Mac OS X Server—save your money

My ongoing efforts to get a new web server up and running have only reinforced my feeling that Mac OS X Server (Leopard) is waste of money—standard Mac OS X is probably a better choice for many users. I’m feeling cranky after wasting hours tracking down yet another Mac OS X server bug. Grrr...

The goal is to have a high performing web server that can offer single-sign-on password-based content, including a subscription service and “live” access to Pro Reviews with automagic integration with Paypal. Among other things, it means I can offer more content that eats bandwidth (eg higher-resolution images, RAW files, etc), and I can offer lower cost and less extensive articles efficiently, something I cannot do today, having to manually respond to every purchase.

This research has been eating up considerable time for the past month or so—perhaps 60 hours, including studying several thousands pages of technical manuals. I’ve ruled out the lame PHP-based commercial solutions, which take a flippant attitude towards security—I simply won’t go any route that has security risks to diglloyd.com or its users. I have settled on a solution and I will have it in place over the next few months. Unfortunately this means reduced photographic content until I’ve over the hump, but you can also amuse yourself reading past content or any of my Pro Reviews.