When Apple announced recently that it was discontinuing macOS Server, the move didn’t come as a huge surprise. Apple has been deprecating and removing its core services for a while, and moving others – such as Caching Service – into the macOS itself.
But let’s take a moment to say goodbye and contemplate what we will do without it.
MacOS Server has a long and storied history. It pre-dated Mac OS X by a year, launching initially in 1999. One of its cardinal features was Open Directory, which launched within Mac OS X Panther Server. It was Apple’s answer to Microsoft’s Active Directory and was a powerful solution for managing Macs, user accounts, and any settings on a Mac bound to it. It also integrated nicely with Active Directory, making it a solution for mixed Mac and Windows environments.
