Today at Enterprise Management World, Microsoft Corp. announced that it, along with Advanced Micro Devices Inc. (AMD), BMC Software Inc., Computer Associates, Dell Inc., Fujitsu-Siemens Computers, Intel Corporation, NEC Corp., Novell Inc., Sun Microsystems Inc., Symantec Corp. and WBEM Solutions Inc., has submitted the Web Services for Management (WS-Management) specification to the Distributed Management Task Force Inc. (DMTF) for further refinement and finalization as a Web services-based management standard. WS-Management provides a common manageability protocol that allows interoperability across heterogeneous hardware and operating system environments. The announcement was also made by Bob Muglia, senior vice president of the Windows Server™ Division, in his keynote address at the Microsoft Professional Developers Conference 2005 (PDC05) in Los Angeles.

The Web services specification addresses the cost and complexity of IT management by providing a common way for systems to access and exchange management information across their entire IT infrastructure. By using Web services to manage IT systems, deployments that support WS-Management will enable IT managers to remotely access devices on their networks, regardless of whether the systems are just out of the box, powered down or otherwise unavailable.