dramsey Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 I just updated to Retrospect for Workgroups. Both my wife and I are programmers, currently working out of our home, and we each run an OS X machine and have a separate OS X Server computer for project management, email, and so forth. I've been backing everything up with Retrospect 5.0 Preview and even had to perform one complete restore on my wife's machine. Everything worked beautifully. I read the Retrospect feature chart (http://www.dantz.com/index.php3?SCREEN=contact). According to this, Retrospect for Workgroups should be able to back up a single Mac OS X Server machine-- at least, that's how I interpret a dot in the row labeled "Allows backup of a local AppleShare IP or Mac OS X Server". OK, I thought-- that's exactly what I need: the ability to back up remote clients and a single server. So that's the upgrade I bought ($199). I removed the old client and installed the new one on my wife's computer and was able to activate it with no problems. But when I tried to activate the new Client on my OS X Server box, Retrospect said: "Login of a Mac OS X Server Client requires a more powerful application license code." I hope I haven't made a terrible error and will wind up having to pay a lot more money! Could some nice Dantz person explain this to me? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 The Workgroup edition will allow you to back up one "local" server and up to 20 "workstation" clients. The workgroup edition does not allow you to back up any "servers" over the network. If you need to back up servers over the network, use the "server edition". Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IrenaS Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 The Workgroup application is designed to be installed on the OS X Server computer, and back up as many as 20 clients running any Mac OS. The backup of a server *as a client* requires the Server edition. If you're using Workgroup, the OS X Server will need to be the machine that runs the backup. Best regards, Nice Dantz person (aka Irena Solomon) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chuqui Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 I'm confused about the definition of "server" here. Is it specifically an AppleShareIP or OS-X Server application system? How does the system determine what's a server? I have a situation where I have a machine that's my web server, but not a file server. I'm unclear on how you make these determinations. is it a specific application running, or what? This needs clarification. I would like to suggest, also, that the setup for the "workgroup" product is flawed. In my case, I have a server, but the backup device will not be living on that server, because I'm going to be upgrading to backing up to DVD-R, and the DVD-R will be living on my desktop machine. There are many legitimate situations where you only have one server, but the backup machine is NOT the server machine. I don't want backups to potentially impact performance of my server machine, and I don't want my backup device to be forced to be tied to the server -- in my case, the DVD-R is both a backup unit AND an authoring unit, and it's on the authoring machine, which will also do backups when I'm not doing DVD work. To be forced to upgrade to the multi-server to get this functionality isn't acceptable to me. the workgroup product should allow local backups including one server, whether or not the server is the backup unit. There are too many circumstances, especially in the market that product is aimed at (workgroup/soho) where making the assumption that backup-machine == server-machine is false. VERY especially in the SOHO universe where my backup needs are, where you don't have the money to buy dedicated hardware when it can serve multiple purposes. I'd like to ask Dantz to explicitly document how they define "server", so I know whether or not my systems are going to fall under that definition (I believe i know how they're defining it, but we shouldn't have to guess), and I'd like to ask the company to reconsider the definition of the workgroup product slightly, because I think it really hoses over the SOHO environment by making untrue assumptions. chuq Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dramsey Posted March 26, 2002 Author Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 Irena, Thanks for the reply. This kinda sucks for me (a 10+ years Retro customer), 'cause the SCSI backup tape drive is hosted on my local machine. The machine running OS X Server is a Cube...which means there's no way to attach the SCSI tape drive. As another reply notes, backups to optical media are rarely done on the server machine, so perhaps a rethink of these designs is in order. In the meantime, I s'pose I have to cough up another $150 for the Server edition. Kinda seems like overkill for just 3 computers, doesn't it? Anyway, since I've already paid the $199.95 for the Workgroup edition, how can I upgrade from _that_ to the server edition for $150? The upgrade page says that if I've already upgraded, I need to enter my "Upgrade authentication code", but I don't seem to have one of these... Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mayoff Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 You can call our customer service at 877-222-5870 and explain the situation and they will help out with the upgrade. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IrenaS Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 A "server" is defined as: 1. Any computer running Mac OS X Server operating system, or 2. Any computer running AppleShare IP. Sorry for the confusion, and thank you for your feedback. Irena Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chuqui Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 Hey, Elena -- thanks for the info. I'm still a bit confused. What part of Mac OS X server triggers Retrospect? Here's why I ask. If I understand what you're saying, my Mac OS X based web server doesn't qualify as a server. But if I installed MacOS X server, and turned off the filesharing piece and only used it as a web server, would it qualify as a server? How is it defining when it's MacOS X server, instead of MacOS X with some services? Is it the file/print piece (i.e. the serialized parts?) that it looks for? I hate to harp on this, but it seems it's still ambiguous what you mean by "server". It seems you're thinking in terms of MacOS X as a file/print server, since that's the modern equivalent to AppleshareIP, but it's perfectly possible to install MacOS X server but use it for web services, or install macOS X and turn it into a web server, and so it's still unclear to me HOW you're drawing the lines. What does Retrospect use to determine that something's a server? Obviously, it's looking at the installed machine for some indicator -- what is that indicator? Unfortunately, simply saying "MacOS X Server" doesn't answer that question. How does it tell it's MacOS X server? Is it the existance of some service? Or what? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
IrenaS Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 If it's running Mac OS X Server operating system (if "About this Mac" says you're running OS X Server), then Retrospect sees it as a server. If you don't need any of the other OS X Server features and you don't want Retrospect to consider it a server, you'd need to run OS X on it, not OS X Server. Hope this helps to clarify a bit! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chuqui Posted March 26, 2002 Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 Thanks for the clarification, Irena. Appreciate it. I still think the "one server" vs. "local server" issue needs to be addressed, but fortunately, it's not relevant to my SOHO environment, AFAIKT chuq Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dramsey Posted March 26, 2002 Author Report Share Posted March 26, 2002 "You can call our customer service at 877-222-5870 and explain the situation and they will help out with the upgrade." I'd like to, but that number has been a solid busy signal all day! I guess it's swamped with Retro OS X related stuff. I'll keep trying. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rabarlow Posted March 27, 2002 Report Share Posted March 27, 2002 I originally posted this separately, but saw it belonged in this thread. I had a similar experience to dramsay and have a similar situation: I've been a Retrospect user for years and, like many, eagerly awaited the release of 5.0. I paid my $199 to upgrade to the Workgroup edition (because I need to back up one OS X Server in addition to 4 clients), ran it on my G4 and was thrilled to see that the problems with AIT autoloaders had been fixed! Top marks to Dantz for making sure things work before shipping! However, after installing the 5.0 client on my OS X Server, then going in to configure it as a client, I got a message saying I need a more powerful version to log in an OS X Server Client. Puzzled, I went back and read the descriptions of the different versions more carefully and was dismayed to read that in order for backup of an OS X Server to work in the Workgroup version, Retrospect (and the backup device) have to run on the OS X Server! This is really inconvenient and annoying, as my server is hidden away in another room, and doesn't even have a monitor or keyboard. I do all my backups (and restores) from my desktop machine, and can't imagine that my configuration is that unusual. According to the current descriptions as I read them, I would have to spend $429.95 (and get 80 additional client licences, bringing the total licenses I'm not using to 96) just to back up my one OS X Server as a client. This seems like extreme overkill and runs contrary to what is suggested in the description of the Workgroup version, touted as the solution for a single OS X or AppleShare Server. Would it not be possible for the Workgroup version to allow the backup of a single OS X Server as either a local server OR a client? I hope so. I am not happy with the current choice between completely reorganizing my workflow and spending another $150 for a version clearly aimed at large network installations and companies. Our network serves our family and our very small home-based business (that includes reselling Retrospect BTW!). In my opinion, a $349 upgrade (or $799 new purchase) is too much for backup software for a 5-computer network. Please reassure me that this is a