Apple on the Enterprise level

[tlarkin]

Quote: Originally Posted by ArcticStones . I see a growing number of my clients using a laptop as their primary machine, and in some instances as their only machine. Q1: What is the rate of change of laptop penetration at the Enterprise Level?

I would say anyone who travels, ie does not have one set location for work will use a laptop. Anyone who works out of the office day in day out will probably run off desktops.

Quote: Q2: How large a portion of enterprise users, and in what fields, have laptops as their primary/only computer?

See my previous response to #1. It depends on your business and your business model. Anyone who may ever have to go off location will probably want a laptop, or anyone who likes to take their work home.

Quote: Q3: How is this likely/unlikely to influence Apple’s coming success/penetration at the Enterprise Level? -- ArcticStones

That is very hard to say since Apple keeps coming out with consumer products like the iPhone, iPod, etc. If they started getting into serious enterprise level stuff like blade servers, deployable mini tower desktop work stations, etc you would probably start to see an increase of their presence.

[CAlvarez]

Good questions about laptops. I see laptop use growing in general, but obviously mostly for highly mobile people. These people might work in the office most of the time, but also do significant work at home or while mobile. There are also some who never take the laptop home, but merely move it about to meetings, presentations, or to work with other people in their office.

I think this is good for Apple. They have a great laptop for a good price, that people seem to like. In general companies seem to be more flexible around laptop choices and use.

[tlarkin]

Quote: Originally Posted by CAlvarez I've heard that a couple times but never experienced it. My experience with Apt is 100% positive, and I love it. This may be due to my use, which is purely for servers where there is never a GUI and no unnecessary stuff loaded. I do the most pure install possible, then run a standard script of Apt-get/installs, and add in the software the server will run. Even kernel patching has gone fine for me. That may be different for workstations that run a lot of apps. Interesting thoughts on DRBL...I might have just the place to try it.

Yeah that is correct. The problem is mostly with end user desktops, as I do not run a slueth of linux servers, and the one's I do run once they are set up never really need to be touched again, because they simply just work.

APT, YUM, Yast, rug, etc are great tools, I just wish they would all work together a bit better especially when distro A tries to adapt a technology from distro B, which does in fact work but some times you must jump through flaming hoops over a giant shark pit to get it to work.

[ArcticStones]

Quote: Originally Posted by CAlvarez Good questions about laptops. I see laptop use growing in general, but obviously mostly for highly mobile people... I think this is good for Apple. They have a great laptop for a good price, that people seem to like. In general companies seem to be more flexible around laptop choices and use.

Yeah, I think the laptop growth will continue to weaken the outright Windows monopoly at the Enterprise Level. As will disappointment in Vista. A worthy and expanded heir to the present version of Apple’s Xserve concept mightn’t be so bad either...

I do not see Apple deciding to produce a cheap tower. They are far too interested in keeping their profit margins comfortable -- and I understand them completely.

Here is what I see happening:

Apple will continue to gain market shares amongst 1) individuals who are free to make their own choices, 2) Small businesses in various sectors, 3) Creative sectors such as photography, music, graphic design etc., and 4) Laptop users, esp. professionals and students.

I see Apple prioritising Education far higher than Enterprises, and this is a right call. Keep in mind that students soon take their preferences into professional life.

Dual-bootable Intel machines are a touch of genius! This is a great palliative against "Apple allergies" and will accellerate their growth in numerous sectors.

Only when Apple reaches a market share of 10% or more -- which will happen sooner than many expect! -- will Jobs & co consider cracking Enterprise.

When the time is ripe, I think they’ll do so with typical Apple flair, with functionality and user-interfaces that leapfrog beyond the present competition.

[CAlvarez]

Quote: which does in fact work but some times you must jump through flaming hoops over a giant shark pit to get it to work.

Did you just say that Linux has "jumped the shark??"

[Daniel_C]

Saw this articled linked on the Apple news site today.

http://www.computerworld.com/action/...sr=hotnews.rss

[tlarkin]

Quote: Originally Posted by Daniel_C Saw this articled linked on the Apple news site today. http://www.computerworld.com/action/...sr=hotnews.rss

I read the article, very basic stuff. It's all been discussed here, but one thing that the author of that article did not mention is the heavy cost of migrating from an existing enterprise solution to an Apple one. The down time it would take to train your employees, to deploy more systems, and your IT staff. Almost every Mac Admin I know, does not have hardware level repair experience. You ask them to take apart an iMac and they look at you like a deer frozen in headlights.

