How Viable is a MacOS-to-NetWare Connection? 33
Otto-matic asks: "I work for the State of Montana. My Art Department more than likely comprises the entire Mac userbase in the Montana State Government (3 users). The state network is run on Novell Netware using Microsoft Exchange Servers over Ethernet. I started here 1 year ago, and the first dreadful thing I noticed was that the Macs were the only machines not connected to the state network. Instead, this department has one Wintel machine we SHARE for network and internet access. I talked to our IT folks about this situation and was assured that the state was vehemently opposed to the Macs being allowed onto the state network. I asked why, and was told a number of varying stories. Some of which include Appleshare being too 'chatty' over the network; MacOS being unstable, easily hacked, etc.; problems with Macs communicating over non-Mac networks.
I'm getting the feeling that the truth is that these guys have something personal against the MacOS, and are unwilling to even allow consideration of its inclusion into the network." Is there anything to the fears of the submittor's IT department? Or is this just a bunch of hot air?
"My contrary explanations in defense of the MacOS have been largely ignored. What I am attempting, now, is to accumulate a collection of corroborating evidence that proves the Macintosh functions safely, securely and relatively unnoticeably on virtually any network. Specifically Novell Netware.
Could anyone here provide technical info to support this claim, provide links to technical and non-technical articles supporting this, or point me to individuals or publications which could help?"
Macs and !Mac = Problems (Score:2)
Mac and Netware can talk in two ways..
1. Macs run Novell(IPX) Client
- Some versions of MacOS have problems with the client. (System 7.5.x was a bitch, 7.6 was good, 8.x is okay NOW, while 9 still has problems, forget OSX for now).
- Some Mac applications just DO NOT WORK with non-Apple FileShares. Most have work arounds that compromise security or performance. (e.g. QuarkExpress).
2. Novell Server runs AppleFileShare (AFP) Service
- Generates extra load on Servers. If the servers don't have anymore juice to spare this can be a big problem.
- Network has to have AFP on AppleTalk, very very chatty protocol. Its a piece of shit.
- Netware requires an extra NameSpace on Netware File System (NWFS) to support Mac files (actual file names and resource forks). Novell's Multi-Volume Journaling file system (Novell Storage Services=NSS) supports Mac,Window & *nix (NFS) filespaces natively through Semantic Agents.
/RANT ON
To all the Apple Holy warriors..
1. Clear text passwords sent over the network (LAN or WAN) is a big no-no. On a state wide network it's is asking for trouble, i.e. HACKABLE
2. OSX is the 1st good (features/scalable) OS from Apple (except Apple Unix), everything before is no better than DOS + Windows 3.x (one program can bring down the whole system).
3. As far as stability goes, some releases of MacOS are the biggest POS since DOS/Windows3.x. Windows machines crash mostly because of
Imagine each application's installer..
a) replaced system extensions (even if the replacement is older).
b) stored system extensions it wants to use in it the app's folder and loaded them when the program was run.
/RANT OFF
To answer the Slashdot question..
- You are better of in your own little kingdom, for now.
- When OSX matures and the state is using Netware 6 it might be again time to bring up this issue with the powers that be.
Huh? MacOS is "easy to hack"? (Score:2)
- A.P.
--
Forget Napster. Why not really break the law?
Oh, brother... (Score:2)
In reality, MacOS-to-Netware connections are quite viable. I've seen and used several networks that actually do connect Macs to their NetWare networks, with no problems whatsoever. The software isn't always the easiest to find (Novell's site can help with that, even though they don't develop the actual client for MacOS), but it's there and it works.
OSX, as far as I know, is currently another matter (are there any NetWare clients for any Unix-based OS, actually, much less Open-Soruce ones?) But that should be fixed soon.
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Re:No way in hell (Score:2)
What a great, informed, open-minded reason to refuse access. Geez, and people say Mac users are bigoted...
Having a unified IT environment makes things easier on the majority of the users...
No, it makes things easier on the techs. But the techs don't matter when it comes to ease of use; only the user matters.
