The Mac shares common ground with all UNIX and POSIX systems. Management tools with open source will recompile and run on OS X -- which incorporates X Window System, VNC, and secure shell servers and clients. Microsoft offers a free download of a fast RDP (Remote Desktop Protocol) client for the Mac. Parallels Desktop will run the native management tools you need for any x86 OS. You will find specific guidance from Apple and in the Mac community for wiring the standard SNMP support in OS X and Xserve RAID into commercial management solutions from HP, IBM, and others.

But make no mistake, when you have to go to the command prompt, the Mac’s quirks most certainly will get in the way. If you’re used to a System V UNIX or Linux OS, the locations of files, the boot sequence, and the contents of the process tree will mystify you at first. If you’re accustomed to system management by custom Perl or shell scripts, your scripts will need some conditional code added to accommodate the Mac.

One quality all Mac systems share makes them a delight to manage: From the administrator’s point of view, all Macs are identical. The policies you set using OS X Server are applied uniformly to PowerPC and Intel Macs, to mobile and stationary users. When you have an administrative task, such as installing an application or an update on all of the Macs on your network, Remote Desktop 3 will handle it for you. The combination of Remote Desktop, Server Manager, Server Monitor, and RAID manager is all the Mac-specific management you’ll need, and it won’t take you an hour to learn the whole stack.

“OS X Server is unproven in critical, high-availability, and large-scale deployments. It’s an enterprise wannabe.”

OS X Server may actually be an enterprise “don’t-wannabe.” Apple has lowered its sights with a server campaign that runs under the tag line, “No IT department required.” Small and midsize businesses are Apple’s server target.

No wonder. Apple’s track record in the enterprise is not exactly stunning. OS X couldn’t get sufficient uptake from ISVs on whose applications enterprises rely. Windows, established RISC UNIX, and Linux already fill the top three spaces in the market.

Yet Apple’s pursuit of UNIX certification for OS X Leopard bodes well for the future. Today, native commercial software must be adapted to and separately validated on the Mac, but if OS X passes the full UNIX-compliance suite, ISVs will be a recompile away from delivering OS X server software.

Meanwhile, a clutch of high-profile customers running Xserve and Xserve RAID bolster Apple’s enterprise credentials. Several broadcasters, including CNN, use Mac enterprise gear to create, store, and air content. The U.S. military hauls Mac servers into the field and out to sea. Mac systems are widely deployed in academia, medicine, high-performance computing, science, film, and other fields where one server failure is cause for hauling a machine to the curb.

“Apple controls the availability of systems, parts, upgrades, and service.”

This incontrovertible truth is one of the greatest points of contention between Apple and its customers. Apple maintains a viselike grip on distribution, pricing, and service, and with the spreading of Apple retail stores, its grip is tightening such that if it chose to, the company could shut down its reseller program entirely and continue to function without a hiccup. The merest whiff of that possibility sent resellers leaping to their fax machines and lawyers.