Microsoft and partners plan to play in the sandbox

By Angus Kidman
Monday, 04 December 2006 05:53

Home IT

Microsoft is hoping a new sandbox service for developers will help encourage development of new communications "mash ups" and dispel the concept that its operating systems are inherently less secure than its rivals.

Microsoft has announced the Connected Services Sandbox, a program to encourage ISVs to build applications combining web services with existing telecommunications systems. BT, Nortel and Bell Canada have already signed up to the program.

"Operators now can open their networks to next-generation web 2.0 applications that can be mashed together with traditional services to create new connected services -- the foundation of Telco 2.0," Microsoft communications sector general manager Michael O'Hara said in a statement.

Sandboxes are typically used to allow isolated access to a single application, without risking damage or corruption of other data and applications in the same networked environment.

They can be useful both for testing purposes and for ongoing running of applications whose operational parameters are too risky to allow them to operate within the general IT infrastructure.

Enterprise security developer AppSense, which specialises in Microsoft platforms, is also close to finalising sandbox capabilities for its security management platform.

AppSense vice president of product management Martin Ingram told IT Wire that the sandbox component is currently being beta tested by a number of existing customers, and should be ready for release in early 2007. "The response so far has been very positive," he said.

While the sandbox approach is far from new, implementing it on Windows platforms has often proved tricky because of Microsoft's tight control of its central code base.