The team at Microsoft sure are an ambitious lot this year!  It seems 2010 is the year of the release.  There are a number of new versions of products coming out.  The list is vast so I could be missing some, but here are the products you should expect this year (or early last). 

SQL Server 2008 R2
Yes I will admit favoritism here and list the one about which I am most excited first.  SQL Server is keeping with Microsoft’s promised 3 year release schedule with this release.  How long that will last is highly debated in the blogosphere but they are sticking to their guns so far.  It doesn’t appear to be the shake-up that occurred in 2000 to 2005 but there are some exciting nuggets such as Master Data Services and PowerPivot.  There also are some interesting new versions called Datacenter and Parallel Data Warehouse.  Datacenter is a high end version that also will support highest levels of virtualization. Parallel Data Warehouse utilizes MPP (massively parallel processing) for highest performance for processing TBs of data.  The release date is set for May 6, 2010. 

SharePoint 2010
SharePoint has done well to weave itself into the framework of business as their content and collaboration platform.  There are many new features that come with this version including emphasis to social networking and support for administration via Powershell.  They also have re-worked the editions available for Sharepoint as well to give you a tailored fit it appears.  It seems there are around 10 editions for the 2010.  The release date is said to be “the first half of 2010”. 

Office 2010
Ah yes, where would we all be without Office?  The highly popular deck of products is also getting a new version this year.  There are snazzy new features to all products such as ribbon interface to Outlook.  All products are boosting browser ability to respond to Google Apps.  The release date is also set for “the first half of 2010”. 

Exchange 2010
The communication tool powerhouse has released a new version.  This actually came out in November 2009 but as close as it was, it is worth the mention.  This version touts enhanced archiving and discovery capabilities.  It also has some snazzy cool features for the common man such as ability to mute themselves from irrelevant conversations. 

Visual Studio 2010
The new version of the IDE programming tool will be available as well.  This version will include tools for Windows 7 and SharePoint 2010 and will incorporate with Silverlight and Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF).  The release date for it has been set for March 22, 2010. 

Windows 7
Yes it is technically another 2009 release, but going to let it slide onto my list as well since I enjoy the commercials.  It was released October 2009.  The sting of Vista seems to have helped Microsoft learn it’s lesson this time around.  This release touts better performance and a string of cool features like Play To which allows you to play media on other PCs, stereos, or TVs.  I am using it and so far I am a happy camper. 

DPM (Data Protection Manager)
This product is Microsoft’s disk based backup solution.  It allows fast backup and recovery.  It works in conjunction with tape backups, as a bit of a middle man.  It integrates well of course with many of the other Microsoft products.  For example it will allow for parallel backups of SQL Server within a single instance.  It also seems to be in the same boat as the other vague release dates of “first half of 2010”. 

Microsoft has always kept things interesting, technically and otherwise.  I have to say this year I am impressed and excited technically.  Time will only tell if all the ambition pays off for them in these new releases but you have to applaud the effort.