Not really, it doesn't. While knowing multiple platforms is a marketable skill, knowing Macs doesn't tend to add that much to a person's salary.
I also get tired of some of the Apple users that claim that Apple is the best solution for everything IT related...
You have yet to refute it.
Making things easier isn't "dumbing down" the OS. Removing functionality from the OS would be, but Apple hasn't done that at all.
I also find it amazing that the Apple user base isn't insulted by this dumbing down.
What, because we're not arrogant pricks who think the "peasantry" shouldn't have access to computing because they haven't spent years learning things that are unnecessarily difficult? Dream on.
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It's not a big deal (Score:1)
We had about 10 Macintosh nodes spread out in various places on the WAN. No big problems - they were using the file/print services on Novell/NT and Outlook/Exchange for email. Most Mac people know how to survive in a mixed network just fine.
There is nothing wrong with running Macs in this environment. There is some extra software to load on the Netware box, some extra software to load on the Mac but it runs fine. There is an Novell NDS client that we used over IPX. I would bet there is an IP capable version today.
Macs have been doing TCP/IP for a long time so it's not a big deal. I will say that I was glad when we switched everybody over to IPX (this was about 3 years ago) so that I could stop routing Appletalk across the WAN.
Appletalk is a big broadcaster but so are Novell servers running IPX, print servers with default configurations and million other things.
In my current job we don't support MacOS directly, but we don't mind if they know how to plug in and get a DHCP address (which they do!)
I think too many admins make a big religious thing out it when the reality is that Macs run fine in the IP networks in use today.
Re:Coupla thoughs (Score:2)
However I'll make an exception.
First you're implying that my assertion that Mac users generally require less support & are more productive is false. If you really care to follow this up I'll do some research & find numbers to back me up. However as you're likely a fly-by-nighter I'm not going to waste time on your sneer-in-passing without some demonstration of committment as to following this up.
Regarding my recent participation in Mac-related discussions on /., yes I have been. They've come up regularly recenty, have been of general interest & and I'm clearly knowledgable in this area. It's only reasonable to expect someone conversant with these areas would post in topics related to them. While you may be fond of posting on subjects you know nothing about or have no interest in the rest of us don't.
If you cared to read some of my postings I think you'll find I'm not particularly biased pro/con Mac. Actually I find it somewhat funny your implication I'm biased pro-Mac when some Mac-folks likely consider me to be the opposite.
Rather I believe this posting was a well balenced & honest one. Aside from your quibble do you have any problem overall with my posting, do you see any signs of bias? Is there anything innacurate or unduly rah-rah?
I've also posted +5 messages on Space Shuttle activities, other Netware-related topics, corporate IS sSecurity, the French language and Computer History (non-Mac related.) When those topics again come up on /. I'll likely become involved again in those discussions, presumably indicating (in your mind) some sort of bias.
Tell me, is it possible for someone to post on something they know about & not be accused of a bias (in your view?)
Re:Coupla thoughs (Score:2)
Finally, why is your karma so precious you can only use it for things you consider sure to gain points? Isn't that a rather dishonest way of using the moderation system?
Re:Coupla thoughs (Score:2)
As to the TCO, so far pulling up lots of K-12 stuff but still trying to find numbers real-world applicable (education is so distorted a market as to be useless for comparison.)
Going a bit further afield I'll point out that I remain at a steady 50 karma by simply posting well written (or at least good enough for /.)cogent posts that express my opinions honestly. Perhaps it's the content of your messages that depreciate them & not their politics? Certianly your originial response to me was both inflammatory & not particularly useful.
AppleTalk flavors (Score:2)
AppleTalk is run on any of several mediums. Originially it ran over LocalTalk, Apple's twisted-pair low-cost networking (a marvel in it's day.)
When these networks began to grow the general "chattiness" of AppleTalk bagan to be an issue. Therefore AppleTalk Phase II was developed & the creation of "Zones". No longer was it a flat network but a series of cells between which traffic was limited.
