In-Depth with Mac OS X Lion Server
by Andrew Cunningham on August 2, 2011 8:00 AM ESTLion Server’s main problem, from an IT person’s point of view, has less to do with the software’s functionality and more to do with Apple’s software support model. Lion Server is a good product that maintains most of the appeal of past OS X Server versions, but like the client version of Lion, it’s clearly a transitional product that makes many changes and foreshadows many more, and there’s less tolerance for that sort of thing in the server room than on the client's end. If your organization depended on something like the Print or QuickTime Streaming service in Snow Leopard Server, or the ability to join Windows clients to Open Directory, Apple decided that those services were obsolete and got rid of them; now you’re stuck having to find something else to do the same work.
That said, server administrators will be happy to know that, in spite of its deeply cut price and consumer-friendly distribution method, Lion Sever stacks up favorably against Snow Leopard Server. Most of the important services, chief among them Open Directory, are present, and are just as useful now as they’ve ever been. Unless you’re hosting a web server on your OS X Server, I don’t anticipate that you’ll hate Lion Server once you get it up and running.
For home users, my recommendation is less conclusive: for power users who like toying around with advanced software and for people who saw a particular service (like VPN, NetBoot, Time Machine, or File Sharing, to name the most user-facing) that will fill a niche in their home, $50 is hardly a steep price to pay for the functionality you get. That said, there are plenty of open source products out there to fill most of these niches, and if you really need something like this in your home, chances are good that you’ve figured something out already. Still, for many services, Lion Server brings OS X’s simplicity to the server level, and that shouldn’t be discounted.
OS X Server is most useful in a handful of different scenarios: the first is that you have a small network that’s in need of a full-featured but easy-to-manage and simple-to-license server product. The second is that you’re managing a network of any size that used to be all-Windows, but hosts a growing number of Macs (this is often the case in education, for example) - OS X Server knows that it’s going to be finding its way into a lot of Windows shops, and as such it integrates fairly well with existing Active Directory setups. The last is that you have a bunch of iOS devices flooding your network and you have no idea what to do with them - iOS management may be Lion Server’s ace in the hole. If any of this sounds familiar to you, you really ought to give Lion Server a try. At $50, there’s not much reason not to.
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jedimed - Thursday, August 4, 2011 - link
Does anyone know if Lion Server supports any DLNA media streaming?jay2901 - Saturday, August 6, 2011 - link
sorry if this has been answered already...but if you aren't interested in legacy nt domain controller functionality, can you join a windows 7 pc to lion server's open directory? would love to use this in a mixed (50-50) environment with mac/pcs without needing active directory.ATOmega - Monday, August 8, 2011 - link
Such a limiting selection of hardware and functionality.Running a server, it makes more sense to take advantage of the strong updates and packages in Debian/Ubuntu and just run with that.
I mean, if you're crazy about the Apple hardware, go nuts! But it's clear what Apple really does with server is integrate a handful of half baked UIs with otherwise free software packages. Calling it a "server edition" changes little from an existential perspective.
I'll never understand the appeal of paying up to 3x more to get the same if not less...
tumme_totte - Tuesday, August 9, 2011 - link
Andrew, you say that Windows computers can't join the OD since a Lion OD Master can't be Primary Domain Master for Windows. But in the documentation Apple says something else:https://help.apple.com/advancedserveradmin/mac/10....
Can this be verified? Windows 7 machines can't be joined to Leopard Server (neither Server 2008) and I was hoping Lion would solve this.
Te-Moz - Sunday, August 14, 2011 - link
Andrew, you can set up device management with a self signed SSL certificate.Obviously it's 'nicer' to have one that's authority signed, but for us, we just need Lion server to control our Macs and iPads, push updates and provide some shared storage. (Educational setting)
Great article, and if you wanted to do one on setting up a golden triangle with Lion Server OD and Win AD, then I'm sure a lot of folk would fine that really helpful also. ;)
reese637 - Saturday, December 24, 2011 - link
Hi all. I'm a young tech enthusiast who likes to get his hands dirty in networks and servers and what not. As of now, I've been running our home network with two Time Capsule routers (acting as access points, web servers, backup drives, and file sharing), and many mac desktops and laptops (I believe four MacBooks and two iMacs). For a while now, I've been interested in upgrading to the Server edition of OSX, but I was afraid that it had too many requirements such as xserves, server domains, etc. Now that Lion Server seems to be a bit more consumer friendly and a lot cheaper, I was seriously thinking in upgrading. Would any of you please be able to let me know if there is anything else I need to buy/do in order for OSX Lion Server to actually work in my home? Thank you.Ron Blatto - Thursday, February 2, 2012 - link
I'm new to using any kind of server software and your guide is exactly what I was looking for.