Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac • Hacker News Board

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#31

Post by ericd » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 12:56 AM UTC

sudont wrote: post #24

m0nastic wrote: post #9

I find myself agreeing with their recommendation, even though I disagree with their rationale. Agreeing to let "HEROES" use Macs in an enterprise (and dear god what a terrible term, as if us Mac users weren't smug enough) seems to be basically capitulating to entitlement. At my last company, when Mac OS X first shipped, I wanted to try it out, so I bought an iBook (the cheapest entry to the world of Macs, in case I e…

As someone currently doing a "pilot" of a Mac in a highly corporate environment, I can say it's not exactly just IT. There's realms and realms of support groups that get to sign off on "authorized" network equipment, and when you bypass them it's the equivalent to a histamine reaction. I never met anyone in IT who disliked Macs completely and totally, just management. We had one specific storage group that "only supp…

Wow, with attitudes like that to deal with, it's a wonder anyone can get any real work done there... I can't imagine having to jump through all those hoops just to mount a drive.

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#32

Post by smithian » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 12:57 AM UTC

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #30

smithian wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You're kidding right? Windows file sharing is trivial to set up.

Between different versions of Windows? No, it isn't.

Well, certainly between anything that owes its heritage to NT it is. I have win2000, 2003, XP, and 7 all playing very nicely together, and I cannot recall any issues with setup or maintenance. Compare that with getting a Mac to print to any printer that wasn't specifically designed with macs in mind... torture.

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#33

Post by protomyth » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 1:08 AM UTC

smithian wrote: post #26

ConstantineXVI wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With a solid/easy backup system like Time Machine, don't even need a proper service plan: * Buy an external HD, set up Time Machine. * Keep an identical spare Mac. * If you're paranoid, buy a second external HD; rotate it and the first drive for TM backup every week-ish (keep the inactive one next to your spare Mac) * When the Mac dies; toss it, get out the spare, plug in the TM drive and restore. Totally back in bus…

So, uh, your backup strategy is "buy two computers for every employee?" INteresting, but hardly cost-effective.

For an enterprise you can do time machine to a lion server connected to your big storage. Then just keep a few spare machines like you would for your PCs.

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#34

Post by Samuel_Michon » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 1:08 AM UTC

smithian wrote: post #32

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Between different versions of Windows? No, it isn't.

Well, certainly between anything that owes its heritage to NT it is. I have win2000, 2003, XP, and 7 all playing very nicely together, and I cannot recall any issues with setup or maintenance. Compare that with getting a Mac to print to any printer that wasn't specifically designed with macs in mind... torture.

Which printer manufacturers don't make drivers for Macs? I don't know of any. Even really old printers from the pre-OS X era work fine, because of CUPS and Gutenprint. It's plug and play, the drivers are downloaded automagically.

http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3669#Gutenprint

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#35

Post by rhplus » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 1:11 AM UTC

johngalt wrote: post #25

51% allow access to web-based email? 37% allow internet access? 19% native email? I've been in IT for 12 years, I've never seen anyone endorse blocking Macs from any of these. 49% block Macs from webmail ? Difficult to imagine a situation where these would be a problem. Maybe super paranoid eavesdropping management?

I think the key phrase here is "employee owned Macs". They don't say what the equivalent results are for "employee owned Windows PCs", but I'd bet they're in the same ballpark. And when they say "owned" they really mean "administrated", meaning the PC isn't part of the corporate domain and subject to corporate Group Policy.

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#36

Post by famousactress » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 1:15 AM UTC

m0nastic wrote: post #23

famousactress wrote: post #20

Earlier quoted context omitted.

...seems to be basically capitulating to entitlement Entitlement to use choose your own tools? Gasp. I think the underlying point the article's taking glancing blows at has plenty of merit, they just failed to do it bluntly enough. I think there's likely a high correlation between highly productive employees, and people who could care less about IT bureaucracy. I don't think it has anything to do with Mac users.. it'…

Entitlement that the rules put in place don't apply to you, because you are some sort of prima-donna superstar. I find that worrisome. It can bloom into pretty ugly (and moderately damaging) behavior. I've worked for clients who have certain divisions which are the super-stars. I think the better approach is to evaluate why you have all these policies, and if they are actually doing what you think they're doing. edit…

No worries about it sounding like the prima-donna comment was aimed at me. I've certainly fallen into the category of people you've applied it to.

At this point I'm sure I'm not remotely fit for The Enterprise, though I've worked in plenty of them. It's not that I've ever thought that the rules put in place don't apply to me.. it's that I've placed a higher priority on other objectives of the company (like getting work done).

