Windows 2000

Microsoft Windows 2000 (also referred to as Win2K) is a 32-bit graphical business-oriented operating system released on February 17, 2000 by the Microsoft Corporation. Windows 2000 comes in four versions: Professional, Server, Advanced Server, and Datacenter Server. Additionally, Microsoft offers Windows 2000 Advanced Server, Limited Edition, released in 2001, which runs on Intel Itanium 64-bit processors.

Windows 2000 has the reputation of being the most stable of the Microsoft operating systems after Windows NT 3.51. In a 2002 public poll for the "Best Windows Distribution" on the technology website Slashdot, Windows 2000 received the most votes (35%) [1].

File:Windows2000.png

Windows 2000 Desktop

Windows 2000 Core Features

All versions of Windows 2000 share certain features. Some of the more significant of these features are:

• NTFS5 — a new version of the NTFS file system
• EFS — (Encrypting File System) allowing encryption of some or all files on a disk
• WDM — (Windows Driver Model) an enhancement for hardware support

NTFS5

NTFS v3.0, also known as 5.0, introduced quotas, file-system-level encryption (called EFS), sparse streams and reparse points, which are used to implement Directory Junctions, Volume Mount Points, Hierarchical Storage Management, Native Structured Storage and Single Instance Storage. By adding these features, Windows could compete with established file serving systems like Netware and Unix.

EFS

EFS introduced strong encryption into the Windows file world. It allowed any folder or drive to be encrypted and was transparent once implemented. As of February 2004, its encryption has not been compromised.

WDM

Windows 2000 introduced the WDM driver model to the NT kernel. WDM (standing for Windows Driver Model) is a multilayer driver model used to separate general functionality of devices from the specifics. For example, Microsoft may provide a standard USB driver that provides the basic functionality a USB device may use, such as raw bus protocol communication. The hardware vendor then only has to implement a driver that provides the functionality specific for whatever the device does. This can greatly simplify driver programming, and keeps programmers from introducing bugs every time a basic device protocol is reimplemented for a new product. Additionally, WDM drivers are theoretically compatible with any version of Windows supporting WDM (Win98, WinME, WinXP) regardless of the kernel. Drivers are the leading cause of instability in Windows, and WDM addresses this.

Windows 2000 Desktop Features

Windows 2000 Professional is designed as a desktop operating system in business environments. It offers greater security and stability than previous Windows desktop operating systems.

Windows 2000 Server Features

The various server products share the same user interface with Windows 2000 Professional, but contain additional components for running infrastructure and application software. A significant component of the server products is Active Directory, which is an enterprise-wide directory service based on LDAP. Additionally, Microsoft integrated Kerberos network authentification, replacing the oft-criticised NT 4 authentification system. This also provided a purely transitive-trust relationship between Windows 2000 domains in a 'forest' (a collection of one or more Windows 2000 domains that share a common schema, configuration, and global catalog, being linked with two-way transitive trusts). Furthermore, Windows 2000 introduced a DNS server which allows dynamic registration of IP Adresses.

See also

• Comparison of operating systems

External Links

• Official Page