Gael Duhamel [MVP]

The Commerce Server team has released a new CTP for Commerce Server 2009 R2 and some good stuff was done by the Commerce Server team. So, you understand that my first impressions are very positive

First, you can say good bye to your old pals 32 bits processor, SQL Server 2000, 2005 and windows 2000, 2003, ‘cause now Commerce Server 2009 R2 just running on 64 bits processor, SQL 2008 (R2 or not) and Windows 2008 (R2 or not).

Let’s start with the installation process which bring you more flexibility in the components you want to install:

• The usual one:
  • Direct mailer
  • Staging => for enterprise edition only
  • Health Monitoring Service
  • Volume Shadow Copy Writer Service
  • Commerce Server (rename in Commerce Foundation Components)
  • Biztalk Adapters
• The handy one:
  • Data Warehouse and Reporting (don’t need now to add a ressources, the features can come up with the installation ) => for enterprise edition only
  • The documentation
  • Desktop Business Management Tools
• For the developers
  • Extensibility Kits
• Site out of the box aka Store Front
  • SharePoint template site
  • Web Parts
  • Web Business Development

The Commerce Server configuration has also been improved to drive you through the features configuration. Two things to say here:

• For the moment, you can only choose the basic configuration. The advanced one will be available in the next CTP.
• There is a bug, if you want to configure Commerce Server on a remote SQL box. Only the local one is available and like for the configuration, it will come with the next CTP. The workaround is quite easy, you just have to run the configuration tool with a command line and give as a parameter an XML file location path. This XML describes the features configuration:.

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