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http://www.macnn.com/articles/10/11/08/likely.not.authorized.to.speak/

Apple exec posts, retracts message backing server software

updated 11:55 am EST, Mon November 8, 2010

 

Likely not authorized to speak


Eric Zelenka -- Apple's senior worldwide marketing manager for server, storage and management products -- has posted and then deleted a forum message giving a clue to the company's future enterprise plans, reports note. "Apple remains committed to the development of server products, technologies and services," Zelenka wrote at the XSanity forums on Friday. "Today’s [Xserve] announcement does not impact the future of Xsan or server software on Mac OS X."

Zelenka deleted the message some nine hours later without explanation. The executive may not have been authorized to talk about Apple plans, which are typically carefully released to the public. The post may alternately have been inaccurate, in which case support for Xsan and/or Mac OS X Server may eventually be discontinued.




by MacNN Staff

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 software, enterprise, Xsan, Mac OS X Server, Apple

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Comments

  1. rvhernandez

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Apr 2005

    +1
    11/08, 12:22pm | report spam | (2 replies) Reply |

    What if...

    Apple were to reinvent the "server" and make it more friendly to consumers? I would love to have an Apple produced solution to our family's iTunes, iPhoto, file sharing needs that was centralized.

  1. prl99

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Mar 2009

    +6
    11/08, 12:31pm | report spam | (1 reply) Reply |

    Eric

    He's been around for a long time and should know what he's talking about. "Server products" doesn't necessarily mean server hardware but Xsan works on Mac Pros.

    If Apple isn't going to produce their own server hardware then I'd like to see them change the server EULA to allow virtualized operation on non-Apple hardware. I'd also like to see them work with server vendors (probably Sun as long as Oracle doesn't kill them) to produce an approved ESXi/VSphere-like system so Mac users can run native OS X Server software without having to mess around trying to make OSX client compatible with non-Apple protocols (stupid SMB, insecure NFS mounts).

  1. bazaarsoft

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: May 2005

    -2
    11/08, 12:44pm | report spam | (2 replies) Reply |

    Why?

    @prl99: "If Apple isn't going to produce their own server hardware then I'd like to see them change the server EULA to allow virtualized operation on non-Apple hardware"

    Honest question: why? What makes Mac OS X Server better than running the same open-source tools on another OS?

  1. prl99

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Mar 2009

    +8
    11/08, 12:55pm | report spam | (1 reply) Reply |

    Because, it works

    bazaarsoft--Apple sells customized versions of open-source server applications that work very well with OSX clients. Server management applications interface very well with this software and provide easy access to almost all settings so admins can roll out working solutions in a minimum amount of time. The only other OS capable of running these solutions would be some variation of Linux and I don't choose to want to learn how to run Linux when OSX is so much easier to use and maintain--that's why.

    I spent fifteen years managing a Mac-based system using Xserves and Open Directory and it just ran. Once I left, the excuse for techs found some used Dell servers and have Mac clients mounting Windows shares. Nothing runs right anymore, backup is either non-existent or weeks old, and the users ask when I'm coming back every time I visit. They use Macs, they want Mac-based applications, they want things to work. I provided that service using Apple products that worked.

  1. Roehlstation

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Aug 2001

    +5
    11/08, 02:10pm | report spam | Reply |

    Enterprise tactics and Apple

    One thing Apple needs to realize is their secretive ways of how they release products to the public is very detrimental in the Enterprise market; as I work in the enterprise support market it is very clear that most hardware and software providers to this market have announcements made way out in front of actual releases, this gives the support community time to work it into solutions, get certification on, and help plan capital technology budgets that are most often in the hundreds of thousands of dollars. Apple's way of doing the black ops coverup of all their products made sense when they were a small company putting out very limited releases of products because it wasn't feasible for them to manufacture a lot, but they are now the largest technology company out there, and those tactics are less necessary.

  1. testudo

    Forum Regular

    Joined: Aug 2001

    -1
    11/08, 02:50pm | report spam | Reply |

    um

    Shouldn't that first sentence read "Eric Zelenka -- Apple's former senior worldwide marketing manager for server, storage and management products "?

    And if xServes weren't selling well, just how many users are using their other server technologies, like xSan? As such, why should Apple continue to invest in such things, if they feel they couldn't even sell a decent server.

    Then again, if Eric had done a decent job marketing the xserve, he might not have been on the support forums telling people that it being dropped is not a harbinger of other things.

  1. egadsby

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Apr 2004

    0
    11/08, 03:15pm | report spam | Reply |

    Tell Apple what you think...

    http://www.ipetitions.com/petition/bringbackxserve/

  1. prl99

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Mar 2009

    +2
    11/08, 04:14pm | report spam | Reply |

    petition

    I'd love to sign the petition but I would also want to back it up with a purchase order for more than one or two Xserves. I know there are companies who have bought Xserves but how many of them have actually replaced them with faster ones? I bought six of the original version and we never replaced any of them with newer Xserves. Macs last forever, right, so Apple has a good excuse to drop them if my purchase was the norm. If I remember right, I didn't buy any extended support for them and only bought one of the server parts kit, which I did use some of the parts, so my only recurring expense was OSX Server updates. Apple's a hardware company so I didn't contribute much after that first purchase.

    I'm sure there are others who were gearing up to buy more Xserves but Apple needs 100K to justify making them (my guess on the minimum number they would need to justify this product; they probably need 2-10X that many).

  1. ilovestevejobs

    Fresh-Faced Recruit

    Joined: Feb 2007

    0
    11/08, 05:18pm | report spam | Reply |

    Welcome to the Apple Experience

    Where you buy spend $$$ investing in a solution with a very short lifespan >:)

Login Here

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