Web Forefront

• "Core Server has gone fully modular, each feature you want to add can be added as needed, IIS functionality will be available through the 44+ modules". Apache users -- I can hear you -- this was Apache web server circa 1996!
• "ASP.NET is further enhanced by IIS 7.0 as the configuration of the web server, sites, and applications are fully merged with ASP.NET applications": This sounds good, streamlined deployment and configuration of server & application, even sounds a step above J2EE apps/servers, although the judge is out if it will work as it sounds.
• "IIS 7.0 is going to allow us to get information on the state of all running sites, application pools, worker processes, and application domains. Additionally it looks like we will get programmatic control of starting and stopping some of these services at levels that are lower than the site.": Excellent, this is along the lines of JMX ("Java Management Extensions") for J2EE servers.

• "Currently still not answered, will IIS 7.0 be decoupled from the operating system" : Well its Microsoft, they generally have control over what is allowed on each operating system version. And from the next point I mention, don't bet on running IIS 7.0 on anything other than Longhorn.
• "IIS 7.0 should no longer be thought of as a "web" server, in light of Windows Activation Service (WAS)" : This is the strategic point for IIS 7.0, it is departing from the classic web server architecture and morphing into or onto Indigo, which will be a central part to Longhorn. ( Cory Isakson further describes this )

Good features in general, but the greatest functionality is the last one, the relation between this new IIS version and Indigo. As you may already know, Indigo is Microsoft's initiative to achieve Service Orientated Architectures, a shift that is also being taken by J2EE vendors and other enterprise software producers.