Soon thereafter EtherTalk debuted: Unsprisingly it was AppleTalk over Ethernet. TokenTalk released around the same time was AppeTalk over Token-Net (saw that coming didn't you?)
Since then AppleTalk has been tunelled, bent folded, spindled & mutilated. There are dial-up AppleTalk services ( AppleTalk Remote Access), wireless versions and over IR links.
Several years ago AppleTalk-IP debuted. To no one's suprise it's AppleTalk over TCP/IP. Significently faster then AppleTalk "classic" it quickly proved popular with users. Along with the protocol change a change in service discovery was implemented going to from the AppleTalk-native Name Binding Protocol to the RFC 2165 Service Location Protocol.
Apple's AppleShare series of Network Services (fileserver, mailserver, listserver, printserver, account-manager, etc. all in a single Mac native easy-to-use-package) quickly became AppleShare-IP where it has had success in the K-12 & Workgroup markets.
With the release of MacOS X 10.0 AppleTalk "classic" is now depreciated in favor of AppleTalk-IP. Indeed AppleTalk "classic" is not even supported out of the box in the initial release of MacOS X 10.0. As AppleTalk-IP has been availiable since MacOS 8.5 this isn't a seen as a widespread problem except in supporting older AppleTalk "classic" printers & other network devices.
At this point AppleTalk-IP is a stable efficient network protocol. Not subject to storms or excessive traffic it's a good corporate-citizen on LANs & WANs and has brought Apple into the Internet-age. One notable use of AppleTalk-IP is Apple's "iDisk" service allowing clients to sign up for 20MB of free server space with direct access to Apple-supplied software releases, updates, promotions, etc.
Finally, I know this all reads like a sales brochure - it's not. I think AppleTalk-IP is a fine protocol & many of the complaints levied against it in the past have now been rectified. It's certianly as good as most other comparable protocols. On the other hand it is another protocol on the network & one more thing to track, support, secure, train-for, etc.
-- Michael
Who bemoans the loss of SPX/IPX as it was a great protocol for security.
Re:Coupla thoughs (Score:2)
Apparently the Gartner Group (who were the TCO-gurus) had a whitepaper but I can't find it/am not willing to pay for it. References to other papers exist but they're all in the '98 timeframe & so not particularly relevant in todays changed market. There's some stuff on K-12 but as I noted earlier that's so distorted a market as to be useless for comparison or extrapolation.
Indeed after an hour of searching I find many sites repeating this "truism" but none with the numbers or links to the numbers.
Coupla thoughs (Score:3)
There is a bias against Macs in many IS Depts. Some of it is just leftover snobbery (no command line / 1-button mouse / easy to use = not a studly OS) and some of it's frustration. MacOS has always done things differently & often idiosyncratically. It's file-structure is tough to accommodate on other OS's and it's networking, while fine amongst Mac's has generally suffered from poor non-Mac clients (Netware a case in point.)
For one thing it's difficult to manage large numbers of Macs without investing a bit of time & effort into specialized solutions. While many enterprise-management packages include some level of Mac support it's often a separate add-on, sometimes at additional cost, and generally works differently then the other parts do.
Then there's application support. While Macs do have a full range of applications they're not always completely compatible with their Wintel counterparts. MS Office for Mac is a fine product but some of it's files are subtly different from the Wintel side. There is no Access database but instead most folks use FileMaker (a product with it's own strengths & weaknesses but nonetheless a *different* product.) WordPerfect for Mac has been dropped & while Lotus does offer Notes for the Mac the client can be, well, challenging at times. MS Exchange support via the Mac Outlook client is best left for truly masochistic - it's a truly evil bit of code & you'll be better off using Exchange's web-interface.
These issues have left Mac's the odd-child out for harried IS staffers, fairly or not. The fact that Mac users tend to require less support & be more productive isn't lost on many IS people but it does get forgotten in the daily run of problems. Where Wintel is the standard anything different is often (unfairly) considered a 'problem'. Thus Mac costs & issues stand out and are an easy target, again likely not fairly.
