Microsoft unveils Windows Server IoT 2019 — Redmondmag.com

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Microsoft unveils Windows Server IoT 2019

Microsoft announced on Tuesday that it has a 2019 Windows Server IoT product, among other details, at this week’s Embedded World conference in Nuremberg, Germany.

Windows Server IoT 2019 appears to be a new edition, adding to the current Windows 10 IoT product line with its Core and Enterprise editions. The name IoT, which stands for “Internet of Things,” is a rebranding of Microsoft’s venerable “Windows Embedded” product line, which is typically used by software and original equipment manufacturing partners ( OEM) to create specialized devices.

Under the old Windows Embedded brand, there had always been a Server edition. Now, nearly four years after the IoT rebranding, it’s back in the form of Windows Server IoT 2019. Microsoft apparently skipped a “Windows Server IoT 2016” edition.

Microsoft’s announcement didn’t have much to say about Windows Server IoT 2019. It apparently just got introduced. There was no discussion if it’s actually available, for example.

An “Overview” document stated that “Windows Server IoT 2019 is only licensed through the OEM channel under dedicated special use rights.” Microsoft offers server upgrades for this product as part of its “Long-Term Servicing Channel” model, which means that new operating system versions are released every two to three years, and the product has the traditional five years of “General Support” and five years of “Extended Support.”

Microsoft positions Windows Server IoT 2019 as useful when large data storage and compute requirements are needed. Examples included analyzing video camera feeds or data from “tens of thousands of sensors or devices”. The server product also allows organizations to scale their workloads “between the cloud and the edge.”

Windows 10 IoT add-ons
The announcement also recapped some recent Windows 10 IoT features. For example, Microsoft Azure IoT Device Agent version 2 preview for Windows 10 IoT was released last month. Device Agent provides organizations with a way to remotely configure, monitor, and manage devices through the Azure Dashboard.

Microsoft also touted the use of the robot’s operating system in the Windows 10 IoT Enterprise edition, which was unveiled in October. At the time, Microsoft had just described the release of experimental versions of this operating system. In Tuesday’s announcement, however, Microsoft said that “developers can now build and deploy commercial-grade robot operating system (ROS) solutions on Windows, making robots easier to develop, more aware of their environment and safer”. These bots can use Azure Cognitive Services along with various other “Azure IoT cloud services,” Microsoft said.

Azure IoT Edge for Windows is also apparently new for Windows 10 IoT developers. Azure IoT Edge has a runtime that is deployed to devices, turning them into IoT Edge devices, this Microsoft document explains. Linux and ARM32 runtimes are also available, but Windows x64 functionality was described as “currently in preview”. Organizations may want to use Azure IoT Edge to access Azure analytics capabilities. It places Docker containers on devices to process data, provides access to various Azure services including Azure Functions and Azure Machine Learning, and enables remote device monitoring, according to this Azure IoT Edge document.

Windows 10 IoT Partnerships
Microsoft also described partnerships with chip vendors including NXP and Qualcomm.

NXP uses Windows 10 IoT Core on its “i.MX 8M and i.MX 8M Mini application processors,” which are in preview, Microsoft said. These processors “will enable secure, power-optimized devices for the intelligent edge that give developers the choice of Linux or Windows IoT,” Microsoft said.

Qualcomm is bringing its Snapdragon processors to the Windows 10 IoT Enterprise edition. This will help deliver IoT solutions for “businesses of all sizes and in all industries,” Microsoft said.

Microsoft also cited some practical examples of Windows 10 IoT use by its solution partners. Action Point, an IT services company based in Ireland, has created IoT-Predict, a predictive maintenance solution for manufacturing companies, which uses Windows 10 IoT Enterprise. IDEX Fire and Safety built a Captium platform to add predictive maintenance to emergency vehicles using Windows 10 IoT Core.