Customer Reviews

Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server For Dummies

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(3)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(1)

 

 

This book told me everything I needed to know -- and some things that I didn't know. This book enabled me to easily create a directory and set up an email server. I thought I knew file servers and print servers, but this book showed me a bunch of techniques and features that I didn't know were there. I also used it to set up managing clients -- including Windows clients -- is something I didn't know much about.

Even installing the server -- Apple's options aren't always clear. I messed an installation and had to start from scratch, but once I followed this book to set up the server, all is now working.

Snow Leopard Server for Dummies demystifies the administration software in Mac OS X Server. The previous reviewer must be confusing this book with Snow Leopard for Dummies -- the non-server book. This book -- the server version -- doesn't have jokes or opinions. It has simple step-by-step directions and clear explanations that will get the features in Mac OS X Server quickly up and running. This book is a must have for anyone managing a Snow Leopard Server.

If you're business just decided to get Mac Servers, or you decided to get a Mac Mini server for your home, this book will surely get you started. I'm in the IT industry (mainly deal with Windows Servers), and even had a Windows Home Server (WHS)for home, but recently I've been slowly changing my business to Mac's rather than PC's, so I figured I would replace my WHS with a Mac Mini Server to start playing around with the OS. I'm not a coder, but rather deal with emerging technologies and I must say the author of this book does an amazing job at explaining things to the average user, even someone who's really new to OS X or OS X Server should have zero issues understanding the author. If your a coder, a hard-core developer, or simply enjoy technical writing, this book may not be for you.

Overall, the book is easy to follow, is designed to allow you to jump between sections without regretting having missed a chapter, and will get you started; however, the book does not go into much details, and if you already know a bit about the OS or server technologies, you will end up with a few unanswered questions, since the book touches on most matters, but doesn't dive into great details on many topics. Regardless, if you're new to OS X Server, you will not regret buying this book, and I highly suggest you do start off with this book. If you are a bit more familiar with the topic, or after you have read this book, i would suggest you look into Snow Leopard Server (Developer Reference) or Apple Training Series: Mac OS X Server Essentials v10.6: A Guide to Using and Supporting Mac OS X Server v10.6. If you're patient, you might as well wait for Beginning Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server: From Solo Install to Enterprise Integration (those of you that have read technical books, surly know Apress is by far a leader in technology books, and they do an amazing job - so it's a book I'll surly be ordering).

...anyways, good luck on your Snow Leopard Server experience and books like this one and those I've listed above will help make it fun!!

If you are trying to get Apple's Snow Leopard Server installed and running, this book will help you. It is well written and shows you it is not as easy to do as Apple's marketing would have you to believe.

This books provides you with a better top down overview of how to implement a server than Apple's documents do. This is really good for a beginner. Also, it discusses helpful third-party add-ons which Apple never does. However, what I thought was its best pieces of advice turned out to be its worse. Please totally ignore Chapter 4 Running Servers in Virtual Machines. Although they make great theoretical case for it, doing it will eat up your hard drive space at an alarming rate. That is because Parallels can not compress Mac OS X virtual machines (as of today). This means that I now have a server that should take up 20 GB as a standalone server now taking up 71 GB as a virtual server.

This is absolutely a great book for the beginner. Well written and funny in some sections. The only beef I have with this book has to do with the screen shots. Before I go now, I will like to clarify that I am using the kindle reader for iPad so I do not know if my issue affects the printed book or the hardware kindle. I find myself pulling out a magnifying glass to read the text in the screen shots and even then, 90% of the screen shots are not readable...quite frustrating when your are desperately trying to get a handle on DNS but find the example is not readable!

This was the first book I bought on my Kindle, and I really love it.

I have been running a small network here at home, with two Macs and two Windows PC's and a Mac mini as a server, but have always wanted to know more about Snow Leopard Server, to get the most out of this awesome Server-OS. I've been looking at Apples own documentation, and reading the Apple User Forums, to get more info on - for example - getting Directory Services up and running. But the info I found always managed to confuse me more than help me.

Not so with this book. Rizzo manages to explain every aspect of Server Installation, Administration and so on, in a clear, concise and easy-to-grasp manner, often with a wonderful understated sense of humor. I really like Rizzo's style, and have found lots of hints and tips I could use on my own network, plus answers to all my questions about Snow Leopard Server.

I'm a very experiences Mac-user, with a great deal of Windows Server experience too, but still did not find this "Dummies" book for dummies at all. It manages to cover both basic topics such as installation, and advanced technologies such as Virtualization, without being either too basic or too hard to understand. It's the perfect OS X Server guide and reference, at least for me.

The Kindle version is really Googled too. Granted I have only bought a couple of Kindle books, but have tried many samplers, and this book really "scales" to the Kindle very well. The Kindles dark screen does not manage to kill the ease with witch this book is read, and having it in such a compact format is really great. Amazon needs to make the Kindles screen much, much brighter, but that aside this book was the perfect fit for me - it's simply awesome and well worth the money!

Dummies books are the best, and certainly not really for dummies. It's just that they really pay attention to wording things understandably. The Mac OS X Snow Leopard Server For Dummies hits the mark to help you install and use your server.

My server installation was barely limping along and had lots of problems. I found the collection of PDF manuals from Apple hardly enlightening. So I saw recommendations and bought this book. It cleared virtually everything up for me, and is organized in such a way that it makes approaching the configuration far less imposing. It could have used some additional detail in spots, particularly in client management.

I'm a rookie server admin running a small business in the real world.
I just couldn't find the in depth information I needed in this book.
There is nothing more than surface information, no real how to's or
fixes, or for that matter verification of proper setup/operation.
To sum it up, I'm sending the book back....

The book was way to general for the topic. Author spent most of the time telling the reader what they didn't need and not enough time explaining what they did. Too many opinions and stupid jokes! I want my money back!!!