Software Technologies

BizTalk Server 2006 is Microsoft's premiere server for building solutions for business process and integration. BizTalk Server 2006, the fourth major version of the product, builds on the innovation and success introduced by the previous three versions—BizTalk Server versions 2000, 2002, and 2004.

The 2006 version includes new capabilities and engine improvements that allow a developer to create more flexible solutions for integrated business processes, and BizTalk 2006 empowers and enables administrators and business users to more effectively monitor ongoing business processes.

The following items describe some of the improvements included in BizTalk Server 2006 in the areas of setup and migration; management, operations, and deployment; the business user experience; developer tools; and the messaging engine.

Setup and Migration

Automatic installation of redistributable components. In BizTalk Server 2006, the BizTalk team will provide a single file that contains the latest version of all redistributable components required by BizTalk Server, eliminating the need for users to search for the components themselves.

Simplified setup experience for first-time users. BizTalk Server 2006 includes a significantly simpler installation experience for the developer, single-computer user, and the first-time user. Selecting to install the product by using the default setting will allow all of the product's components to be installed under a single account on one computer, with minimal need of user input.

Flexible setup experience for advanced users. In BizTalk Server 2006, the setup experience has been redesigned to provide greater flexibility to support the advanced user tasked with deploying solutions across large server farm. When installation completes, the custom configurations can be exported and imported to ease the installation of settings across server farms or development build labs.

Seamless upgrade experience. Upgrading from BizTalk Server 2004 to BizTalk Server 2006 is an in-place upgrade process. When a customer executes the BizTalk Server 2006 setup on a computer where BizTalk Server 2004 is already installed, the setup program will automatically upgrade the installation to BizTalk Server 2006. All solutions built for this earlier version will work unchanged in the new version.