Re: [WinMac] Re: About the Liscencing of Mac OS-X

John W. McCarthy(jwmcmac[at]flash.net)
Sat, 27 Mar 1999 02:36:08 -0600

Richard,

Good point(s). I had not thought about how many servers there might be
on a site, but was mainly thinking about the numbers of clients, which
seemed to be the main complaint of the complainants in those negative
articles.

What is the average number of Mac servers on a college campus these
days? Could get expensive I suppose if there are 50 of em, or were you
exaggerating or being hypothetical?

I know I'm out of my ball park on most of these issues.

My point:

I just think we need to at least look for some "good" in what the other
guy is doing (in what Apple is doing in this case) instead of crying
"the sky is falling" every time something out of the ordinary happens (a
change in licensing policy). It shows a bias and bad will.

As to "why" one would want to Install and run OS-X Server:

Because it has great promise and hope. Because some of us just like it
a lot. We really do feel that it is a wonderful OS to work with and in.

I haven't heard of too many problems with the Mac OS-X server or the
MacOS.app application in which the 8.5.x Mac OS runs in it's own
environment apparently Native inside the Server OS.

I know there are bound to be problems, but I think they will be "fixed"
as they come up, just as in Windows NT or any other OS. I believe Apple
has as good a record as anyone at working out the bugs in a timely manner.

What really impresses me and surprises me is how fast and how well the
Mac shareware guys upgrade and fix their apps. They are incredible.

As to your statement . . .

> Why I would want to do this is beyond me since MacOS 8.5.1 appears to be
> somewhat LESS stable when running Mac Apps under the Blue Box on a
> MacOS X Server machine. Personally, I would not let any end user touch
> a machine running MacOS X Server - I am happy to let them share files
> or web documents from the server, but not work at the server itself.
>

I may not be reading the above correctly, but I believe even if you
Net-Boot from the Mac OS-X Server you are still running in the Ram of
the Workstation (client) and only sharing files with the Server, just as
you say you would do.

I don't think any end-user would ever actually "touch" the Server or
work from it except for the sys admin. It seems unlikely but at least
possible that the Mac OS 8.5.x might never even be needed to be run from
the Server.

Unfortunately, I'm not much of a network person, so I may be misreading
or misunderstanding what you said or even how Servers are used (by end-users?)

Anyway, thanks for your points well taken.

Kelly

> Subject:
> Re: [WinMac] Re: About the Liscencing of Mac OS-X
> Date:
> Fri, 26 Mar 1999 11:15:48 -0500
> From:
>
>
>
>
> John W. McCarthy wrote:
>
> >

Pricing:

            $499 for "unlimited client license" (Apple Store)
            $249 Education/Government
            5-client version mailed free to members of Apple's
            upper-level developer program;
            $99 for lower-level members

> >
> >Can anyone realistically expect better than that? Unlimited for crying
> >out loud. That is much better than any 30 or 50 or 300 client site license.
>
> If you read carefully you will notice that it means you can connect an
> unlimited number of computer to ONE MacOS X Server machine. You can only
> install MacOS X Server on ONE machine.
>
> If I wanted to install MacOS Server on all of the say, 50 machines, in my
> company, I would need to buy 50 copies.
>
> Why I would want to do this is beyond me since MacOS 8.5.1 appears to be
> somewhat LESS stable when running Mac Apps under the Blue Box on a
> MacOS X Server machine. Personally, I would not let any end user touch
> a machine running MacOS X Server - I am happy to let them share files
> or web documents from the server, but not work at the server itself.
>
> MacOS X Server is not an upgrade to MacOS 8.5.1 and it is most
> emphatically not a workstation operating system. Apple may have some
> justification in their position in not including it in the Upgrade
> Contract (it is more of a sybling and eventual replacement for
> AppleShare IP), but Apple SHOULD include MacOS X itself next fall since
> it is the successor to Rhapsody Unified Release.
>
> Rick Hallmark
> Hallmark Consulting
>

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