January 11, 2005

3:47 PM

I'm thinking of dumping my home Redhat 9 linux server in favor of the new cheap Mac Mini to serve the same purpose (file, web, mail). Is this a good idea? [mi]
posted by sfluke20 to (13 comments total)

I've struggled with security, packages, corruption, compiling, upgrading and endless configuration with Linux for the past 6 years or so for my home web/email server. I run Apache, MySQL, php, Postfix, Courier-Imap and a smattering of other normal things. For years I've had this server but I've never trusted it... While I could have used it as a general file server, I've never felt comfortable using it in this way. It seems like it could just "go" at any minute, either by crashing, corrupting or some sort of an intrusion.

So with the new cheap Mac Mini I'm considering throwing away my years of work getting the dumb Linux stuff to work, and using the Mac as a server. I'm not sure if this is practical or not based on the specs of the Mac, and so on. Does anyone have any experience moving from a Linux -> Mac to use as a server for very small, personal purposes?
posted by sfluke20 at 3:47 PM on January 11, 2005

OS X is not build to be a server out of the box, you will basically have to install and config all the web server apps yourself anyway.
posted by Hackworth at 3:53 PM on January 11, 2005

If you do go the Mac mini route I'd suggest you grab a firewire hard drive (or two) and RAID it with the internal drive. Better software or not, if anything is going to "go" it's going to be a drive.

If you can stick OS X Server on a Mac mini I'd suggest you do that as well.

Get some more RAM while you're at it; apparently the Mac mini's RAM can only be upgraded by an Apple authorized service price-gouge.

On preview: Hackworth is correct. But Apache and PHP can be started with a mouse click and Postfix is already installed (at least with the 10.3 Client I'm running.) With Fink things get a bit easier.
posted by brettcar at 4:00 PM on January 11, 2005

File, web and mail services are all available in the default install of OS X, just waiting to be turned enabled. And with Postfix instead of Sendmail!

On preview: what brettcar said, but also with a plug for darwinports. I'd also recommend having a look at FreeBSD.
posted by jperkins at 4:03 PM on January 11, 2005

OS X is a form of BSD, so your Linux knowledge will not go to waste. Much of it is very similar, and playing around on the prompt setting up Apache is almost identical.

No need for OS X server if you're willing to get your hands dirty, and with your Linux experience it seems you are.

OS X is an amazing UNIX OS, and I do almost everything with it that I do in Linux too. OS X is great for Apache, MySQL, sendmail (sorry, not a postfix guy), and all that jazz.

You will not regret such a move.
posted by wackybrit at 4:08 PM on January 11, 2005

I happen to use a couple old Macs as servers, each running OX 10.3 (not Server). I've found that the tradeoff between the ease-of-use of OS X versus the difficulty of manually building and configuring most of the server apps (and updating them when exploits are found) to be about a wash. So while I wouldn't discourage anyone from using a Mac they happen to have laying around as a general-purpose "server", I also wouldn't advise them to buy a Mac for that specific reason.

Personally, I'd suggest you try a couple different Linux distros or one of the BSDs before buying one of those adorable little boxes. Alternately, you can buy me a Mac Mini, and I'll gladly run your web and e-mail for you.
posted by Eamon at 4:10 PM on January 11, 2005

You may have to do some config if the defaults aren't to your liking, but nearly everything does come pre-installed. Apache turns on with a click of a button. A lot of people do prefer Marc Marc Liyanage's PHP and MySQL packages because he compiles in a lot more options than Apple. Postfix is kind of a pain no matter what, but for $10 Postfix Enabler makes it a lot simpler to configure.
posted by nakedcodemonkey at 4:20 PM on January 11, 2005

Alternately, you can buy me a Mac Mini, and I'll gladly run your web and e-mail for you.

Damn! Wish I'd thought of that offer.
posted by jperkins at 5:35 PM on January 11, 2005

Hackworth is wrong, nakedcodemonkey is right. Practically everything you want ships pre-installed -- you just have to turn it on.
posted by jjg at 5:37 PM on January 11, 2005

Well, this is my plan. I have an ageing RatHead 5.1 server that I use as web server, mail server, and firewall (I call it the "filewall").

I intend to replace it with a Mac Mini, and buy a home firewall appliance with port forwarding to set along side it (since the Mac Mini only has one NIC, and I'm not sure you can do logical firewalling + NAT with ipfw)

I will probably use this as an opportunity to ditch sendmail and go postfix as well, and it will be great to have a native appletalk over IP server (rather than atalkd)
posted by jimfl at 6:28 PM on January 11, 2005

I'd wait 6 months to make sure Apple didn't get any bum hardware. They've had some major problems in their consumer level boxes in the past.
posted by alan at 8:14 PM on January 11, 2005

Why not just run BSD on your present machine?

You'll have the same thing as OSX, just without the flare and ease of use. If you're used to configuring a server by hand, I doubt you'd notice (seems to me at that point you're working out of a terminal in OSX anyways, but I don't use a Mac, so someone else will show me up, I'm certain).

Why not try Qmail? If you use it vanilla at least you can be sure you won't need to touch it (at all, literally) for another 5 years or so.
posted by shepd at 11:52 PM on January 11, 2005

i wondered the same, but was discouraged by the poor specs (i need 3 ethernet connections, for example). the bsd suggestion is a good one - i had a firewall running bsd (or the other one, can't remember) and it was rock solid.

also, not wanting to start a distro-war, but i have debian at home, and while i'm fed up with it, it's way better than the red hat i have to deal with at work (that may be that i have more experience with debian, of course). i use exim rather than postfix and it's been reliable.

finally, i must admit that life has been much easier since i gave up on the idea of also using my linux server as a desktop machine too (this is at home with a limited number of computers) - leaving it without sound or graphics support has made it much more manageable.
posted by andrew cooke at 4:28 AM on January 12, 2005