Today Mary Jo Foley's column predicted that May 6, 2010 would be the official "due date" for SQL Server 2008 R2. A Transaction Processing Performance Council (TPC) benchmark for SQL Server 2008 R2 was published in early November 2009. According to Microsoft, the TPC rules require a product to be released within 185 days of the published benchmark. Add up the days and you get a release in early May 2010.
We checked with Microsoft to see if the software giant is ready to commit to the May 6 release date. Not yet. Or maybe, close but no cigar. Here is the official explanation:
"We are working hard to get SQL Server 2008 R2 to our customers quickly, while ensuring delivery of a high-quality release, incorporating feedback from the November CTP. We remain committed to a delivery date in the first half of calendar year 2010. In November we supported our partner, Unisys, in publishing the first-ever TPC benchmark results with SQL Server 2008 R2 on a server with >64 logical processors. The 'by May 6, 2010' date noted in the blog post comes from the TPC rules that requires products to be available within 185 days of benchmark publication. As we have in the past, we intend to comply with these rules. If this release needs some additional time, to deliver the quality our customers and partners expect, these benchmark results would be re-published using the final build of the product."
There you have it. Look for a release or another benchmark publication by May 2010.