SQL Server 2014 RTM's, available for download on the worse possible day (no fooling)?

The Official Microsoft Blog - SQL Server 2014 released to manufacturers, will be generally available April 1

Today I am very happy to announce SQL Server 2014 has been released to manufacturing and will be generally available on April 1.

SQL Server 2014 is the culmination of thousands of hours of hard work from Microsoft engineers and thousands of hours of testing and input from our preview customers. The result is an important component of Microsoft’s overall cloud-first data platform. The platform delivers breakthrough performance, accelerated insights through tools everyone uses and the ability to scale globally on-premises and in the cloud – letting our customers get the most from their data.

This release of SQL Server is significant in that, in addition to delivering key hybrid scenarios, it rounds out our journey to embrace in-memory technology. Several years back, we began exploring the changing hardware landscape – memory being one of the key areas of focus. Today, our in-memory technology spans the core workloads in the data platform: business intelligence as part of Analysis Services, Excel and Power BI for Office 365; complex event processing with StreamInsight; in-memory columnstore in SQL Server and our data warehousing product; and now with SQL Server 2014 – in-memory transaction processing.

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Windows Azure and SQL Server provide a continuum of capability and flexibility in deployment options for our customers – on-premises and in the cloud. Windows Azure also supports an important data workload – Windows Azure HDInsight, our Apache Hadoop-based solution in the cloud. Today, we’re announcing the general availability of Hadoop 2.2 support in Windows Azure HDInsight, which has been updated to take full advantage of the latest Hadoop 2.2 platform, including support for YARN and Stinger Phase 2.

There has never been a more exciting time in the database and broader data platform industry. In an era where nearly everything will become digitized, today we’re delivering the data platform that will help our customers digitize their business. Customers can download SQL Server 2014 on April 1 or register today to be notified once the release is available. Customers can also learn more about the release and our data platform strategy at our “Accelerate your Insights” event on April 15, where I will be joined by Microsoft CEO Satya Nadella and COO Kevin Turner. In addition, some of our customers deriving value from our data platform today will also be in attendance. I encourage you save the date and tune in for the event.

<rant>April Fools Day? Really? You couldn't release it a day earlier or later? Think what a Build bullet point this would have made during the Day One Keynote on the 2nd? But noooo... This will now and forever be known as the SQL Server April Fools edition.

Yeah, yeah, I know we're all tired of the April Fools crap, but ... really? really?

Don't get me wrong, I think this is one of the more existing versions of SQL Server in a while and there's some awesome tech in it. Congrats to the team, just do me a favor and smack the marketing wonk who pick this date...</rant>