MS details plans on Tarantula for Web

Microsoft revealed more details about its plans to help users turn their desktops into Web mini-servers at the TechEd 96 conference in Los Angeles today.

Code-named Tarantula, the desktop Web server will let Windows 95 and NT Workstations act as peer-to-peer servers on intranets or the Internet. The product is a port of the Internet Information Server already available for Microsoft's workstation and server operating system Windows NT.

Tarantula is slated to replace the Web server now bundled with FrontPage, which company officials said had problems running on Windows 95. The desktop version will include HTTP, FTP, and Gopher services and will be bundled into the Internet Add-on pack set for release in the third quarter. Tarantula will use the same permissions security model as Windows 95 and will help users connect to back-end databases.

The company will also release the Web Publishing Wizard add-on to let users publish a page on any site without rewriting specific commands. The Web Publishing Wizard should be available for free on the Web this summer.

Microsoft will begin beta-testing Tarantula next month. A final release date has not yet been set.

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