To your own case more specifically as you've discovered there's been erratic support from Novell for Mac clients on Netware. Originally when Netware offered Mac support it was at an extra cost for the server package. Then Novell rolled NW-for-Mac into the base Netware offerings at no additional cost.
Unfortunately the Novell MacOS/Netware clients were awkward & didn't blend in well with the MacOS environment. Eventually Novell outsourced MacOS/Netware client development to Prosoft Engineering Inc. with the rationale that a Mac-dedicated company would do a better job. The up side of this was the new clients behaved like native MacOS networking clients, the down result was one now had to pay extra to ProsSoft for the clients.
Then the agreement ran out and folks were stuck with so-so drivers on an evolving MacOS (rapidly becoming less compatible) & no options from either company. Recently (March 1st) there's been a new contract signed & ProSoft has resumed development. Needless to say customers of both companies are irked. Check for details at http://www.prosofteng.com/netware_faq.asp [prosofteng.com]
In the meantime Novell has announced NW6 will support Mac's using IP natively (along with apparently every other OS) but of course that's a bit off before it's deployed widely. In the meantime it's either use ProSoft's drivers or wait for NW6.
My advice: Why do you want to be on the larger network?
Here's my take on the various services:
- File Servers: Presumably there are files you could benefit from having direct access to; for collaborating more closely with your clients if nothing else. On the other hand you've gotten along thus far without this so something is working.
- Email servers: This is a different set of issues. As I noted the Mac Outlook Exchange-client is a scurrilous thing deserving only of being burnt at the stake then the stake driven through it's author's heart (if any can be found - the heart that is.) (Do I sound like I don't like this application?) Here while it might be nice it's not worth the hell.
- Application Compatibility: Here is where you might run into some issues. Eventually the State is likely to adopt some sort of widely distributed software that willl *require* Wintel. It shouldn't happen but it does, over & over again. This is a long-term strategic problem for you & your department. At that point you'll likely run into a problem with the single-PC access point.
- Forward Migration:Apple's MacOS is undergoing fundamental changes. You'll be fine using your current OS & applications for another few years but the change is coming & it will affect you folks sooner or later. It's too soon to predict accurately but under MacOS X it appears networking will be significantly improved. The same holds true for Netware 6.0 - it promises much better Mac support. Either or both of these changes could provide opportunities to better connect your desktops to the larger network.
My suggestion would be to consider what the benefits to you & your department would be (of greater connectivity) & balance them against the costs to the overall IS architecture. If you can make a business case for certain types of services being made available do so but keep in mind you're three or so users, not a large constituency.To provide Mac support on one file server would be an administrative problem (making the server unique, requiring reevaluation of it's loads, increased filespace usage, determining if the backup systems support Mac namespaces, altering disaster-recovery plans, etc.) It might or might not be possible depending on a number of factors but its certainly not farfetched assuming there are no direct technical obstacles & the administrative will to make it happen.
To enable Mac support on *many* servers would be a very large undertaking & thus very unlikely for only a few users. I wouldn't even bother pushing for this, the cost/benefit ratio just isn't there.
The situation promises to change over the next year and the newer versions of Outlook for Mac are *almost* not completely foul but I wouldn't hold your breath or fight for this quite yet until the darn thing is actually out. In the meantime trust me, use the PC & be happy.
My solution would be to invest in Virtual PC. It performs exceedingly well considering what it's doing (running a full-PC environment in your Mac) & will allow your Macs to serve double-duty as PC desktops.
You'll be able to copy files to & from your Mac via VPC to the larger network environment & IS can treat it all as just another PC client & ignore the whole Mac-aspect of it.
Frankly it's the best of both worlds: You get your wonderful Mac desktops & all of the applications & tools you've invested in, IS gets to treat you folks as just more Wintel users and you can (within VPC) run all of the applications everyone else is without any special provisions or 'gotchas'. As you're graphics folks your Macs are likely up to snuff for running VPC reasonably already so you're 90% of the way there.
