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http://www.macnn.com/articles/07/02/20/virtualization.and.apple/

Virtualization: key to Apple in enterprise

updated 05:25 pm EST, Tue February 20, 2007

 

Virtualization and Apple


Apple is trying to extend its reach into the enterprise market, and allowing users to run multiple 'virtualized' copies of Mac OS X on its own hardware will further its efforts, according to one report. Apple currently provides Intel Mac owners with a means to dual boot various operating systems -- such as Microsoft Windows -- via its Boot Camp beta software, and plans to integrate third-party operating system support in its forthcoming Mac OS X 10.5 Leopard update. Enterprise customers are easier to manage, partition, create, modify, and maintain when compared to separate physical machines. That fact suggests that big business may soon adopt smaller numbers of much larger servers running multiple virtualized operating systems, rather than numerous individual servers linked together. Computerworld suggests that pressure will quickly build for the Cupertino-based company to support virtualization software capable of running multiple copies of Mac OS X on Mac systems.


by MacNN Staff

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  1. testudo

    Forum Regular

    Joined: Aug 2001

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    02/20, 06:49pm | report spam | Reply |

    Huh?

    Maybe I missed something, but I thought the big push on virtualization was to run multiple different OS'es on one box, not multiple instanaces of the same OS on one box.

    But, then, if the article is stating it correctly, what virtualization software would Apple have to support? There isn't any for the Mac that I've heard of. Is Apple going to be forced to make it just for their 4 enterprise customers? Or perhaps Computerworld is just looking for something new to complain about?

    Of course, I'm still scratching my head on this line: Enterprise customers are easier to manage, partition, create, modify, and maintain when compared to separate physical machines.

    Why are enterprise customers easier to partition and modify vs. others?

  1. Peter Bonte

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Aug 2001

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    02/20, 06:51pm | report spam | Reply |

    Inevitable

    Virtualized osX and non Apple hardware are the logical next steps if Apple wants to enter the enterprise market, don't have to be a visionary to see that. Intel osX isn't hardware DRM locked so i don't see how Apple can stop this evolution.

  1. fahlman

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Jun 2003

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    02/20, 08:53pm | report spam | Reply |

    How'l they'll stop it

    The two big virtualization companies (Parallels & VMware) both recently made statements to the effect that they will not allow their product to run Mac OS X on non-Apple hardware.

    http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2007/2/9/6983

    http://arstechnica.com/journals/apple.ars/2007/2/11/6995

  1. LouZer

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Nov 2000

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    02/20, 11:15pm | report spam | Reply |

    Re: inevitable

    Intel osX isn't hardware DRM locked so i don't see how Apple can stop this evolution.

    Easy. Their EULA specifically states that OS X can only be installed on Apple hardware. Right there, it stops the enterprise. No real IT group is going to just start breaking EULAs and hope that, when things go bad, that no one notices.

    As for on Mac hardware, that's a different story, and what is mentioned in the article (it actually doesn't say above about running Mac OS X on a dell server box).

    Virtualized osX and non Apple hardware are the logical next steps if Apple wants to enter the enterprise market,

    But, right there, you made the point. Apple isn't going to give up the hardware sales, so they won't allow virtualization on non-mac hardware, and, as such, they won't be making much inroads in the enterprise areas that require virtualization.

  1. chadpengar

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Oct 2001

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    02/21, 12:52am | report spam | Reply |

    re: huh?

    The biggest use of virtualization in the real Enterprise world IS to run multiple copies of the same or similar OSes on one box. For example, M$ bought out the Virtual PC people in order to get their Windows version of VPC -- the Mac version they got along with it as a side benefit. The reason they wanted that is that it allows customers to segment their SW so that some mission critical piece of SW that only runs in W2000 for example, can be run in a virtual machine running W2000 on a single server that has been upgraded to run Windows Server 2003 or whatever the Vista server will be called. Anyway, frm a home user or hobbyist perspective, Virtualization allows you to mix and match OSes on one machine at the same time. For the Enterprises, it is about segmenting the work into differnt VMs that may have the same or similar (ie same but different version) OSes running but each has its own requirements that can be met.

  1. dawho9

    Senior User

    Joined: Mar 2001

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    02/21, 07:57am | report spam | Reply |

    Last sentence is key...

    The article says that we are talking about running on OSX on Apple Hardware. Chadpengar is right. All of our developers have VMware Workstation installed so they can test applications running inside of Windows XP on their Windows XP workstation. We test Vista in VMware before it ever sees the day of light on physical hardware.

    I can not imagine it would be difficult to run OSX in a virtualized environment. I would guess that VMware will be planning this support in their product and for Parallels could most likely add it with some community voice for it.

    Most people don't think about running multiple OSX instances on a machine but it could be useful for application testing and such.

    dw9

  1. bhuot

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Nov 2003

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    02/22, 12:35am | report spam | Reply |

    third party software

    It would be good to run mutiple versions of OS X for applications that only want to support one and different versions of OS X. I remember fighting with third party companies to update their products to run on the new version of OS X when 10.3 and 10.4 came out and they didn't want to support more than one version when they updated it plus they required a paid upgrade. That is why I am trying to stay all Apple plus Open Source software.

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