# Anyone try Lion Server?



## Guest

Has anyone taken the plunge yet? I actually setup a VMWare virtual machine last night and installed Lion into it (not yet supported, requires some hoop jumping but seems to run fine) ... but when I tried to purchase Lion Server from it ... it told me that it wasn't able to install. Not sure if it's missing requirements or if I need to fiddle more with my VM (I'm going to move it to another machine today that has much more ram available and see what happens).


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## Dennis Nedry

[deleted]


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## Guest

Yep looks like we're stuck until they sort things out. I was also wondering if it wasn't the way it identifies the CPU (the App Store that is) as in VMWare the CPU's come up as unknown and the Server app requires specific processor types.

I don't have a spare machine to install onto right now to test with so I guess I'm going to either have to spare up a machine to test or wait :/


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## John Clay

FWIW, I'm staying away from Lion Server.

When my mini gets upgraded, it'll be to a CentOS or Debian server.


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## Guest

John Clay said:


> FWIW, I'm staying away from Lion Server.
> 
> When my mini gets upgraded, it'll be to a CentOS or Debian server.


I run a CentOS server here too, but I actually use a lot of the OSX Server stuff (iCal server, Open Directory, VPN, Netboot, AFP, SMB). Some (probably most actually) can be done in Linux but tend towards being a lot of work to maintain and/or fix, not packaged up so nicely with one button to turn them on like OSX server has. Depends what you need to do I guess, but either way I'll have to support it as well so not much choice but to learn it .. and what better way than running it


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## Chealion

Currently have a test copy running at work and my home computer for giggles - and it's a big change from Snow Leopard Server in terms of management tools. There's lot of good changes under the hood and some a lot of people won't like.

Things worth mentioning:

- Profile Manager (MDM Server) is really neat. Worked great at work but at home I had all kinds of certificate issues.
- Push notifications. For mail, iCal and Address Book. I'm looking forward to the day I can upgrade work's server so it supports this. It's AWESOME.
- The new Server app - it grows on you. It's Server Preferences updated to suck a lot less. It's no Server Admin however.
- Server Admin is just a shell of it's former self.
- MySQL isn't installed by default. I never used the default install anyway.
- Server.app's configuration for Web is laughably simple. If you're wanting to configure web sites you're going to the command line.
- Several services are not GUI configurable anymore (eg. FTP which is turned off, NFS)
- No more QuickTime Streaming Server.
- The amount of know how and ease to make a new server that just does file sharing, calendars and an MDM server for small businesses? It takes 15 minutes and it walks you right through it.

I highly recommend checking out AFP548's videos on Lion Server. The one showing off Server.app shows it actually has most of the day to day things you'll actually care about.


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## Guest

Thanks Chealion. I watched their videos yesterday. I also figured out a way to get it installed here at home as well, will be doing that over the weekend.

I've never (seriously) used the MySQL of web portions of OSX server and when I did try to it wasn't with the built-in stuff because it was too limiting, missing important things, etc.


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## cdnbacon

I bought the new Mac Mini Lion Server yesterday for my home office. Ran the initial setup and seemed pretty easy and intuitive, will have more time to dive deeper in a few weeks. This is my first attempt in running a Mac server since the ASIP days!


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## Niteshooter

How is Lion server at hosting multiple domains, eg newsroom.com/newsroom.net/kevinomura.com etc.

Basically only need web services and maybe email through multiple domains
at the same static IP address. I am just messing up my new SL server and
have the option of upgrading to Lion and Lion Server through the Lion up to date program. Already qualified and have my codes to purchase but am struggling here.


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## steviewhy

sudo rm -rf /


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## Niteshooter

steviewhy said:


> If you do it you are in for a world of hurt. Don't, just don't. Snow Leopard is more suited to what you are doing.


Had a funny feeling that was the answer, thanks for saving me a lot more grief!


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## Theseus

steviewhy said:


> If you do it you are in for a world of hurt. Don't, just don't. Snow Leopard is more suited to what you are doing.