Re:Coupla thoughs (Score:2)
Re:Macs and !Mac = Problems (Score:1)
Cleartext passwords are awful. Apple does not use them in any of their current Appleshare/IP products. Appletalk has been deprecated for a while, though I would like to point out that while it is chatty and ugly, it does have its benefits. Until very recently most laserprinters had hideous tcp stacks onboard. We had one printer here that took something like 5 times as long to print a job over lpr and tcp/ip as it tooke to print over appletalk.
Your right though, OS X is much better, and a heck of a lot more stable.
Re:Macs and NetWare != convenience (Score:1)
Just do it... (Score:2)
That's what I did when the shop I worked for wouldn't allow Linux on the network. I spent my own time installing and configuring a box to support their configuration.
I'm sure that if you set the Macs up without making additional work for the IT department, they won't notice, and when they do find out, it will be much easier to argue that they won't affect anything.
Won't Be a Problem (Score:1)
Those guys haven't touched a Mac in 5 years... (Score:4)
Macs Netware is perfectly doable if everyone is willing to work together. (Unfortunately for my PowerBook, the local IT group wasn't willing). Some helpful links I found while trying to solve the problem unilaterally:
Where I would start.... (Score:1)
Macs Are Trouble (Score:1)
We use it at our school. (Score:3)
- Enabling Appletalk on Your Netware box this is ok, limited password length and cleartext authentication(ick). But its simple, and works with any mac
- Native IPX clients for MacOS This works much better, is cleaner, and faster. No real reason no to use this
We havn't had any problems with our macs speaking IPX to our netware servers.*Not a Sermon, Just a Thought
*/
Appletalk is pretty nasty (Score:2)
I worked for a while in an academic dept. where all the secretarial pool used Macs, and everybody else used Linux (or occasionally Solaris, but mostly Linux). The Macs were a constant source of problems, and quite frankly just didn't get along well with anything else on the network. (Oh god, where to begin? Having ethernet adaptors that only worked with a specific kind of switch, causing broadcast stormlets, not being able to see network shares and printers and the internet at the same time, etc. etc.)
I'm not a mac-head, but it should be possible to configure the macs to use TCP/IP instead of Appletalk. This is supported better as you increase the MacOS version number. This cured a lot of our file sharing or printing but not both at the same time problems. (Note that we were using NFS mostly, with one file server running atalkd to interact with the macs). Don't know about netware.
So basically, your admins aren't bullshitting you. Macs are a royal pain in a heterogenous network (esp. the more you stick with Apple-specific protocols, of course).
--
News for geeks in Austin: www.geekaustin.org [geekaustin.org]
Re:No way in hell (Score:1)
Well, thanks.. !
> I could make up a list of reasons why but > frankly I just don't like Apple or their > products and have no use for them.
Well then I'd like to hear som points.
I do know that AppleTalk (the built-in-one-size-fits-all-proprietary-apple-prot
But all the MacOSes from 7.x to 10 speak natively TCP/IP, so w/ a browser it makes good surfstations. Besides they look prettier..
Then, there is a NDS-client for mac (someplace), so you can authenticate and restrict user access.
AND, for the MacOS X, you can use all your favourite BSD-tools you like.
I'm looking forward to your 'list'..
Aarno
clueless IT dept (Score:4)
"MacOS being unstable, easily hacked, etc."? And they still allow Windows XX on the network? I'm not a big fan of MacOS, but...
HAHAHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHHAHAHAHAHA
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The AOL-Time Warner-Microsoft-Intel-CBS-ABC-NBC-Fox corporation:
Linux (Score:1)
Looks like you'd better forget ever using Linux on your LAN, too.
clear text passwords? (Score:1)
some thoughts on macs (Score:1)
I would also like to comment on the Mac OS stability "issue"...
