Microsoft to slash Windows RT licensing fees in effort to boost soft sales - report

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  • Reply 61 of 70
    Unless you work with SharePoint, you really can't comment on it, especially from third view opinion. It is a monster of a platform, of which I still learn something new, even after 5 years on the platform. I don't see enterprise size businesses moving towards Mac Server or Linux. They are usually used in small business, schools labs etc.

    I do see corporate IT moving to cloud technologies and off shoring of IT jobs to India... not to open source alternative solutions...

    Ed
  • Reply 62 of 70
    timgriff84timgriff84 Posts: 912member
    djames4242 wrote: »
    My point is that there are often times better solutions out there. I haven't personally set up a collaborative site using Sharepoint, Plone, Drupal, or anything else; I'm simply basing my comments on the experiences of folks that I trust. From my discussions with them, I understand Plone to be more powerful, customizable, and secure than Sharepoint, while Sharepoint beats Drupal in power and customization (and probably security); Drupal is nice from an ease of set up and cost, i.e. free, and can be appropriate for smaller sites.

    Plone integrates with Active Directory security, however I doubt it has the tight integration with Excel that Sharepoint has. That's the side-effect of Microsoft owning them both - they can build support for their own server tools into their client tools and, thus, effectively kill (or diminish) perceived support for non-Microsoft products (much as they have tried to do with the integration between IIS and IE with ActiveX/COM objects that only worked with Microsoft's Internet server and client components, to say nothing of how they tried to kill the cross-platform benefits of Java with a customized Microsoft Java VM with Windows-specific extensions, but I digress...).
    Drupal is not an alternative to Sharepoint. Its a very good CMS solution and people may have built lots of modules that replicate someof the sharepoint functionality. But at its core its a CMS, not a tool for collaboration on documents.

    The whole Microsoft diminishing other products by integrating there own I find quite boring as well. Of course the integrate there products, theres no reason for them not to. If theres no market reason there for them to integrate with someone elses product there also not going to. Thats just sensible.

    However there products are some of the most extensible out there. If someones product doesn't integrate with Excel, thats down to the people making the product. Anyone can write an excel plug in, its not even hard. Office 2013 even has an app store for integrations with other peoples software that can be written in HTML. A lot of Microsofts of integrations even use the exact same plugin model.

    The big thing Microsoft has going for it though is that everyone building enterprise software builds integrations with MS products. If your looking at what products to integrate with MS has the biggest set of customers so it makes the most sense to integrate with. IT people can often be confident that when they go with sharepoint, the office apps people have on there phones will be able to connect to the sharepoint installation for people to access files.
  • Reply 63 of 70
    relicrelic Posts: 4,735member
    bigmac2 wrote: »
    Most IT doesn't even know about Apple MCX, Kerberos single sign-in solution, Remote booting and home folder. M$ only offering is to make sure corporate IT wont lose their jobs. 

    Sorry to be so abrasive, but I'm so sick to deal with institutionalized users with locked down computer by IT derp who think WinXP + IE 7 is the safest environment.  

    What are they going to run it on, a Mac Mini Server, try to shove a Mac Pro into a server rack. Apple got out of the enterprise server game a while back. OSX Server isn't even on the menu. A small office or educational institute sure, fortune 500? Our company has been on AIX and Solaris for decades, nothing beats a top tier Unix environment. We do utilize Windows Server 8 for Office users but you can only bring up a single application threw Citrix.

    I personally love this solution as all of our data still resides on the Unix side and never actually touches Windows. Example, the largest users of Office is our Treasury department, clearing houses sends us reports via a secure FTP site. Even though Excel is a powerful tool we do most of our calculations with Python, Pearl and PHP prior to anybody seeing it. Unix really is fantastic, even our executive assistance's write shell scripts with embedded SQL to access data in a custom format. Yes there are report makers but we actually found it was easier and more productive to show someone how to edit and create new scripts then use prefabbed software. Plus in opinion it makes people think more logically.
  • Reply 64 of 70
    bigmac2bigmac2 Posts: 639member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Relic View Post





    What are they going to run it on, a Mac Mini Server, try to shove a Mac Pro into a server rack. Apple got out of the enterprise server game a while back. OSX Server isn't even on the menu. A small office or educational institute sure, fortune 500? Our company has been on AIX and Solaris for decades, nothing beats a top tier Unix environment. We do utilize Windows Server 8 for Office users but you can only bring up a single application threw Citrix.