Tell me about it...I've been asked to write a couple chapters of the official Apple Authorized Training Series workbook for use in the LION201 (Server) training courses, and it's an awful pain trying to come up with exercises which all basically tell the student to "Slide the switch to On - the service is now configured."

The server engineers I've been in contact with have told me that if a feature isn't in Server.app, configure it in the command line. Server Admin is quickly becoming deprecated.


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## Chealion

Niteshooter said:


> How is Lion server at hosting multiple domains, eg newsroom.com/newsroom.net/kevinomura.com etc.
> 
> Basically only need web services and maybe email through multiple domains
> at the same static IP address. I am just messing up my new SL server and
> have the option of upgrading to Lion and Lion Server through the Lion up to date program. Already qualified and have my codes to purchase but am struggling here.


From my gander, it's just as good (if not better because of push notifications) as Snow Leopard. In terms of doing the actual hosting bit.

As for configuration? Well that's your 99 steps backwards. Instead of a somewhat usable GUI to at least get you to a starting point it's entirely by hand now making the reasons to use Mac OS X over installing Linux or Snow Leopard Server very few.


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## Guest

Chealion said:


> As for configuration? Well that's your 99 steps backwards. Instead of a somewhat usable GUI to at least get you to a starting point it's entirely by hand now making the reasons to use Mac OS X over installing Linux or Snow Leopard Server very few.


Indeed. Apache/PHP/MySQL stuff has never been great on OSX server to start with and Lion did not help things. If iCalDAV and AFP weren't such a pain in Linux (not to mention time machine backups over the network not being supported, etc) I'd go fully back to Linux in a second for my needs.


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## Chealion

mguertin said:


> Indeed. Apache/PHP/MySQL stuff has never been great on OSX server to start with and Lion did not help things. If iCalDAV and AFP weren't such a pain in Linux (not to mention time machine backups over the network not being supported, etc) I'd go fully back to Linux in a second for my needs.


I haven't had a chance to investigate that closely but with CalendarServer and AddressBookServer both moving to using Postgre as their storage backend - wouldn't that make setting it up on Linux easier? The whole setting up an OD wannabe kludge with CalendarServer 1.0 put me off ever trying to set it up.

Another thing on my list is to see how hard it would be to roll your own APNS (Push Notifications) integration with Dovecot on Linux...


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## Guest

Chealion said:


> I haven't had a chance to investigate that closely but with CalendarServer and AddressBookServer both moving to using Postgre as their storage backend - wouldn't that make setting it up on Linux easier? The whole setting up an OD wannabe kludge with CalendarServer 1.0 put me off ever trying to set it up.
> 
> Another thing on my list is to see how hard it would be to roll your own APNS (Push Notifications) integration with Dovecot on Linux...


The painful part about the setup was all the fiddly configuration, not so much the backend of things. I haven't tried things lately, I want to find the time to do so as well though. I'm not sure if the db backend as opposed to the flat file setup is going to make that much of a difference.

I'm not sure about Push stuff on linux at all either. I just stared for a couple minutes at the one really nice Linux server I built that's sitting in my rack here at home and collecting dust. It was originally running iSCSI based storage but I've since moved my storage solution to hardware RAID on my OSX Server box and the Linux machine hasn't even been booted in about a year ... I should get cracking on that one!


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## bgps

I have Lion Server installed and it works great. Right now running on a MacMini, no issues at all. I'm looking at it on a large scale for work. Looking at MacPro Server and Promise VTrack attached RAID. This is mainly going to be used a File Server where large files are going to be archived. Haven't made final decision as of yet but I am leaning that way. 

BGPS


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## Guest

Well I got to spend some quality time with Lion server yesterday and all I have to say is wow ... it's got some _serious_ issues going on. Anyone considering deploying this on a large scale I would recommend to wait a while at the very least. 

