Author: Andrew

  • Windows 10 Upgrades Over

    Today marks my first failed attempt to upgrade an activated Windows 8.1 Pro system to Windows 10 Pro. Microsoft recently announced that free upgrade paths from older versions of Windows would end with older software keys no longer activating Windows 10 installations. I tested this today with a VirtualBox running Windows 8.1 Pro that I…

  • Microsoft Windows® from the Apple Store

    If an individual bought an Apple computer in the 90’s then kept their field of view inwards toward Apple only what operating systems would they encounter? Obviously there’s System Finder, System 7, Mac OS, Mac OS X, OS X, and macOS. There are then the servers with AU/X, Mac OS X Server, and then there’s…

  • End of NetInstall on macOS Sonoma 14.4

    With improvements to Parallels Desktop 19.3 I found myself ready to transition more of my Macintosh Rescue services to Apple Silicon so yesterday decided to virtualise my NetInstall service which was hosted on a Mac mini (2018) with an i7 processor. When macOS Sonoma was released I noticed that on the bootpd manpage the NAME…

  • Goodbye Mac OS 9

    On Monday, May 6, 2002 Steve Jobs said farewell to a dear friend of the Macintosh world: Mac OS 9. Today Saturday, April 1, 2023 Macintosh Rescue does the same, but the legacy will live on. Up until now I have proudly hosted a network that supports present day Mac’s and all the way back…

  • Apple & Andrew: State Of The Union

    It’s coming up for WWDC 2022 and Tim Cook has “exciting things” including the State Of The Union. Here is the state of my Union with Apple: I deeply regret the decision I made that brought me into the world of computing as an Apple user. Many years ago I purchased a discounted iMac G5…

  • Jitsi Meet (Not on Oracle Cloud Infrastructure Free Tier)

    This evening was very sad for me. I’ve been using an authenticated Jitsi Meet service running on cloud hosted virtual machines. I have had success running with a few users on a Nanode available from Linode.com , but decided to reduce costs by moving to Oracle Cloud Infrastructure and using a VM in the Free…

  • The End of macOS Server (from Monterey)

    Another announcement has been made by Apple positively entitled “the future of macOS Server”; which of course is Apple speak for “destroying macOS Server”. As of April 21, 2022, Apple has discontinued macOS Server. Although existing customers can still keep running the final version (5.12.2), but this will not work beyond macOS Monterey. This means…

  • The Demise of Parallels Desktop for Mac

    There was once a product that allowed a Mac to run a massive variety of x86 and x86-64 operating systems harmlessly; It was called Parallels Desktop. Over the years Parallels enhanced the functionality of their product with the subscription only Parallels Desktop Pro which introduced powerful (although incomplete) command line tools, and the ability to…

  • Another Basic Qualification (Red Hat Enterprise Linux)

    Not much to shout about. Simply having little money prevents me from studying at the level I want to. At least I’m sort of qualified to operate my home server which took a lot more setting up with Red Hat Enterprise Linux than that course could prepare a user for.

  • Apple made me PC

    I’ve been using exclusively Macintosh computers for many years and have almost forgotten what a PC is. Mac’s are a form of Personal Computer (PC) but are rarely referred to in that way. It all started with macOS Server which was not and still isn’t a particularly reliable product. I persisted with macOS Server because…