RE: [WinMac] OS X vs Win2000?

From: Dan Schwartz (Dan[at]BrakeAndGo.com)
Date: Fri Jul 07 2000 - 08:36:36 PDT

  • Next message: Bruce Johnson: "Re: [WinMac] OS X vs Win2000?"

            Actually, Kevin, your comment is quite correct on the Army's use of Macs
    for Web server front-ends. This is really a special case where the Web
    server is running an ODBC router, making database calls to a SQL server
    running NT. The twist is that a NIC is added to the Mac (yielding two
    ethernet ports), with IP bound to the one ethernet port exposed to the
    outside world and ONLY AppleTalk is bound to the other port. Then, the NIC
    on the NT database server has ONLY AppleTalk enabled.

            Why this setup?

            As it turns out, even if a hacker breaks into the Mac web server, s/he
    can't use their IP cracking tools to penetrate the AppleTalk link and reach
    the mission critical database server. Also, the Mac front ends are basically
    disposible: You have a shelf full of them being fed by a load balancing
    switch, so if one fails just yank it out and drop in another one. But the NT
    database server is a whole different ball of wax, requiring full mission
    critical techniques and practices.

            Cheers!
            Dan

    > -----Original Message-----
    > From: Kevin Brunson
    > Sent: Friday, July 07, 2000 9:18 AM
    > Subject: Re: [WinMac] OS X vs Win2000?
    >
    >
    > I'm way out of my league debating technical specs, but I have a
    > comment and a
    > question.
    >
    > COMMENT: [I hope I have my facts straight on this one] A few months back
    the
    > Army switched to Mac hardware and OS to thwart hackers (no command-line
    > interface). Isn't that testimony to mission critical capability?
    >
    > QUESTION: Does the UNIXness of OS 10 expose a Mac server to attacks?
    >
    > >
    > > To put it another way, would YOU run your mission critical
    Internet
    > > services (mail, WWW) on a G4 workstation? An iMac?!
    > >
    > > Cheers!
    > > Dan

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