My primary usage of Macs, specifically G3 and G4 systems, is running Final Cut Pro and a variety of plugins for DV editing and compositing. All are running Mac OS 9.1 and beta3 of the Quicktime 5.0 media layer. (For those interested, Mac OS 9.1 is a free upgrade from the $99 Mac OS 9... however Mac OS X sells for about $130 and includes both Mac OS 9.1 and Mac OS X on separate CDs). I routinely work with files in excess of 1 GB and often shuffle over 100 GB of data between hard drives, DLT tape, and DVD-R in a single day. My machines are constantly rendering effects and compressing video data. I have yet to experience a single crash in the past 12 months while working with these tasks. If that isn't heavy lifting for a consumer-level desktop computer, I don't know what is. Yet I do experience crashes and dying apps, indeed I do. Netscape 4.7X has died on me at least 8 times in the past 30 days, though not once has it required me to reboot the machine. I have also experienced a few total system crashes, all resulting in a total freeze or hang of the system... all happened while playing with some games or some new wizbang shareware apps. Is this "unacceptable"? I don't think so. It's a fair trade off... the machines and their OS are rock solid for pushing data around, but can't handle poorly-written applications as well as Windows or UNIX can. At least I didn't have to worry about the Internet Explorer / Outlook exploit-of-the-day awhile back.
Good luck getting your Macs on the LAN, some organizations aren't too friendly to those that don't fit the status quo. Maybe Mac OS X will make things easier... we'll know more in due time. Mac OS 9 and my video apps work too well for me to make the leap until I know if it's safe. Video work keeps food on the table for me, a major platform switch just for the sake of upgrading is not work the risk.
Macs and NetWare != convenience (Score:2)
Sometime around service pack 5, ProSoft's product stopped working for us. We really didn't notice too much because our Macs are not that active, so we were slow to respond to their reports of it not working. By the time we got service pack 6 loaded, Novell made some key changes which convinces me it's not GOING to work until ProSoft releases some more patches. Long story short, we don't have that working any more. It's been a nightmare. There is a separate IPX client, however, requiring a separate login, also from ProSoft. In the *past* it has worked fine for us, but our Mac people insisted on being able to use the chooser, so we haven't pursued it that much. But for someone that's willing to be reeducated a little, there's nothing wrong the the native Mac client.
Maybe you're not interested in accessing files on any of those servers (and from the sound of it, the state network is not about to load a 3rd party product). But if you want Internet access, that works well, most of the time. Now depending on how they have their firewall and proxy configured, there's not much more to it to get a Mac connected other than get an IP address and configure your browser for the proxy server, if there is one (you can pretty much duplicate the settings from Netscape for Windows). YMMV, but here's the quick rundown on how we have our Internet access configured. We use a proxy server and block quite a bit via our firewall (both incoming and outgoing), and track proxy/web usage via NDS username. Thus, when we configure a browser to use the BorderManager proxy server, it tries to figure out who is requesting access. With Windows, there is a nice little utility that works in conjunction with Client32, clntrust.exe, that will tell the proxy server who the logged-in user is. If that isn't loaded--it's not available for Mac--it brings the user to a secure web page and asks them to enter their NDS username and password. That's all there is to it, and it works fine. Any trouble we have is usually NDS, not Macintosh related.
Now as for the stories you get about why the powers that be don't want you to hook your Macs up: (I assume you don't have them networked at ALL?) I admit I'm no Mac expert but this is what I've heard and experienced. Appletalk is a chatty protocol, but it doesn't bring our network to a halt. I wouldn't say it's any more chatty than SAP and other IPX related traffic, so if they still use IPX, who cares? Plus, if you're speaking of a multi-site WAN, aren't there firewalls and routers that would filter some of this out? If you're using TCP/IP from the Mac exclusively to get on the Internet, the rest of the WAN won't see the Appletalk traffic.
As for MacOS being unstable or hackable, well, I find it kind of unstable too sometimes, but so is Windoze. It's really the user's concern if his machine crashes while he's using it. I *don't* think it's all that prone to being broken into. Windows machines are probably worse off in that arena. And again, so what? Don't they have firewalls from the outside world preventing this kind of thing?