There is no easy or cheap way to migrate, so really the best bet is still for specialized situations or specialized users. A basic user can get a PC (full package for around 500) with windows and office and be able to perform all their duties on their computer no problem. Sure they may be more prone to attack from viruses, and the like, but there are plenty of other security measures already in place that prevent this. Routers, firewalls, NAT, spam filters, etc are typically already in place and take a lot of the risk of getting viruses. Nothing is fool proof and if Apple ever did make it big in the enterprise level (and I hope they do) they better be prepared for the security that comes along with that. What happens if Apple can't handle the exploits being published for its OS if they become a big player in the Enterprise market?

[tlarkin]

We just got done deploying 25 brand new intel iMacs at work about two weeks ago. We used bombich's netrestore, ntfs.prog and some of bombich's shell scripts to create and deploy the images over netbooting. We multi casted it out.

All I can say about my very first experience doing this, is that I am VERY surprised how easy it went the first time. Typically working in IT you tend to expect the few first trial runs to fail and then you will work out the kinks as you go.

Basically, the iMac netboots to an image we have activated on a OS X server on the same subnet. Once it boots we pointed the imac to the path of the image. The scripts were already in place, so this is how it worked. It would first push out boot camp, and install it. Then partition the drives to a scheme we decided, we went with 80% of HD space for OS X 20% for XP Pro. Then it deploys the OS X image on the proper parition, then it runs a post image script that will then toss the xp image onto the remaining partition. Voila, all done, and it went pretty damn smooth.

Just this week I had to compile my first custom package installer ever via ARD. We got a bunch of new wacom tablets and we needed to push out the software to use them. I took the .app from the wacom CD, made a custom install package with the extras on the ARD software and then pushed it out to all the desktops in that lab. It worked first time for me.

Apple does do some things right for an enterprise solution, just thought I would share. I only hope they can integrate with AD at some point natively. We are also currently working on getting the to work with our edirectory via LDAP, but it is kind of a trial by fire.

[trumpet_999]

Quote: Originally Posted by CAlvarez Good questions about laptops. I see laptop use growing in general, but obviously mostly for highly mobile people. These people might work in the office most of the time, but also do significant work at home or while mobile. There are also some who never take the laptop home, but merely move it about to meetings, presentations, or to work with other people in their office. I think this is good for Apple. They have a great laptop for a good price, that people seem to like. In general companies seem to be more flexible around laptop choices and use.

My home computer is now a laptop and will stay that way even for future releases as far as I can see. It's the portability that keeps me coming back

[tlarkin]

Quote: Originally Posted by trumpet_999 My home computer is now a laptop and will stay that way even for future releases as far as I can see. It's the portability that keeps me coming back

I agree, having basically serviced, supported, repaired, and used about every major brand laptop in existence I think I can come to the conclusion that Apple just makes some of the best damn laptops on this planet. The things that I dislike about the Macbooks and Macbook Pros are really preferences, and do not touch on the functionality of the machine, therefore I kind of disregard them.

[ArcticStones]

Quote: Originally Posted by tlarkin I agree, having basically serviced, supported, repaired, and used about every major brand laptop in existence I think I can come to the conclusion that Apple just makes some of the best damn laptops on this planet...

I have been noticing that the laptop share of Macs sold has been skyrocketing (was it over 50% now?), as well as the laptop share of business and student machines. That bodes well for Apple – also on the Enterprise level.

As a non-tech professional, I find myself almost exclusively using my laptop.

[tlarkin]

well as a testimonial to this ongoing thread I've created, I had an experience yesterday which reflects on real world down time on a Mac.

Yesterday, was a bad monday, everything went wrong from 8AM till time to go home. Mainly I fought it out with a server all morning, but when that was over with I had an epic battle with an iMac.

The iMac is not easy to take apart, not easy to work on, the downtime was still about maybe 2 days total for the user, but it took me about 5 hours of working on it to get it fixed. Replaced parts following the service manual procedures, which are basically narrow down, order parts. The thing is, that if it were a mid tower PC counter part I would have had it fixed in about 15 minutes, that includes me imaging the computer. I replaced a power supply, and the main logic board. The problem was half way fixed with the parts replacement the other half was resetting firmware, smu, running ASD, etc and eventually the problem was fixed, 5 hours later. There is no robust troubleshooting information out there for apple other than forums like this one and macfixit.com, and perhaps xlr8yourmac.com. The service manuals don't tell you that you may need to do a SMU reset 5 or 6 times sometimes to fix the issue. You have to figure that stuff out yourself.

