Chapter 6. Software Installation and Initial Configuration
In This Chapter
Installing Mac OS X Server
Remote interactive installation
Automatic installation
Mac OS X Server uses the same installer process as its desktop operating system sibling. In fact, Mac OS X Server is the desktop Mac OS X with some additional server software installation packages and a few minor configuration changes.
However, some very significant installation differences do exist. One involves Open Directory, the directory services infrastructure that Mac OS X Server uses to manage account records for users, groups, and computers.
A Mac OS X desktop machine manages local user accounts, which are used to log in or authenticate when remotely accessing the machine, such as for personal file sharing. However, desktop systems don't export these user records to other systems, and they don't provide external authentication for other systems; for example, you can't log in to a desktop Mac with an account created on a Mac notebook. The closest you can come to that is setting up identical accounts on both machines.
Every Mac maintains its own sense of authority in terms of user accounts unless it's bound to a directory service domain, which it then trusts to provide authorization. User accounts created on Mac OS X Server can not only provide access to file shares and local login to the server but may also be used to log in to machines bound to the domain.
Managing client login and network authentication services is a key feature ...
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