June 4, 2008 -- (WEB HOST INDUSTRY REVIEW) -- Web hosting provider DiscountASP.NET (discountasp.net) announced on Wednesday it has launched an invite-only SQL 2008 hosting private beta program, enabling select customer members to test SQL 2008 in a live hosted environment and offer valuable feedback.

"Under the SQL 2008 Go Live program, we are currently inviting customers who are active in the ASP.NET Community to participate in a SQL 2008 hosting private beta," says Takeshi Eto, VP of marketing at DiscountASP.NET. "We hope to get early feedback to help us get closer to finalizing our production SQL 2008 hosting offer. We also plan to open up SQL 2008 beta hosting for all our customers in a few weeks."

As a major update to its enterprise database product, Microsoft SQL Server 2008 is currently in CTP-6 release. Despite no official launch date scheduled, Microsoft says it anticipates the final release of SQL Server 2008 will be sometime in Q3 2008.

The new SQL 2008 offers many features for developers, including new data types, such as geospatial data types and date/time data types. It also includes Language Integrated Query, integrated full text search, sparse columns and large user-defined types that help build next-generation data-centric applications.

DiscountASP.NET provides Microsoft Windows hosting with focus on providing in ASP.NET hosting and SQL database hosting. As a Microsoft Gold Certified partner, the company says it is one of the first hosts to offer Windows 2008 shared hosting.

In April, DiscountASP.NET achieved its third competency in Security Solutions within the Microsoft Gold Partner Program, adding to its previous competencies in Networking Infrastructure Solutions and Advanced Infrastructure Solutions.