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Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

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Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#341

Post by andybak »

chippiewill wrote: post #320
andybak wrote: post #273

Earlier quoted context omitted.

My use case is that I need to build for a recent iOS device but I don't want to upgrade my Macbook to an os version that doesn't support 32bit apps. But the 24hr thing kills it for me. I will never get 24 hours use out of it. Maybe a few hours. Why am I paying for the other 21 hours? Maybe someone can wrap this SaaS in a other Saas and sell timeshares in a virtual Mac.

> Maybe someone can wrap this SaaS in a other Saas and sell timeshares in a virtual Mac. That's precisely what the EULA prevents, otherwise Amazon would happily sell you smaller slice of time.

Ah. Of course!

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#342

Post by strobe »

em500 wrote: post #304
wayneftw wrote: post #293

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The EULA applies to leasing the whole OS. I don't need a whole virtual Mac to run CI jobs. It doesn't sound like there's anything stopping anyone from offering a Mac CI job runner that gets shared with multiple organizations at the same time.

There are some fairly broad usage restrictions in section 1.J.[1]. Except as otherwise permitted by the terms of this License or otherwise licensed by Apple: (i) only one user may use the Apple Software at a time, and (ii) you may not make the Apple Software available over a network where it could be run or used by multiple computers at the same time. You may not rent, lease, lend, sell, redistribute or sublicense th…

if I've mac with accepted EULAs and share it via network to wife, kids or neighbor (might be even wife/neighbor used it to do some business activities) - how it does works from legal perspective? is it will viewed as EULA violation?

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#343

Post by kevas »

ohmaigad wrote: post #309
em500 wrote: post #286

Earlier quoted context omitted.

One thing is, they could write anything in the EULA, I was just wondering how much it is actually enforceable (even with a click-through "consent". Second, I wonder on what legal basis they can actually impose usage restrictions of a whole Mac (hardware+software) via an EULA as long as I don't breach any copyright (which I don't think I do if I rent out usage of the entire system for a few hours). AFAICT (again, not…

I have a hard time believing 1.J.[1] could be enforced as it sounds like you cannot sell your MAC, use it in a work or school environment. Apple can't risk to prove the point in court because if it is enforceable no organisation will touch their products.

Here’s a question: can a Mac be sold more than once in a 24 hour period?

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#346

Post by banana_giraffe »

banana_giraffe wrote: post #42

No mention of pricing that I can see, and I don't see it on ec2instances, AWS's pricing page, or the spot-pricing widget on the console. Am I missing something? Edit: And the reserved instances widget (I was going to guess based off this cost) just flat out breaks when you pick mac. I guess we're still in the "If you have to ask, it's too expensive" stage, or something.

Finally showed up on the Dedicated Host Pricing[1] page: $1.083/hour

And I assume on top of that you'd have to pay the $2/hour dedicated host charge.

I'll keep the Mac Mini around.

[1] https://aws.amazon.com/ec2/dedicated-hosts/pricing/

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#347

Post by somethingwitty1 »

em500 wrote: post #226
saagarjha wrote: post #172

An interesting offering from Amazon that is crippled by Apple and MacStadium, who deserve to be raked over the coals for their recent EULA changes. Just read the post on MacStadium's blog: https://blog.macstadium.com/blog/developers-big-sur-and-vind... Under the new agreement, you must: * Rent to only one organization * Rent for 24 hours at the minimum * Use it for some set of "approved" development work …among other…

Not a lawyer, I do wonder if such terms would hold up in court. I can see the case for EULA around virtualization when you're running multiple instances of macOS. But say I just buy a bunch of Mini's and rent (full access to) them out (bare metal, full system) per hour, rather than 24hr. Or for non-"development" work, whatever that means. Could Apple really put up a good case in court? It seems unlikely that they cou…

If you are in the US, it doesn't necessarily matter whether the terms would hold up in court. The question comes down to how deep your pockets are and how much money you are willing to spend to fight Apple. Apple certainly has deep pockets. There aren't a lot of companies that can take the financial hit to fight against a behemoth in court.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#348

Post by lotsofpulp »

wewake wrote: post #262

Boycott Apple completely. How did we go from open development to some overpriced, only half decent and walled mess that's now worth $2 trillion? Shame.

Because that’s the solution that resulted in my parents not suffering from malware and various toolbars in their browsers. There is no way they or a significant portion of the population was going to learn how to discern good programs from bad, and a walled garden is apparently the option that works.

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#349

Post by Blahah »

skohan wrote: post #297
BillinghamJ wrote: post #257

Earlier quoted context omitted.

No I'm sure AWS don't want it either. And it absolutely is 100% typical of Apple to do this kind of thing. They don't want third party companies to provide offerings which might cause them problems or degrade their brand/perception. I'm not at all saying these terms were added to benefit AWS. More that they were a condition of Apple doing this first official cloud partnership.

It's also 100% in line with Apple's recent trends of being hostile to developers. It's absolutely absurd to have to rent an server for 24 hours to do a single build. It's incredibly wasteful to have this much hardware sitting around and doing nothing.

Is there anything to stop someone renting the servers and running a build service on them, thus subdividing the use of the resource?

Re: Amazon EC2 Mac Instances

#350

Post by coldtea »

saagarjha wrote: post #267
BGStucki wrote: post #245

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Brian Stucki here. If I had the power over Apple that you think I do, I definitely would have pushed for iPhone Socks first. Joking aside, the software license agreement was certainly a cause for personal celebration. It might be helpful for you to compare macOS 11 to previous versions. (Linked in my post.) If I/MacStadium did anything, we showed that there was a need for this sort of service and that both Apple and…

Hi, thanks for weighing in. I'm sure you picked up that I'm pretty mad, but I'll try to tone it down a little bit. I'm not an Amazon employee or someone who is personally harmed by this or anything, aside from being a developer for Apple's platforms who occasionally looks around for CI services. I'm mostly arguing about the principle of the thing. Anyways: I read your blog post back when it came out. Whether Apple to…

>aside from being a developer for Apple's platforms who occasionally looks around for CI services

So, you give him all this shit and you're not even using his service?

>There's still a huge hole for a service that lets you rent a Mac for the a couple minutes so you can build your Xcode project. It's not your fault that doesn't exist, it's Apple's.

If we're talking for CI of builds, sure. But in that case, one wouldn't be much affected (the C in CI means continuous, so you wont just rent for a few minutes).

Otherwise, as a user, I'm quite satisfied with less developers being able to build XCode projects and submit apps without even owning a Mac to test them on. Looks like it would bring a delluge of poorly ported apps based on cross-platform APIs and only tested in non-Mac platforms (if that).

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