Microsoft Corp. last week rolled out the widest beta release yet of its Windows Vista operating system. Windows Vista Beta 2 can be downloaded from Microsoft's Web site. The next full beta version is due in late August, after being pushed back from an earlier release date of mid-July. The new operating system is scheduled to ship late this year for corporate users and in January for consumers.

Red Hat completes JBoss acquisition

Red Hat Inc. last week completed its US$350 million acquisition of Java application server vendor JBoss Inc. JBoss will operate as a division of Red Hat, with Marc Fleury, founder and former CEO of JBoss, heading the division as senior vice president and general manager. The closing of the sale comes a week after Red Hat disclosed plans to drop its own application server based on the open-source Jonas project in favor of the JBoss product.

EMC purchases software vendor

EMC Corp. last week acquired privately held nLayers Inc. for an undisclosed sum. EMC plans to integrate the company's technology into its resource management offerings. NLayers' flagship InSight product can help users understand and map relationships among applications, servers and devices. NLayers already provides the foundation technology for EMC's Smarts Application Discovery Manager software.