The web interface for the profile management is horrible (and doesn't even render properly in latest Safari!!?!). There are items far down the left hand list that I could not even get to. Push doesn't properly work (at least at first try) for the profiles, and in fact I also had issues even downloading and manually loading a profile on a test machine -- so not sure if it's the push or the actual profile stuff to blame. Some things took, some didn't. Open Directory/network authentication is painfully slow (and yes everything resolves properly both ways). Any changes to configurations result in 2-3 minutes of the "profile manager" updating after you've made the changes, during which time the server was not very responsive (a late 2010 mac mini w/ 4G ram) and nothing else running on it at all. Showed lots of free ram, but it showed the CPU cores massively pegged the whole time.

I am very very disappointed with the direction they have taken things with Lion server. Don't know who they had on the teams that made the decisions on this one but I hope they don't stick around too long :/

I honestly can't recommend this to any clients who need more than absolute basics (file sharing seems to work ok for AFP users anyway). I found serious issues (read: data loss) with iCal and Addressbook components within first 15 minutes of usage. iCal also lost delegation info 3 times in a row on one calendar. Not sure I even fully understand how this new delegation is supposed to work ... when you make new "calendars" they look more like groups (with calendars embedded within them). Group calendars seem to be missing in action as well. Maybe I just need to spend more time with the documentation ...

Time to brush up on my Linux skills again methinks. This new server releases feels very "beta" ... maybe even approaching "alpha" quality.


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## Guest

Here's an example for you all -- the web interface says calendar service is off ... the server app says it's on (and it is indeed on and working with iCal clients).


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## Guest

And some more fun ... apparently I have a user called "Loading..." AND it lets me edit this user and supposedly the "push" to it works as well (other user names blanked out in the screen shot to protect the innocent hehe).

I take it back on my beta comments, we're definitely dealing with "alpha" material here ...


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## Guest

Profile Manager web interface issues:

1. Can't actually scroll all the way down to edit all of the items.

2. Notice the red box and arrow, that's pointing to the menu that you're supposed to see when you click on the icon above it. Instead it seems to load below the viewing area (and no resizing fixes this).

I really feel at this point like Apple should be paying me to test their server for them instead of me having to pay them for the "privilege" of testing it for them.


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## Chealion

mguertin said:


> Here's an example for you all -- the web interface says calendar service is off ... the server app says it's on (and it is indeed on and working with iCal clients).


Web isn't turned on. Is that some funky cross service dependency not documented again?



mguertin said:


> Profile Manager web interface issues


It definitely feels like a 1.0 Server product - lots of potential. Was the same with CalendarServer, AddressBook Server, anything not based outside Apple. :-(

I think it'll be good enough for SMB after a couple updates (eg. 10.7.2 should be the start, 10.7.1 is a non-update)

Remember to file those bug reports. Radar or it doesn't exist. ;-)


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## Guest

I'm sure the radarweb guys are cursing me already  I've filed quite a lot in the last several weeks heh.

I wondered about the web service too, but turning on or off didn't make a difference, nor have several reboots. Haven't had time or energy to nuke and pave and start again yet, but I will try that as well. 

I have a client install to do this Friday and of course they were promised the world at the Apple store when they bought the Mini server package. The people at the Apple store really up-sell server these days but sadly don't actually understand enough about the reality of things to do it properly and like to promise the moon. Have had several people buy at the Apple store and then actually be very upset about the fact that they really can't really move their entire online operation in-house and onto their cheapo dynamic IP DSL line (that can barely keep up with their normal office traffic) and that it's so easy that they can do it all themselves.

We'll see how it works out.


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## Niteshooter

Ugh! Thanks for the updates. I'm glad I didn't do the upgrades, still on SL on the Mini and sloooowly working through some things that were driving me crazy.

I was finding 2-3 particular domains would suddenly stop working and I'm beginning to think it was denial of service attacks. The one thing I didn't have turned on by default was Firewall, I turned that on and it seems to have stopped the problem for now.

IP blocking, I see in the security logs a couple of IP addresses trying to guess my user id and password and a lot of failed attempts at trying to access the list of mail accounts on the server.