    I personally love this solution as all of our data still resides on the Unix side and never actually touches Windows. Example, the largest users of Office is our Treasury department, clearing houses sends us reports via a secure FTP site. Even though Excel is a powerful tool we do most of our calculations with Python, Pearl and PHP prior to anybody seeing it. Unix really is fantastic, even our executive assistance's write shell scripts with embedded SQL to access data in a custom format. Yes there are report makers but we actually found it was easier and more productive to show someone how to edit and create new scripts then use prefabbed software. Plus in opinion it makes people think more logically.


     


    Of course they are a use for every kind of environment, I'm pretty sure your company put their AIX and Solaris server in good use but at software level it is nothing special with Solaris and AIX that OSX won't do. My pretension was 1) the Windows hegemony is a lot due of governmental and institutional IT who knows they won't lose their jobs with locked down windows environment, 2) most security issue comes from this hegemony and IT nor Microsoft takes the blame for bad user experiences and finally 3) IT has always downplayed Apple OSes with no solid reason. Of course I recognized Apple has throw the towel for HPC server, but still, you've got to give Apple some credit for everything they made built-in in a 50$ piece of software. 


     


    Someone once said, the computer is the bicycle of the mind.  An institutional PC is more like a uniwheeler juggling between what they can't do and crashes.  

  • Reply 65 of 70
    djames4242djames4242 Posts: 651member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by BigMac2 View Post


     


    Of course they are a use for every kind of environment, I'm pretty sure your company put their AIX and Solaris server in good use but at software level it is nothing special with Solaris and AIX that OSX won't do. My pretension was 1) the Windows hegemony is a lot due of governmental and institutional IT who knows they won't lose their jobs with locked down windows environment, 2) most security issue comes from this hegemony and IT nor Microsoft takes the blame for bad user experiences and finally 3) IT has always downplayed Apple OSes with no solid reason. Of course I recognized Apple has throw the towel for HPC server, but still, you've got to give Apple some credit for everything they made built-in in a 50$ piece of software. 


     


    Someone once said, the computer is the bicycle of the mind.  An institutional PC is more like a uniwheeler juggling between what they can't do and crashes.  



     


    Perhaps that's true when it comes to the OS, but IT departments are going to be unlikely to condone the widespread use of Macs as servers when Apple no longer makes hardware with redundant power supplies and network ports,and with Lights Out Management support. Sun's biggest selling point these days is small-to-large scale hardware with lots of redundancy and hot-swappable parts (CPU, Memory, and Network cards can all be swapped out without powering down the hardware, and if one power supply blows, it can be replaced while the secondary power supply keeps things running). They also provide console access for remotely managing systems.


     


    OSX makes for a capable small-to-midrange server, but once Apple killed the Xserve platform, they eliminated this sort of reliability counted on by large organizations.

  • Reply 66 of 70
    bigmac2bigmac2 Posts: 639member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by djames4242 View Post


     


    Perhaps that's true when it comes to the OS, but IT departments are going to be unlikely to condone the widespread use of Macs as servers when Apple no longer makes hardware with redundant power supplies and network ports,and with Lights Out Management support. Sun's biggest selling point these days is small-to-large scale hardware with lots of redundancy and hot-swappable parts (CPU, Memory, and Network cards can all be swapped out without powering down the hardware, and if one power supply blows, it can be replaced while the secondary power supply keeps things running). They also provide console access for remotely managing systems.


     


    OSX makes for a capable small-to-midrange server, but once Apple killed the Xserve platform, they eliminated this sort of reliability counted on by large organizations.



     


    I do agree with you, my issues are on the user end. Beside ignorance, I fail to see why so many IT derp doesn't allow Macs has workstation. I fought with so many IT to integrated Mac on Windows domaine which they all told me it can't be done, at the end I found more easy to not told IT about it and make them think I was about to add a new PC instead.  I remember when I've started has an Apple consultant for a big corp (over 2000 employes) ten years ago, only the graphical dept was using Mac, when I've left few years ago, all director was switching to mac. 

  • Reply 67 of 70
    relicrelic Posts: 4,735member
    bigmac2 wrote: »
    I do agree with you, my issues are on the user end. Beside ignorance, I fail to see why so many IT derp doesn't allow Macs has workstation. I fought with so many IT to integrated Mac on Windows domaine which they all told me it can't be done, at the end I found more easy to not told IT about it and make them think I was about to add a new PC instead.  I remember when I've started has an Apple consultant for a big corp (over 2000 employees) ten years ago, only the graphical dept was using Mac, when I've left few years ago, all director was switching to mac. 