IT policy at most corporations I've worked at is completely inarguable. In my experience it's very difficult to get a reasonable accounting of cost/benefit when it comes to making almost any change in policy... in part because productivity benefits like the ones I feel I get from my choice of tools are hard to measure, and in part because I don't think I've had the experience of working anyplace where the IT department charged themselves with making other people's jobs easier/better.

I think job function matters too. Programming is a craft. Good craftspeople are ridiculously passionate about their tools. If you walk into a nice auto-mechanic shop, the racks of tools against the wall are owned and paid for by the mechanics. I imagine that's not the case at the Jiffy-Lube, but you're we're probably talking about people at a different skill level. Good craftspeople in any industry end up in a relationship that's closer to independent contractor, or even peer with the organization they work for. That's happening in our industry, and I think it makes sense to look at functions that provide friction for those people, because it will become much harder to hire them.

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#37

Post by pyre » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 1:25 AM UTC

smithian wrote: post #26

ConstantineXVI wrote: post #21

Earlier quoted context omitted.

With a solid/easy backup system like Time Machine, don't even need a proper service plan: * Buy an external HD, set up Time Machine. * Keep an identical spare Mac. * If you're paranoid, buy a second external HD; rotate it and the first drive for TM backup every week-ish (keep the inactive one next to your spare Mac) * When the Mac dies; toss it, get out the spare, plug in the TM drive and restore. Totally back in bus…

So, uh, your backup strategy is "buy two computers for every employee?" INteresting, but hardly cost-effective.

You only need two computers for every employee if you expect an event where all employees will need to swap out their computers at once. On a personal level, you would need two, but on a company-wide level you don't need that absolute redundancy.

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#38

Post by m0nastic » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 1:26 AM UTC

famousactress wrote: post #36

m0nastic wrote: post #23

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Entitlement that the rules put in place don't apply to you, because you are some sort of prima-donna superstar. I find that worrisome. It can bloom into pretty ugly (and moderately damaging) behavior. I've worked for clients who have certain divisions which are the super-stars. I think the better approach is to evaluate why you have all these policies, and if they are actually doing what you think they're doing. edit…

No worries about it sounding like the prima-donna comment was aimed at me. I've certainly fallen into the category of people you've applied it to. At this point I'm sure I'm not remotely fit for The Enterprise, though I've worked in plenty of them. It's not that I've ever thought that the rules put in place don't apply to me.. it's that I've placed a higher priority on other objectives of the company (like getting wo…

For what it's worth, I totally agree with you. I'm presently trying to extricate myself from a large enterprise.

I'm not necessarily a gung-ho "startup good/big company bad" kind of person, but purely from an "asymmetric effectiveness" standpoint, it's easy to see why people think large enterprises are a relic of last century. In many ways, it seems like they're designed to just continue treading water until the lake evaporates, rather than trying to swim to the other side.

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#39

Post by smithian » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 1:32 AM UTC

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #34

smithian wrote: post #32

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Well, certainly between anything that owes its heritage to NT it is. I have win2000, 2003, XP, and 7 all playing very nicely together, and I cannot recall any issues with setup or maintenance. Compare that with getting a Mac to print to any printer that wasn't specifically designed with macs in mind... torture.

Which printer manufacturers don't make drivers for Macs? I don't know of any. Even really old printers from the pre-OS X era work fine, because of CUPS and Gutenprint. It's plug and play, the drivers are downloaded automagically. http://support.apple.com/kb/ht3669#Gutenprint

The ones that I have had the most "See Note 7"* moments with have been large multifunction workgroup printers that you would find in any office - of varying manufacturers. these printers all claim to have mac drivers, and generally these claims are terrible, terrible lies.

*Note 7: This will not work.

Re: Hell freezes over: Forrester urges IT to support the Mac

#40

Post by mikeash » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 2:45 AM UTC

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #6

lunchbox wrote: post #4

One of the two main cited reasons people prefer Macs was this: > Many of today's corporate PCs are saddled with management, backup, and security agents that can bog down a PC. Employees want their PCs to boot in 10 seconds, not 10 minutes...They're drawn to uncluttered Macs... I don't see how this shows superiority of Mac over PC; presumably if the Mac were running this software it would have these problems too.

The difference: when you use a Mac, you don't need that software. - You don't need to run third party antivirus or antispyware software on the client, only on your mail server (to protect Windows users if you forward Windows executables). OS X has built-in malware protection. - You don't need third party management software, you can use NetInstall/NetBoot or ARD. - Using NetBoot also solves the backup problem on the…

> OS X has built-in malware protection.

That's not really true. OS X doesn't generally suffer from malware purely because there isn't much Mac malware out there. It's only difficult to get infected with malware because it's difficult to find the stuff. But it's actually pretty easy to write the stuff, if one were so inclined.