The bottom line is, it takes more skill and effort to repair Macs, which would require higher trained staff. If you outsource your repair to a contractor or even RMA to apple your down time instantly goes to 1 week for turn around. Where as in house can usually do it a lot sooner, 1 to 2 days at most. Now, if I had several of them break at once that would have been a problem. So, now if you are a manager of an IT department, or in charge of staffing or in charge of whatever at your business/organization, you have to take that into account if you wanted to implement macs into your enterprise. It will take time and money to train your staff to be able to do this, or you will have to outsource to contractors or AASPs for your warranty support, then that increases your down time to a week. 1 week is unacceptable in my book for repairs. Unless there is good reason, ie back ordered part is obviously unavoidable.

Now, there are some things Apple just does right, and they do it right out of the box. I gotta run, but will post more later of what they do offer that no one else does out of the box. Also, how windows is starting to copy what they have done. It seems that if there is an out of box feature Apple does, MS tries to replicate it. Out of fear of switchers, or whatever their reason be. I can't dog on MS on the server side, their server products do work, and they do have robust sets of tools with them. I am off to do some work now, but will post back the pros of apple out of the box in your enterprise solutions.

[cwtnospam]

How long it takes to fix an iMac, or any other hardware, isn't relevant. In the larger scheme of things, the entire IT department barely registers on corporate radar. That's why corporations are only just now begining to get an inkling of how much Windows based systems are really costing them.

That fight you had with a server is much more common and therefore more expensive than hardware issues, and the lost creativity and innovation due to locked down desktops is an enormous problem that IT hasn't even considered.

You can claim that the Mac doesn't have the enterprise tools, but the fact is that when Macs were locked out of the enterprise, the PC didn't have those tools either. Just as Microsoft can quickly make poor copies of Apple features, Mac developers can and will swiftly create quality versions of those tools when IT gets its head out of its butt and embraces the Mac.

[tlarkin]

well really, in my opinion novell made what we would call today's enterprise level technology with networking, print servers, mail servers, etc. MS pretty much stole NDS technology from Novell, and turn it into their AD environment.

You are only looking at the proposal of Macintosh on the enterprise level in a unilateral way, as that of an end user. Of course, no one can deny that with out any users, IT staff would not be needed. Its the same thing about retail and customers, with out customers you have no business. When dealing with data that may be sensitive in many different ways there are more than good reasons to lock things down. I know that when certain HDs fail from certain servers, my boss takes a crow bar to the HD and destroys it. It is because there is some medical information kept on those HDs, and with HIPPA, we are required by law to destroy the failed HD. Access level permissions and policies are needed, because people also don't do what they are suppose to, and there is definitely resources out there that not all users need access to. There also needs to be a system of control, because with out that system of control you are stuck supporting way more than you can handle. Typically, when deploying a new technology do you a small test run first, see how it works, tweak it, then deploy it all over.

I don't care how you argue it, there has to be a line where you tell users what they can and can't do. Its not black and white, it is gray, because every user has different needs. When you look at it from that perspective you have to limit things because there is just too much to know, too much to learn, too much to support, too much of everything. If you have a financial department using 5 different types and versions of softwares for their financing work and reports you are going to run into lots of problems trying to support that.

The system of control that IT workers implement isn't always put in place to annoy the user, its put in place for many many reasons. We can't have every user going out and adding their own third party hardware then expect the IT workers to keep track of drivers, install all of them, etc.

The down time for a desktop in an environment where every computer is needed and used needs to be a few days. Companies or Organizations who have 1,000s of systems are typically a partner or self maintainer with the companies of products they use. This allows the IT department direct access to parts ordering, diagnostic tools, service manuals, software patches, firmware updates, etc. I can order a part from any computer and have it over nighted to me so I get it next day. This allows me, and the other techs I work with to replace hardware in 1 day turn around. Now, we also have laptops in place that are used as loaners if people need their system, but they are limited, and we need to get them their system back ASAP. Repair time is an issue, because taking forever to repair something irritates the user, which comes back to you in the end. iMacs are far from ideal as an enterprise level desktop from a hardware repair stand point. They are designed in such a dumb way to take it apart and get to anything you have to disassemble the whole system. Also, not everyone can take it apart with out breaking the hinge on the screen cover or any other of the heat shields or snap parts. They are plain out harder to repair.

