I am working to enhance our Macinstosh environment at our school in Boston, MA. OS X is amazing and I am glad Apple has the momentum again.
So, far with OS X I still see a few problems limiting its use as an equivalent desktop replacement in a mostly MS environment.
1) This is the biggest one for me. It will take MS and Apple to work together to resolve. Why can't there be an real Windows 2000 Active Directory client? I did find a good article @ Apple on AD in a Windows environment. But, all it talked about was using NetInfo syncing with AD. From a server perspective I don't want to maintain yet another server for the Mac Users only just for directory services. Of course, in the Microsoft world, the option is to use the Services for Macintosh and a UAM volume which, I think, is a clumsy solution too. This would ease support in our environment.
2) Are there any tools for Mass Deployment via imaging? Like Ghost? It is cool that Apple has the technology for image booting but all I want to do is throw an image down to a desktop like I do an Intel PC. Again, I don't want a special server for this.
3) Ok--without invoking "the religion" It looks to me like Apple wants to remain a hardware company--like Sun. It's just my opinion but if I could install a Mac OS X on my Dell desktops wouldn't that be a good thing? If my server infrastructure can support both AND I can standardize my desktop environment on say "Optiplexes" for example, why would that be bad? I could then customize to the user even further.
Wheelock College infuses a great deal of k-12 education software in their curriculum. I am looking forward to the future software development for Mac OS X. I am just trying to find the best way to leverage the new OS for other applications.
Chip Towle
ctowle@wheelock.edu
So, far with OS X I still see a few problems limiting its use as an equivalent desktop replacement in a mostly MS environment.
1) This is the biggest one for me. It will take MS and Apple to work together to resolve. Why can't there be an real Windows 2000 Active Directory client? I did find a good article @ Apple on AD in a Windows environment. But, all it talked about was using NetInfo syncing with AD. From a server perspective I don't want to maintain yet another server for the Mac Users only just for directory services. Of course, in the Microsoft world, the option is to use the Services for Macintosh and a UAM volume which, I think, is a clumsy solution too. This would ease support in our environment.
2) Are there any tools for Mass Deployment via imaging? Like Ghost? It is cool that Apple has the technology for image booting but all I want to do is throw an image down to a desktop like I do an Intel PC. Again, I don't want a special server for this.
3) Ok--without invoking "the religion" It looks to me like Apple wants to remain a hardware company--like Sun. It's just my opinion but if I could install a Mac OS X on my Dell desktops wouldn't that be a good thing? If my server infrastructure can support both AND I can standardize my desktop environment on say "Optiplexes" for example, why would that be bad? I could then customize to the user even further.
Wheelock College infuses a great deal of k-12 education software in their curriculum. I am looking forward to the future software development for Mac OS X. I am just trying to find the best way to leverage the new OS for other applications.
Chip Towle
ctowle@wheelock.edu