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

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

#91

Post by yardie » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 3:51 PM UTC

johngalt wrote: post #78

yardie wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is why employees hate their IT department. Instead of helping them do their job better they dictate and put up roadblocks so IT guy has an easier job. 1. If business critical data is lost this is your fault because those backups should have been performed regularly, throughout the day. 2. Unknown devices on the network should have automatically been switched to a DMZed network. If they want it on the corpora…

I think we have a tone mismatch here. For instance if a user brought in a Mac the email would be something like "Hey, just saw $newdevice connected to corpLAN. Remember that all company data needs to be saved to a share in order to be properly backed up. Also here's what you'll need to connect to email etc..." 1. Backups are performed regularly on devices I have control over. If someone stores their info on a persona…

Sorry I might have been mistaken then. I've been both user and admin of the IT department and the amount of bullshit handwaving that comes from some of them is infuriating. I honestly believe that 25% get their jobs through nepotism because there is no way that IE6 should still be a requirement for any PC.

1. I share the same view. Once it leaves the network you're on your own. I encourage our users to backup to our servers because storage is cheap and if they are going to be using it for work might as well.

2. DMZ doesn't mean killing it just means your unknown device has a connection to the internet and that is all. Some users just want to bring in an iPad and aren't looking to get 802.11x certificates, 26-character WPA passswords, etc.

3. Unless someone is being a nuissance on the network I try not to get involved and even then I fire off an email directly to shut them up.

I work for a software company so most users are really computer competent so I haven't encountered the "problem" user that most IT workers love to make fun of.

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

#92

Post by yardie » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 3:54 PM UTC

cbs wrote: post #69

yardie wrote: post #62

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And this is why employees hate their IT department. Instead of helping them do their job better they dictate and put up roadblocks so IT guy has an easier job. 1. If business critical data is lost this is your fault because those backups should have been performed regularly, throughout the day. 2. Unknown devices on the network should have automatically been switched to a DMZed network. If they want it on the corpora…

>Instead of helping them do their job better they dictate and put up roadblocks so IT guy has an easier job. Oh yes, I forgot. IT budgets are infinite and supporting all existing business computing requirements on any foreign device that show up takes zero time.

There is a world of difference between not supported and not allowed. If you don't support it then don't support but there are some places that are actively hostile to anything but windows.

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

#93

Post by Samuel_Michon » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 4:15 PM UTC

WayneDB wrote: post #90

tomkarlo wrote: post #11

Earlier quoted context omitted.

At what point are we going to get over the concept that Macs don't have virus issues because there's not popular enough yet? I feel like I've been hearing that chestnut for a decade now. There are already IT management tools for Macs. I've worked at two large companies in a row (25k+ employees) where a large percentage of the company was using Macs (~30% or more) and they both had established management solutions tha…

Why are Banks known for getting robbed more often than Bakeries? That's where the money is. The reason you've been hearing about Mac popularity with regards to viruses is because it's true, despite the fact that you'd like to think otherwise. The fact is that Mac market share is still only around ~15% in the US and much less than that worldwide. That is about triple the market share that they had ten years ago. Also…

"Why are Banks known for getting robbed more often than Bakeries?"

Because of Hollywood movies? It isn't actually true.

Of all robberies in the US, only 2.1% targets a bank. Shops (including bakeries) are targeted far more often, 14.3% of the time. Gas stations are robbed more often than banks, and convenience stores are even 2.5 times more likely to get robbed. [1]

The number of bank robberies is on the rise, but that's not because "that's where the money is". It's because the number of bank branches has grown rapidly, banks have standardized floor plans, and banks have procedures to deal with robbers (= just give them the money). [2]

To further break down some bank robbery myths: nearly 80 percent of bank robberies are committed by one person. 70 percent of bank robbers are unarmed offenders who do not use or even threaten violence. About 60 percent of bank robbers do not bother with disguises; only 7 percent of robbers in Florida did. And finally, more than 80 percent of arrested bank robbers have no prior convictions for bank crime.

[1] http://www2.fbi.gov/ucr/05cius/offenses/violent_crime/robber...

[2] http://www.popcenter.org/problems/robbery_banks/2

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

#94

Post by Samuel_Michon » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 4:25 PM UTC

smithian wrote: post #89

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #84

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I was referring to the following: "Compare that with getting a Mac to print to any printer that wasn't specifically designed with macs in mind... torture." Like you said, printing is not a problem in OS X. As for the other functions of a MFC, I agree: it's hit-and-miss. But that wasn't what OP was complaining about.

Printing is no picnic either, as any cursory browse through discussions.apple.com, support.apple.com, or any of the many mac-centered tech forums will attest. Here's a few examples, by no means exhaustive: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2776655?start=0&tst... http://ask.metafilter.com/79984/Need-help-printing-to-work-p... https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3137602?start=15&ts... https://discussions.apple.com/…

That's proof that there's a lively online Mac community, nothing more.

Guess what? Any search for "> windows not working" will also produce scads of results, often taking you to discussions that are dozens of pages long with people who can't print from their Windows PCs to any number of printers. The same can be said about most GNU/Linux distributions.

The only support forums where no one complains are those of products that no one uses.