As for them having a personal vendetta against Macs, well, my department and I have the same vendetta against the remaining Macs we have on campus. :-) But I bet if you have enough control to get some IP addresses (we use DHCP, which helps) and configure the machines, they probably won't even notice. Your Macs will function safely, securely, and unnoticably on their network, even if Novell is involved (not that that even makes a difference). I don't have any sort of research to prove it, but I do have similar experience to share.
Hope that helps.
"I say consider this day seized!" -Hobbes
Some Montana Specifics. (Score:3)
For the non-montanan's out there, ISD is the part of our state government who has responsiblity for running the state's phone, video, and data networks, and has broad discretionary powers over what is done state-wide. Generally, they have the power to set standards for such things as Word Processing, SpreadSheet, Email, Database, Network Operating systems, etc. Agencies are generally required to follow their lead. Or, in some cases they are allowed to go off on their own but that generally requires an act of god.
The standard desktop machine for the State of Montana is a PC Compatible of some sort. When I was there you had a choice between a Dell and I think DEC, perhaps IBM also.
It sounds like you have had compelling reason in the past to use Macs for your work. Compelling enough that the purchase was permitted. However, that can't compel ISD to permit their connection to the state network.
I suspect the real reason behind this is simple. ISD isn't funded from the General Fund (at least to the largest extent). This means that almost 100% of their revenue stream comes from the agencies they serve. In the past, this has been in the form of a per-pc "tax" on each machine connected to the network. For this you (at least 5 years ago) got the network connection and everything that went with it. This included email and everything else. The figure of $40/pc/month comes to mind but I could be off by a lot, and it might have been per year, but that figure seems too low.
In any case, let's assume they permit you to connect the Mac's to the network. Let's assume there aren't any problems and you don't yelp much if at all. Then everything is great and everything is happy.
But, let's assume you can't make them work. Who is going to be responsible. Traditionally, ISD has helped with these types of issues, but I can say that I suspect that there aren't that many (if any) Mac experts on staff.
Add to that the complication of you perhaps needing to connect to the state mainframe. They will have to support a whole new set of applications on those macs.
If you want Novell services, they will have to deal with namespace issues on the servers you are on.
If you want Email, they will have to get you some sort of Outlook client for a MAC and then figure out why it doesn't work.
And so forth and so forth.
To boil this down a bit, I suspect the real reason is that the potential hassles of having 3 Macs on the network far outweight the benefits. Note that I am NOT saying that the Macs will be a problem.
There is one last thing that I'm going to add here. I would recommend you not rock the boat too much, as what might happen is that you would end up converted to the PC world. Right now, you have it good- basically you're in the driver's seat as far as hardware and software selection. Once you end up on the PC platform, ISD makes those decisions for you.
Re:Macs and NetWare != convenience (Score:1)
Re:Huh? MacOS is "easy to hack"? (Score:1)
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With OS X... (Score:1)
There *is* something to it . . . (Score:1)
Nothing that can't be handled technically - it's (likely) some combination of the following:
Underpaid and Overworked IT staff
Far too many problems/challenges on their network without having to spend time/energy/funds
Don't underestimate that last. The time fighting any hassles getting your three Macs networked is time taken away from several hundred other pressing problems.
I've supported Macs in two different places - one the artists supported themselves, and we managed the connect to the rest of the LAN. The second, the user's managed themselves, and didn't pester us for support.
Perfectly viable (Score:2)
I set up a network that had Macintoshes talking to Novell Netware over 10 years ago, and ran it for quite some time. We used AppleTalk then, and I have no idea whether they've replaced it with TCP/IP by now (for many good reasons).
Yes, there were some issues. We had to install an AppleTalk card in a Novell server and configure it. Took me a few hours. The Win3.x machines we were running at the time couldn't deal with the Mac filenames. It put a bit of a load on the server.
For goodness' sake, you're talking about three Macs here! I think the benefits of providing those Macs email, filesharing and printer sharing across the network (yes, we shared Apple LaserWriters between Wintel and Mac machines) far outweigh a few hours' work to hook it up.
Your net admins probably know little about Macs and just don't want to put in the effort. Tell them it really isn't a big deal.