The battle with the server is something that has many other factors into it, I have started a thread about win2k3 server on this forum looking for anyone to point me to a windows centric forum where I could figure the problem out. The thing is, its not our server, its a different departments so we never originally set it up, which right there makes it a battle to support.

[cwtnospam]

Nobody's saying there isn't a need for control. Only that the current system slows a company down and discourages innovation. Worse, it only needs to be as draconian as it typically is because Windows is so vulnerable. That's a huge expense that isn't accounted for, but is slowly becoming obvious.

I still think it doesn't really matter because productivity is far more important, but if you really want to compare repair times, compare per machine repair time per year. If it takes twice as long to fix an iMac but it needs repair half as often, the cost in time is the same. I can't imagine an iMac needing repairs as often as a Dell.

[tlarkin]

Quote: Originally Posted by cwtnospam I still think it doesn't really matter because productivity is far more important, but if you really want to compare repair times, compare per machine repair time per year. If it takes twice as long to fix an iMac but it needs repair half as often, the cost in time is the same. I can't imagine an iMac needing repairs as often as a Dell.

Again, a very misunderstood fact about Apple computers. We operate in a 4% mac environment meaning we have over 9,000 PCs and around 400 Macs. So yeah the probability of a PC breaking down more often is A LOT higher over our macs because there are more of them.

When i worked at an AASP before this job, I had broken macs on my bench every day, multiple of them all with hardware failures. i have probably repaired over 1500 of those CRT iMacs. I can take one of those apart in my sleep. Macs fail, and about the same rate as most PCs. My personal PCs I build have pretty much never failed me. Asus make great motherboards and I have never had one fail in the 10 years I have been using Asus. of course, not everyone has the same experience I do, and results will always vary. The bottom line is they break, and when they break they need to be fixed, and someone like me has to fix them onsite. most businesses who use macs on a larger scale will have certified techs and become a self maintainer. there are just too many benefits of being a self maintainer not to.

Okay, now on to what Apple does right out of the box with OS X on the enterprise level. Then i will compare it to how it works in the real world and what needs improving.

Booting options - Target disk mode is such a kick ass tool. I wish every platform adopted this technology. This allows such great tools like imaging, running diagnostics, migration assistant, macs also have the standard media boot and netboot. Netbooting and netrestore which is open source and included in OS X server is a great solution built in for deploying images over the network with your machines. This is awesome that it is built in, and windows has done the same now with WDS (windows deployment server) but I have yet to touch that product myself. What OS X lacks in booting is a PE (preinstall environment) disk. This is probably due to the lack of Apple allowing virtual machines of OS X, another down side. Installing a machine from scratch to test something out is a pain, just let us have virtual machines of OS X. Also, even though target mode booting is awesome, OS X lacks legacy support on newer models. Which means that I have to constantly reinstall OS X on my firewire drive to keep it current and to boot of multiple machines. We run on replacement cycles just like any other business or organization. So, most places will run several models of macs, not just one. Thus the need for legacy support in booting OS X would be very nice.

Compatibility - the Mac is honestly the most compatible computer out there, being able to network and to run just about any OS now that it has adapted over to the x86 platform. However, what the mac lacks is actual compatibility with existing enterprise technologies. Right now we are working on getting eDirectory to work with OS X, and are stuck with the problem of making the machine authenticate to edirectory or making it authenticate to OS X OD master that is syncronized with edirectory. Even though both support the same open source technologies, and eDirectory natively supports AFP, there are still tons of issues at hand. This is not always apple's fault, but they could make an effort to make it more compatbile. AD and OS X have come a long way, and honestly I can only see it becoming better down the road, but until then I don't see Apple playing a major part in Enterprise networks until it can be more easily migrated to. So, even though it is probably the most compatible platform out there, there is a lot to be desired of the platform. end users never see this technology in place, because its usually in the background doing its job. We did test out iPrint and it works great with OS X so far, and that is major plus when managing tons of network printers. The more I learn about the mac platform the more I can figure out how to make it work. The problem is, the time it takes to learn these things sometimes and it is not always documented very well. the lack of complete documentation is also a problem.

Deployment - apple did a wonderful job on netbooting/imaging. We deployed our first dual booting OS X and Windows iMacs a few months back and actually had pretty much zero problems using OS X server and Bombich's software and scripts. I have to tip my hat to apple on that one.

