App-V 5.0 SP2 and UE-V 2.0 Released to Beta

Part of the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack (MDOP), both App-V and UE-V provide user-oriented virtualization services. Announced casually at TechEd Europe, and then stuck in the middle of a post about Windows 8.1 business features, Microsoft has stamped a Beta tag onto the latest revisions of App-V and UE-V. App-V 5.0 SP2 and UE-V 2.0 are the most current versions to hit beta and can be obtained from the Microsoft Connect site in the following locations after a brief survey:

Not familiar with App-V or UE-V? Here's a brief overview:

App-V (Application Virtualization) – App-V allows companies to centrally virtualize applications and then make them available to the business user. This solves a couple problems. First, IT only needs to deploy the application once and then make it available to all who need it through a virtual instance. And, when application updates are available, those updates can be applied directly to the virtualized occurrence, without having to worry about deploying the updates to all end-users. And, because it runs in a virtualized instance, there is less worry that the application might conflict with other applications installed on the end-user PCs.

UE-V (User Experience Virtualization) – There are many familiar with roaming profiles, allowing end-users to see a similar desktop when they log into different computers.  UE-V takes this a step further by monitoring any changes users make to Windows and application settings, capturing those changes, and then synching them to a central storage location. When a user initiates a logon session on any other PC or device, the cached and stored experience becomes immediately available, ensuring the user has the EXACT same experience no matter where they login, including Virtual Desktop Infrastructure (VDI) sessions. IT can manipulate a central template to control which enterprise application settings are available for roaming.