Identity Lifecycle Manager “2” is now Forefront Identity Manager 2010

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As you may have seen in other announcements or in various unintentional hints the product previously known as Identity Lifecycle Manager (ILM) “2” is now Forefront Identity Manager (FIM) 2010.  The re-branding comes as part of an overarching strategy which is better explained in the official website.

What does this mean?  For one, I now can share screenshots of the product publically.  Exhibit A:

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Second, we can proceed with our discussions about extensibility based on current builds.  While these current builds will not be publically available until Release Candidate 1 (RC1), I hope to provide sufficient content so that you can try out extensibility on day one of the public release.  There is nothing worse than getting a fantastic product which you don’t know how to use!

Next week we will introduce the new prototype client API and present the full agenda for the remainder of this quarter.  If you are internal to Microsoft, you may take a peek today at codebox (look for the rmclient).  The intention of getting this next prototype out the door is to gain wisdom and feedback about what a good API looks like for FIM.  Long-term we should* build a supported client.  No one in the product team argues the “if” question -- for us it’s more a matter of “when.”  It is is my hope that that we can use the prototype to deliver a supported client sooner than later.

As an aside, you may see references to FIM 2009. There is no shipping version of FIM 2009. Back in December when we planned to ship this fiscal year, we re-branded the product to FIM 2009. With the slip into the next fiscal year we now will ship as FIM 2010. We have not begun transitioning to FIM 2010, so many recent screenshots and splash screens most likely will show 2009. The re-branding last December was the key reason we could not show publically recent builds or screenshots since January.

*4/23/2009: Slight correction -- I softened the language form will to should since the supported client is not part of the official plan of record.