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

#95

Post by smithian » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 7:18 PM UTC

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #94

smithian wrote: post #89

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Printing is no picnic either, as any cursory browse through discussions.apple.com, support.apple.com, or any of the many mac-centered tech forums will attest. Here's a few examples, by no means exhaustive: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2776655?start=0&tst... http://ask.metafilter.com/79984/Need-help-printing-to-work-p... https://discussions.apple.com/thread/3137602?start=15&ts... https://discussions.apple.com/…

That's proof that there's a lively online Mac community, nothing more. Guess what? Any search for " > windows not working" will also produce scads of results, often taking you to discussions that are dozens of pages long with people who can't print from their Windows PCs to any number of printers. The same can be said about most GNU/Linux distributions. The only support forums where no one complains are those of prod…

I was responding to this:

> It's plug and play, the drivers are downloaded automagically.

and this:

>Like you said, printing is not a problem in OS X.

This is obviously and clearly not true, but you seemed to need evidence which I provided. In addition, in my experience the compatibility of macs and printers is far worse than windows and printers.

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

#96

Post by smithian » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 7:24 PM UTC

lloeki wrote: post #58

cbs wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Macs in the enterprise don't need management, backup or security software? You're fucking around, right? Even in my personal limited deployment of macs, they're managed by joining the domain and ssh access. They're backed up with a combination of rsync and a home-rolled login hook/git solution. Given the recent malware hitting the internet for macs, our aggressive firewalling already doesn't cut it for security. Once…

> "Given the recent malware hitting the internet for macs, our aggressive firewalling already doesn't cut it for security". Three odd trojans that need to be explicitly user-installed, rarely if ever met in the wild, and blocked by the daily-updated system are a threat to your über-firewall? I'm not downplaying the recent evolution in the area, but up until now you have to admit it's a dud. > "They're backed up with…

In point of fact, I run no regular antivirus on my windows machine and have had no viruses ever. I verify this with a boot scan. It's not about macs vs PC's it's about user savvy and market penetration.

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

#97

Post by smithian » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 7:32 PM UTC

snorkel wrote: post #76

kokey wrote: post #65

I work for one of the biggest corporations in the world, and I can see the acceptance of Macs creeping in. There is at least active support for using Macs as terminals for Windows virtual desktops. That said, it's still a long way to go so it would be nice to see these things speeding up. The quote "For the same reason they wouldn't wear cheap shoes and a bolo tie to meet with Lloyd's of London to insure their cargo…

I also worked for a big corp recently where IT would not issue a Mac to anyone unless they worked in a "creative area". Some of the Intranet tools were strictly IE-only too, as in changing your user agent to IE didn't help you at all. The silly part of the Windows-only IT policy is that it's intended to simplify IT support when in fact every week IT would broadcast alerts "EMERGENCY: Everybody must stop what you are…

You worked at a company with a dysfunctional IT department. In non-dysfunctional IT departments, security updates application patches are installed automatically without user intervention.

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

#98

Post by chris_dcosta » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 7:52 PM UTC

The biggest barrier to entry for the Mac in the corporate world is SAP. SAP GUI and the additional products it runs like the reporting tools (Bex) just cannot be run on Mac. The SAP GUI only works on Windows and in theory is supposed to be supported on Mac through Java and HTML equivalents, but in practice they don't work.

SAP is so ingrained into corporate IT that unless SAP themselves decide to rewrite everything (unlikely) I can't see PCs being replaced any time soon.

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

#99

Post by WayneDB » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 8:56 PM UTC

Samuel_Michon wrote: post #93

WayneDB wrote: post #90

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why are Banks known for getting robbed more often than Bakeries? That's where the money is. The reason you've been hearing about Mac popularity with regards to viruses is because it's true, despite the fact that you'd like to think otherwise. The fact is that Mac market share is still only around ~15% in the US and much less than that worldwide. That is about triple the market share that they had ten years ago. Also…

"Why are Banks known for getting robbed more often than Bakeries?" Because of Hollywood movies? It isn't actually true. Of all robberies in the US, only 2.1% targets a bank. Shops (including bakeries) are targeted far more often, 14.3% of the time. Gas stations are robbed more often than banks, and convenience stores are even 2.5 times more likely to get robbed. [1] The number of bank robberies is on the rise, but th…

It may not be true anymore, but that doesn't mean that Hollywood made everything up about that! Ever heard of Jesse James? The point is...thieves go where the money is.

Okay, so fine you don't like my analogy. Let's fix it for you then: If you found a large oasis in the middle of a desert, would you pass it by in order to find a smaller one?

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

#100

Post by bdunbar » Fri, Oct 28, 2011, 10:00 PM UTC

marze wrote: post #16

I've heard in the past one theory for IT departments favoring PCs (besides all of the pro-PC marketing aimed at them) might be that the Macs are very cheap to administer and thus don't require much IT support. I thought this was an interesting response to this news, over at the AppleInsider forums: "I work for one of the largest corporations in the world. Surprisingly, they don't do anything to block access to networ…

I've heard in the past one theory for IT departments favoring PCs ... might be that the Macs are very cheap to administer and thus don't require much IT support.

If true, that's a mighty dysfunctional IT department.

Perhaps it's the company I work for: if there was a desktop machine that was cheap and required little support, we'd be all over it.