    It has nothing to do with ignorance, most IT department heads fully understand the positives and negatives of equipping their staff with Apple machines. The company I work for instance doesn't utilize them for a few reasons, cost, none modular design (unfriendly upgrades, CPU, Ram, HD, Graphic Cards), and no internal option for a Smart Card (login keycard). There are also some issues with proprietary software but that's nothing our programming department can't work on (still costs money though). Laptops are a little tougher, we have this old standing rule that I personally think is a little archaic, the machines must have a removeable battery, docking station and a biometric lock. We use to use nothing but HP but have since moved on to Lenovo Thinkpad's and that also includes their new Windows 8 tablets. Which is fine by me as I happened to really like the Thinkpad's, we have a choice between the X230 and the T430s. Every machine we buy has the optional external slimline battery that attaches to the bottom of the unit which makes Thinkpads last for about 20 hours on a charge vs. the 5 -6 hours you get from a Macbook Pro. Coming back to my first point of pricing, Lenovo and HP both gives us incredible deals because we buy so many desktops/servers/laptops from them, yes Apple is also willing to deal but the prices resemble that of the education store, I guess it wasn't enough of a savings because we don't have any.

    Before you jump in on me I'm really only repeating what the Chief IT administrator told me after I asked him if I could get a Macbook Air, this was before we moved to Lenovo I and I really couldn't stand the HP laptops we were using. All the while he was telling me the jerk-off had a Macbook Pro next to him, I'm sure it was his private laptop but us little people are not allowed to bring in personal computers and that pissed me off.

    Anyway, I hope I could shed some light on the inner workings of the IT department for one of the largest banks in the world.
  • Reply 68 of 70
    bigmac2bigmac2 Posts: 639member

    Quote:

    Originally Posted by Relic View Post





    It has nothing to do with ignorance, most IT department heads fully understand the positives and negatives of equipping their staff with Apple machines. The company I work for instance doesn't utilize them for a few reasons, cost, none modular design (unfriendly upgrades, CPU, Ram, HD, Graphic Cards), and no internal option for a Smart Card (login keycard). There are also some issues with proprietary software but that's nothing our programming department can't work on (still costs money though). Laptops are a little tougher, we have this old standing rule that I personally think is a little archaic, the machines must have a removeable battery, docking station and a biometric lock. We use to use nothing but HP but have since moved on to Lenovo Thinkpad's and that also includes their new Windows 8 tablets. Which is fine by me as I happened to really like the Thinkpad's, we have a choice between the X230 and the T430s. Every machine we buy has the optional external slimline battery that attaches to the bottom of the unit which makes Thinkpads last for about 20 hours on a charge vs. the 5 -6 hours you get from a Macbook Pro. Coming back to my first point of pricing, Lenovo and HP both gives us incredible deals because we buy so many desktops/servers/laptops from them, yes Apple is also willing to deal but the prices resemble that of the education store, I guess it wasn't enough of a savings because we don't have any.



    Before you jump in on me I'm really only repeating what the Chief IT administrator told me after I asked him if I could get a Macbook Air, this was before we moved to Lenovo I and I really couldn't stand the HP laptops we were using. All the while he was telling me the jerk-off had a Macbook Pro next to him, I'm sure it was his private laptop but us little people are not allowed to bring in personal computers and that pissed me off.



    Anyway, I hope I could shed some light on the inner workings of the IT department for one of the largest banks in the world.


     


    I've worked for many big organization as employe or IT consultant, beside RAM I have never see an IT department bothered to upgrade user workstation's video card or CPU, they mostly replace the whole computer after a while and stacking old computers in their warehouse to be sold in auction. And I've found most IT pretty lazy who prefers much statu quo easy way than thinking and develop. 


     


    OSX ever since 10.4 has been approve by the US government for high sensitive application and got options to enabling Smart Card and biometric kerberos login, this is a good example of common IT ignorance about Mac security. BTW cheap biometric gadgets put on laptop are easily hackable like being demonstrated by the Mythbusters. 


     


    Here is insightful guides on Apple secure login options:


    http://manuals.info.apple.com/en_US/FSCP_Install_Setup_Guide.pdf


    http://manuals.info.apple.com/en/Smart_Card_Setup_Guide.pdf

  • Reply 69 of 70
    bigmac2bigmac2 Posts: 639member


    dup!

  • Reply 70 of 70
    I was part of the iOS evaluation program for the US Army. I agree with your statement as our project management was inept. I am hoping with the newly approved Army directives pertaining to iOS, it will open doors for developers who can get a security clearance ( non-India outsource crud).

    Ed
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