To save money, the BC Gov't has standardized on M$ Windows for the desktop. They've never actually looked to see if they have saved any money from this decision, but I can tell you about the thousands of work days lost due to security issues with that ... and that after spending millions in trying to convert off of Macs, that the legislative support crew is using Macs and saving time.
The standard mailer that comes with OSX can use exchange as one of it's servers. You can also purchase M$ Entourage for OSX that is M$ new Exchange client. The only thing I haven't found a free nice and easy tool for is Exchange calendaring. Although if you're not using some ancient version of Exchange, meetings come in as little double-clickable attachments that put themselves into you OSX calendar.
I do 90% of my work against an Oracle DB, that I run locally on my laptop.
All of my applications are targeted either for Solaris, HP-UX or AIX. My current project, and the next one we're starting are the first Linux based apps to be used in gov't (they have linux for mail, dns, webmethods, etc.) ... so following suit Gov't has standardized on RedHat Linux.
In the 2 years that I have used my laptop as my 100% client, I have not found 1 issue that was not easily handled. In my current project as people refresh their own workstations they are now opting for OSX machines and no one has had any problems. On my last commercial product, even the CEO switched over to a Mac as well as the rest of the developer employees because "everything just works".
All of the *nix tools you want are already in place so mounting or sharing SMB is there. The built-in VPN is okay and ssh is stable, along with the Java side of things. I also use the Cisco VPN client for OSX and it's been much better then the any of the Windows versions of the VPN that the rest of the office is using.
The rumour mill puts the G5 laptops out for next summer, given that they can solve the heat problems.
Have fun, Thor HW
On 7-Dec-03, at 10:07 AM, Jorg Heymans wrote:
I would've gotten one of these a few months ago, but decided on a winxp instead because i wasn't sure about its "standard office compatibility". I mean can you easily link up to an exchange server? See windows file servers, mount windows directories, open/edit/save m$-office word and excel files (and all this without recompiling kernel, configure samba, edit config files or *purchase* add-on software).
Any real-life experience to be shared? Can one survive with these things when getting dumped in an all microsoft office environment? I don't want to beg for pdfs all the time when word-docs are being sent around.
Taking this even further off-topic, sorry. Jorg
Alain Javier Guarnieri del Gesu wrote:
* John Morrison <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> [2003-12-07 11:12]:Hi All,
Sorry for the off topic posting, but I've been thinking about upgrading my laptop and you guys have been saying how good the modern Macs are :)
I was wondering if you'd tell me which Mac you have and whether you'd buy one again :)
Thanks,
J.
PS, I've never owned a Mac before. PPS, if you want to email me about this off list; that's fine too :)Must chime in. I "switched" a couple months ago to a G4 Powerbook. What strikes me most is my new-found ability to pick up where I left off. I've had laptops that knew how to go to sleep before, but never one that knew how to wake up. Just open the screen and there's everything just as I left it. I leave a line of code half-written and pick it up first thing in the morning. The G4 makes me realize the importances aesthetics, especially the aethetics of something I am going to stare at for 14 hours a day. That is is pleasant to look at also makes it easy to resume, to find myself in that space where I forget the computer is there, where I am just looking at my toughts. And its Unix. I'm in vim, in mutt, in bash, in ssh, in bash, in screen, right now. There are no Windows applications for me to miss. I use Eclipse for Java. The JDK ships with OS X. OS X politely patches itself from time to time. System maintence is nothing I concern myself with. The "it just works" factor is the trump. You will come to see your Macintosh as a shrewd investment. You will see the commodity-priced computing alteratives as false economy. When you buy a Mac you are literally buying time. Sorry, I know this is off topic.