Haha, if I could figure out how that worked (mail server) then I might have a problem! Instead I gave up and reverted back to FirstClass for my mail as I can figure out how to set it up for mail across multiple domains. 

On the Mini I haven't figured out how to even log into it for mail, I know I need to go through the manual again. I suspect I set up webmail but I haven't set that up at the ISP's dns. I have to rejig all my domains anyway so that might be a good excuse to fix everything then.

For what it's worth, the person I dealt with at the Apple store didn't know a lot about the Mini I picked up for the FirstClass server including telling me I had to buy another HDMI to DVI adaptor as it didn't come with one. I didn't bother because I had one from the Mini Server I bought refurb online. Lo and behold when I opened the box there it was. 

The other thing I really didn't like was the long wait, I did set myself up in the que for service but dang it I knew exactly what I wanted and had I been able to just fill out an order on the iPad I could have even paid for it and then picked it up somewhere. Instead I had to endure a bunch of questions and upselling, eg do you have a monitor and keyboard. Do you want an extended warranty.... ok I'm sure they are programmed to ask all these questions but sheez I did tell him all I wanted was the computer and I'd be on my way.

Seems that at least in the store I was in they didn't allocate their resources well, I was stuck waiting for 1/2 an hour while there were staff wandering about doing nothing, one person who I first talked to said he couldn't help me because he was setting up for some sort of seminar. He set up a cordoned off area and stood there for 15 minutes with nobody showing up, then he took it down. Heck he could have sorted me out in 5 minutes and I would have been gone.

If I didn't need to pick this thing up that day I would have ordered online..... and I will from now on.


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## bgps

mguertin said:


> Well I got to spend some quality time with Lion server yesterday and all I have to say is wow ... it's got some _serious_ issues going on. Anyone considering deploying this on a large scale I would recommend to wait a while at the very least.
> 
> The web interface for the profile management is horrible (and doesn't even render properly in latest Safari!!?!).
> 
> Well don't know what you are doing wrong...I have server up and running perfectly...all the Safari interfaces work fine, and setup was fast and easy. And I have it running on a basic MacMini!!!
> I was in a business yesterday and they just finished their setup using a MacPro server, and Promise Vtrack and is running beautifully!
> 
> bgps


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## Guest

bgps said:


> Well don't know what you are doing wrong...I have server up and running perfectly...all the Safari interfaces work fine, and setup was fast and easy. And I have it running on a basic MacMini!!!
> I was in a business yesterday and they just finished their setup using a MacPro server, and Promise Vtrack and is running beautifully!
> 
> bgps


I don't know what I'm doing "wrong" either ... all I did was download and install as per the Server.app guides you. I'm doing another clean install tonight to see how it goes.


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## broad

soooo i am torn about what to do. i have to move away from 10.5 server to 10.6 or 10.7. obviously id rather pay for 10.7 than 10.6, but im concerned about a)the craptasticness of 10.7 from everything ive read and everyone ive talked to and b) being in the exact same situation 365 days from now when apple and other vendors decide to force 10.6 server into obsolescence 

rock-----me-----hard place


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## Guest

broad said:


> soooo i am torn about what to do. i have to move away from 10.5 server to 10.6 or 10.7. obviously id rather pay for 10.7 than 10.6, but im concerned about a)the craptasticness of 10.7 from everything ive read and everyone ive talked to and b) being in the exact same situation 365 days from now when apple and other vendors decide to force 10.6 server into obsolescence
> 
> rock-----me-----hard place


Yep that's a real tough one for sure. 10.6 server is pretty stable (but 10x more expensive and as you say destined for EOL sooner than later). What do you specifically need to do with it, as in what services?


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## Guest

Chealion said:


> Web isn't turned on. Is that some funky cross service dependency not documented again?


So it turns out that this is all mostly due to apache configuration issues ... the default apache config is missing the _NameVirtualHost_ directive ... someone was asleep at the wheel on that one. There are a few workarounds but they are messy and with most of them if you make any changes in the Server.app GUI then it overwrites them and you have to do it all over again.