situation that can/will be corrected. Reni Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brendanu Posted March 27, 2002 Report Share Posted March 27, 2002 Um, thanks for the phone number, but I'm located in Australia and don't even know that I can dial international from the organisation I work in. And I don't know whether you're seeing the point of the problem. Most don't want to upgrade to something that was really part of a previous version of the product - ie. being able to backup an OS X Server. When I purchased the upgrade, I went through the questionnaire and it said that the 'Workgroup' edition was the one for me - ie. I need to backup only one OS X Server. It wasn't clear that the 'Workgroup' edition needed to be installed on the server itself. Now a great deal of your clients backup from a remote machine to reduce load on their servers, reduce the threat of crashes with previous versions of Retro and for in some cases, because their servers won't run their backup devices (ie. we have a G4 Cube as our server, but the backup device is a SCSI DDS3 Autoloader which is currently only being recognised under OS 9 anyway). As you can appreciate, finding (or purchasing) another machine that will take the SCSI backup device and reconfiguring the server for this one thing is out of the question at this point. I think it's about time that Dantz review their policy for the 'Workgroup' edition as many will be without backup of critical data tonight and until Dantz change their stance. Currently myself and many other loyal Retrospect users are not happy, with I suspect many more to come as they decide to upgrade to v5.0. Brendan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jlg Posted March 27, 2002 Report Share Posted March 27, 2002 I bought the workgroup edition yesterday, installed it on our Mac OS 9 backup host, and upgraded the client on our Mac OS X Server, W2K Server, and WNT4 Server, and didn't get any complaints from Retrospect that I needed a different license code. I can back up the MOSXS host from the Mac OS 9 host using the workgroup version of Retrospect 5. Is this not supposed to work? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SteveW928 Posted March 29, 2002 Report Share Posted March 29, 2002 As I mentioned in another post, this really needs to be addressed. Almost no-one would ever put retrospect and the tape drive ON the server... so basically, your workgroup version is just Desktop with 20 clients, and allows users no way to back-up a single file server. Which kind of blows the whole analogy of a 'workgroup'. Also, not so much with the Mac OS, but with Windows, it is quite common for a 'workgroup' to have several 'Server' OS'ed machines just running things like web, db, etc. servers, and not actually be the 'file server'. (say a 5 person network with a file server, a db server and a web server. 8 machines, but would need the 'server' edition for this scenerio. It would greatly simplify things, if you just changed it to only backing up 1 full server (local or remote), and only data directories on any other 'client' machine, whether it be a server or workstation. -Steve Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
brendanu Posted April 2, 2002 Report Share Posted April 2, 2002 Has Dantz had any thoughts about changing the policy of the Workgroup edition of the Retro software with regard to some of the issues raised in this discussion thread. There seem to be many people caught out by this policy of only allowing the 'Workgroup' software to run off of the server when many have previously run from a seperate backup machine for many reasons (reliability of server services, no I/O support for backup device on server). Is Dantz at all considering a change? Thanks Brendan Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
chrisa Posted July 3, 2002 Report Share Posted July 3, 2002 i have to 2nd that the arrangement is poorly done. i am at a small non-profit where we have also been retrospect users since the get-go. not only has service diminished horrendously over all in the past year, but this situation with forcing home and small office users to buy your top-end product just to back up a couple machines that include their web server (without compromising the efficiency of their web server) is plain selfish. booo! we also upgraded with the understanding that workgroup backs up one server amongst its 20 clients. now i can't say if the clarification was just added to the site or if i somehow missed it all when doing my research, but i was quite surpised to have retrospect tell me last night (we just finished setting up our new server) that i needed to upgrade my brand new product in order to do the only thing that i'd upgraded to 5.0 for in the first place. heck at least 4.3 let me have more clients (5.0 has determined my "older" 4.2 (and expensive) client pack is "too old" to recognize) and supported appletalk clients to boot. we can't afford to upgrade...$200 already seemed ridiculously pricey for a 4.3-> 5.0 upgrade and was a reach for our budget. now i have to trade it in (assuming you'll let us) for a more expensive product? thanks alot. chris Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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