People often ask me if I think Apple is a company that knows how to make a good server. My answer is usually a little longer than what those people probably had in mind. Tim Berners-Lee wrote the first web server in 1989 on a computer running the NeXTSTEP operating system. At the time, NeXTSTEP was a fledgling, Unix-like operating system that was in many ways a by-product of Steve Jobs leaving Apple in 1985. When Steve Jobs returned to Apple, he brought the Unix-like operating system (then known as OpenStep) with him. Over the course of the following decade, NeXTSTEP replaced the Apple operating system, ultimately becoming Mac OS X and Mac OS X Server.

The operating system that has evolved into Mac OS X hosted the first web server, but much has changed since 1989. Sure, Mac OS X Server still has a web server, although now it runs Apache. And Apache is one of the hundreds of open source products now built into Mac OS X Server. Mac OS X Server can now manage thousands of client computers using Open Directory and Profile Manager. Over the years, Mac OS X Server has been a file server, a podcasting server, a video streaming server, and an imaging server for Mac OS X client computers. Basically, Mac OS X Server can do most anything that administrators might want a server to do.

Mac OS X Server has now been Apple’s server operating system for over 10 years. During this time, the server has undergone many changes. Out of the box, Mac OS X Server is an easy to use product that appeals to nontraditional server administrators. Once marketed as “open source made easy,” the product has continued to get increasingly simple to use while still allowing for administrators to hack together their own solutions as Berners-Lee did in 1989.

If you’re considering a Mac OS X server for your small business, school, nonprofit, or home network, this easy-to-follow guide will help you get up and running in no time. You’ll learn how to share files, mail, and calendar information on your desktops, iPads, iPhones, and other devices, whether you’re new to Mac OS X servers or need to update your skills for the Lion edition.

Discover how to configure your network to include multiple operating systems—including Mac, iOS, and Windows—and set up servers for wikis, websites, and podcasts with relative ease.

• Plan your installation to make sure you have the right server hardware
• Control data access with permissions, and use Apple’s Time Machine to back up your network
• Share contacts, schedules, and instant messaging with groupware
• Manage wikis, blogs, and websites with Lion’s web service
• Build an email server and protect it against spam and malware
• Handle preferences for the network’s Apple computers and iOS devices
• Deploy new Apple computers to the network with disk imaging