It really really feels like Server has taken second (or maybe fifth) fiddle here. Bugs like the one above are quite astounding. That's _serious_ rookie material there. Gives the feeling that it was seriously rushed out the door when things like that slip through.


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## broad

so i took the plunge, put 10.7 and then 10.7 server on my mac pro. its been running really nicely for the past few days (knock on wood)

i ended up finding a BNIB 10.6 server on ebay for a great deal, bought it and then while waiting for it to arrive rethought my stance and decided to go to 10.7 to ensure longer compatibility (as im sure 10.6 will be EOLed this summer)

my initial observations are smoking fast boot/shutdown vs 10.5 server, much more efficient memory use (less leaks, less processes running using 2GB of RAM haha) less hangups while shutting down and less general all around buggy-ness. i don't have advanced needs so im quite happy with it.


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## Guest

I've set it up for about a dozen clients so far and none of them are having any serious issues, but they are all using the basics, afp, addressbook, ical, vpn, etc. The profile manager is still pretty messed up, but luckily no clients have needed to use profiles yet. So yes, for straightforward needs I think it's ok too.


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## Niteshooter

Hmmm sounds like Lion server still isn't for me. SL server is running ok the only headache I am running into is figuring out to get one friend to access only his website and not everyone elses. I'm sure it's just me and a mixed up permission but it's starting to drive me crazy.


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## broad

after a few days of use i am finding a few obnoxious quirks, mainly to do with the finder. 2.66 QC mac pro with 12GB of RAM should not be hanging and beachballing as much as this is when moving around through files. also finding some finder windows just pop up blank for a few secs, then populate after 5-10 seconds. i cannot frigging get over how much more efficient the memory use is on this than 10.5 server though.


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## Guest

Well I take back my assessment that it's ok for basic usage ... two different clients today having serious ACL inheritance issues. One worked fine for several weeks and the other worked fine for a week. They both stopped working over the weekend. Basically any new files/folders that are being made are not inheriting permissions and are being set so that only the user who created them has read/write access, everyone else is read only. No sign of ACL's at all on the new items (only POSIX permissions).

The only workaround I've found so far (this was even Apple support's suggestion) was to NOT use AFP file sharing and to only use SMB file sharing -- which completely ignores ACL's from what I understand and just uses POSIX inheritance. Just when I thought they were starting to get their act together ... it seems that they aren't. Seems like AFP sharing is quite broken, at least in this release.

I'm honestly at the point where I think Apple just really doesn't care about their server product any longer. Their support person was literally just searching the KB and telling me what the articles he found said -- like I hadn't done that already.


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## Guest

I found a workaround (that doesn't involve having to disable AFP sharing). It seems to have worked for both clients if I manually removed all the ACL's and then restore and re-propagated them -- but this only works if they are propagated from the hardware area in the "Storage" tab. We'll see how long things hold up.


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## Kami

Here's a review of Lion Server on Ars. Author wasn't too impressed

Is Lion Server suitable for home use? Ars investigates


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## Guest

Apple is moving in the same direction with all of their formerly professional products ... cripple them, candy wrap them and make them suitable only for the average home user. Lion server has some pretty serious issues that they haven't addressed yet ... Apple has done this with the last several releases of the Server OS -- which you can't even call a server OS now, it's basically a band-aid they tack on the side of the client OS now ... they add new and "cool" things to it that they never actually finish debugging and get resolved.

The latest pain I've had to deal with are lost ACL's -- one filesystem "lost" it's ACL's twice in a two week period and totally screwed up the permissions on tons of things. Apple's solution was to run a filesystem repair and then manually re-add all the ACL's. That's not a solution, that's another band-aid fix. If you have some straight forward ACL's sure, I guess it's tolerable. When you have fine-grained ACL's for many many folders it's painful.

And let's not even talk about profiles.

Apple is turning into an iOS factory that's catered towards mom and pop users and everything else be damned. I wouldn't be surprised if this was one of the last (if not the last) release of their "Server" software product (not to mention server capable hardware).


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