Now, comparing all the problems that people have with windows, because that is the main argument it seems from a lot of mac elitists. Most spyware/malware and virus problems are caused by the user. Yes the user, thats right. It usually involves P2P network sharing apps and pirated software. that is really the bulk of where all these PC problems come into play. how do I know this? Well, I for one have a windows XP box that has ran for years with no anti virus, no anti spyware and no firewall. i run behind NAT and SPI firewalled router, and that is all the security I have. I also use web based email, but still have never gotten a virus via email. I don't use P2P file sharing apps, and I don't download tons of pirated software. My xp box runs like a champ with no problems, no spyware or viruses and never really had any major issue with it. In an enterprise network there are admins who restrict this type of behavior for several reasons, which is why you see windows clients run with out the bulk of problems they really are suppose to have. Again, from my experience this is true. Plus employees downloading pirated media and software on company time is a bad thing.

Now, OS X has none of these problems either really. With the exception of some poorly written software that may crash or maybe kernel panics or your typical software corruption that happens in all computers regardless of platform. Needless to say, if there were a bigger market share you could assume that these things would become more common. Things like P2P on a Mac and much more software piracy on a mac as well. No one knows truly what happens.

So really IMHO, Apple does have some advantages over a windows or Linux client machine, but it also lacks some things as well. there will never be a perfect OS or a perfect solution for everything. I think if some of the compatibility issues and perhaps maybe some enterprise products Apple could make its way more easier in the market. An enterprise desktop that is cost effective money wise and the ability to deploy in existing infrastructures would be key for Apple getting a piece of that market.

Building from scratch is one thing, and it can be more easily done. Most major companies out there already built their network from scratch, so that is not an option and that is where some of the problems lie.

[cwtnospam]

So you're saying that Macs break down as often as cheap Dells?

Quote: Originally Posted by tlarkin Now, comparing all the problems that people have with windows, because that is the main argument it seems from a lot of mac elitists. Most spyware/malware and virus problems are caused by the user. Yes the user, thats right. It usually involves P2P network sharing apps and pirated software. that is really the bulk of where all these PC problems come into play.

Blame the user? Sorry, no. P2P is a legitimate application that is likely to be the future of networking when it matures. The fact that today it often gets used for illegitimate purposes has something to do with the user, but any malware that results from its use is still and always will be, the fault of the OS.

Quote: Originally Posted by tlarkin Plus employees downloading pirated media and software on company time is a bad thing.

Yes, it is a bad thing. It still doesn't excuse the OS for being susceptible to malware from P2P, or any other source.

[tlarkin]

Yes it is the user when they are downloading pirated software. I use bit torrent all the time to download open source Linux apps and distros, so I know it is future, its the user who abuses the product and causes problems. That is why at most enterprise level environments P2P apps are blocked. Its not the apps fault it is the users fault.

I mean no matter what type of system is on my business network, Linux, OS X, Windows, etc I am going to lock out those things to avoid the problems that come with P2P networking apps. Its smart management.

[cwtnospam]

Quote: Originally Posted by tlarkin Yes it is the user when they are downloading pirated software.

Even then, it's still a problem with the OS. Unless a user deliberately downloads an installs malware, it is not their fault and any attempt to shift blame weakens the OS since it removes incentive to fix the real problem.

The user needs much better control over what an application can do. They ought to be able to set default rules about what resources are allowed for any newly installed applications.

Before you start telling me how you can do this or something like it already, I'm saying this should be point and click, maybe a list of resources in the getinfo box, if not something simpler. The era of the computer geek is over. It's time to make computers into powerful and versatile tools for regular people.

By the way, I'm not saying the Mac is perfect either. Sure, it's better than Windows, but that doesn't say much for the Mac OS. Why for example, should the Calculator have access to my scanner or the internet? It shouldn't, and yet all operating systems allow many things like that by default.

[tlarkin]

here is the problem,

you allow P2P applications to be loaded on user's machines. They install something like Limewire, a known threat filled with embeded viruses and spyware in the files you download. You have then pretty much opened a can of worms for any user to click on the wrong file and cause damage.

Same thing goes for torrents. I like how utorrent lets you see the contents of files. I have seen vb scripts embeded in torrent files, and we all know where that can lead to. So, even torrents can become a threat, and the user probably does not know or understand what to look for, which makes it very smart to not allow these types of things.

Like I said, Apple has a lot of things going for it. Also, users for the most part on the enterprise level do not need access to do anything. They just need to use the computer for its purpose. I am talking strictly enterprise environments, not home user environments.

Even in the Apple training for the OS, and their Server OS certs they plainly state this kind of security should be enforced because not every user is friendly, etc etc.