It's got to be tough trying to release six different applications at the same point in an update cycle, and with BackOffice 4, Microsoft hasn't bothered to try. Instead, the company has bundled a mix of old and new versions of the core products. Still, this is the first update of BackOffice since the interim BackOffice 2.5, released shortly after the introduction of Windows NT 4. We tested a beta version.

BackOffice 4 consists of Windows NT Server 4 (Service Pack 3), with the Windows NT Option Pack, which includes Internet Information Server 4 (see "4.0 Takes the Lead," Mission Critical, December 1997). On the new side, it includes the latest version of Exchange Server (see "A Powerful Exchange," Mission Critical, December 1997), Proxy Server 2 (see "Novell's NDS, a Step Ahead," Mission Critical, February 1998), and brand-new versions of SNA Server 4 and Site Server 3 (in the form of a coupon good for a copy as soon as it's available; you get Version 2 to tide you over until then). On the old side, it includes Systems Management Server 1.2 and Sequel Server 6.5, and a five-user version of Seagate Software's Crystal Info 5 (which doesn't include the OLAP tools of the newly released Crystal Info 6). Still, this version comes bundled with a number of useful reports designed explicitly for BackOffice.

The installation process has been improved significantly, compared with the earlier BackOffice releases. Now, the installer application prompts you for the type of installation you'd like to create and then installs and configures the appropriate applications. You can choose from either an Intranet Publishing Server (based on IIS 4) or an Intranet Collaboration Server (based on Exchange Server 5.5). You can also do a custom install, in which you select the components you need, or a complete install, which installs six CDs' worth of BackOffice software.

On our tests, we used the Intranet Collaboration Server install and a custom install. We still found the installation process a bit annoying, however. Even though we selected an installation that didn't require SNA Server or SMS, the installer gave us the impression that it was installing those applications. A later installation screen confirmed that those apps were not going to be installed, but the indicated local hard disk space requirement included room for them. The installation process itself was fairly long, even on our test system, a Micron dual-processor Pentium Pro 180 with 128MB of RAM.

The installer started off by telling us it needed to install system updates (we were already running Service Pack 3). It then updated the system without giving us any indication of what it was doing to our system. We really would have preferred to know which post-SP3 fixes BackOffice needed to install. It also installed Internet Explorer 4.01 (Version 4 was already on the system). These two updates required us to reboot the system three times, and took almost 40 minutes to complete.

Our overall installation, which included all of BackOffice, except for SMS and SNA Server, took close to 90 minutes. It would have been longer, but the system already had the Windows NT 4 Option Pack and Site Server 2 installed.

All the BackOffice applications--even IIS 4--must be installed on the same server, because separating the applications violates the license agreement. Although you can download IIS 4 for free, and you may already have a running installation, the BackOffice Web server integration (new to Version 4) has no facility for using a Web server that isn't installed on the same machine.

Back Office includes two client applications you can install on a Windows NT or Windows 95 workstation. These are Visual InterDev 1 and FrontPage 98. The inclusion of these Web development tools fits in with the newly added Web integration, which is one of the highlights of the BackOffice upgrade. The Internet-related installations (and a Web Site Creation Wizard) created sample intranet applications to demonstrate what you can do with BackOffice. Using the supplied templates, you can create your own, albeit small-scale, applications. The sample Web site is installed as part of the general BackOffice installation.

BackOffice 4 also includes Web-based system-management tools, most of which appeared originally in the update to the Windows NT 4 Server Resource Kit. These tools are very limited and only let you view the system event logs from certain perspectives (by event type, for example) or run a simplified version of the NT User Manager to add or delete users.

This version also includes Snap-Ins for the Microsoft Management Console (a feature of the Windows NT Option Pack that provides a unified framework for system-management tools), including IIS 4, Transaction Server, and SQL Server.

The integrated installation and installation scenarios both go a long way toward integrating the component applications, but there is still a huge amount of work to be done. Each component application has its own management tools, interfaces, and peculiarities, and the product provides little information about how to get all the pieces to work together. Microsoft has proven it can create a more unified management and administrative structure for BackOffice in the Small Business Server product. The company needs to apply that experience here.

Current BackOffice users should take this opportunity to upgrade their BackOffice installations. New users who understand that they need a Pentium II with at least 64MB of RAM to run all the BackOffice applications on a single server should also give it a look. It's a good choice for smaller workgroups or development environments, but not for large applications.

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