. They've also got marketing help available.

While Azure is overpriced compared to Google Cloud (and maybe compared to AWS
- dunno cause AWS pricing is convoluted), having them comp it is really nice.
Azure is also a lot more full service than Google's stuff, if you need more
than IaaS.

~~~
Elepsis
Just curious--I thought all three platforms were committed to essentially
matching each other's prices. Has that not been true in your experience? Or is
it something specific that's driving up your perceived price of Azure versus
the other options?

~~~
MichaelGG
No, that's trivially untrue, just go try the pricing calculators.

They make a big deal about being the same price on _storage_ and bandwidth. We
talked to MS and determined that even after discounts for committing to Azure,
the VMs themselves are 50% more than on Google. Without a commit, the price is
200% of Google's.

And even on storage, Azure isn't competitive, even if the price is the same.
Their SSD options that are available now are laughable. (A temp SSD drive that
erases _on reboot_ \- mostly useless.) Their currently-in-preview SSD option
is ... awkward and just plain weird. You have to use special VM instance
types, then create special storage accounts, then select from 3 presets in
terms of space/perf. Azure actually suggests software striping them together
to get more perf.

Google's SSD offering is straightfoward and just works and is quite fast. Want
more perf? Just get a bigger disk and they scale up the IOPS, no problem, no
fuss, no special VM or anything needed.

I'm sort of an MS fanboy, and I really dislike and distrust Google. But after
using GCE a little bit, wow, for IaaS I wouldn't ever choose anything else.
Everything seems just simpler, easier, cheaper, faster. (Machines boot super
quick, the portal is simple/fast, and they have an SSH client in browser as a
kicker.)

