Previous incarnations of Microsoft Terminal Server always fell short of Citrix in several key ways. With the release of a greatly improved Terminal Services 2008 (TS2008), Microsoft has gone a long way in addressing these shortfalls:
- Application publishing.
- Seamless windows.
- Intelligent load balancing.
- SSL gateway/proxy.
- Intelligent Web interface.
The improved functionality of TS2008 has many enterprises asking, "Can we just use TS2008 without layering Citrix on top?" The answer is yes, but not for all cases. A lot of what Citrix provides is now functionally possible using just TS2008, but TS2008 lacks the in-depth management capability, and it can be more complex to configure to fit those specifications already available with Citrix.