A colleague of mine at my university has negotiated space on a university server for moodle, but I am told that it's a MacOS server. Is this going to work???
Hi there
I've been looking for info on running Moodle on a Mac Server too. I found a Wikki that says don't use OSX as it has performance issues and IO blocking issues. Addmittedly the post in the wikki was dated some time in 2004 and I know computing moves on quite rapidly. I also found the instructions for how to install it.
Has anyone put it on Mac OS 10.3.9, does it have performance issues or is the info I found now out of date.
Thanks
I've been looking for info on running Moodle on a Mac Server too. I found a Wikki that says don't use OSX as it has performance issues and IO blocking issues. Addmittedly the post in the wikki was dated some time in 2004 and I know computing moves on quite rapidly. I also found the instructions for how to install it.
Has anyone put it on Mac OS 10.3.9, does it have performance issues or is the info I found now out of date.
Thanks
Hi Heather,
Yes, many people use OS X as a Moodle server. Was this the installation hints you found?... http://moodle.org/mod/resource/view.php?id=3858
I have one server using 10.3.9 and hope to upgrade to 10.4 soon--no problem with the small groups I use it with. Linux is faster because it does not have the GUI overhead that OS X does--I estimate that it could be a 20% overhead. So if the best speed is what you want and you can dig into Unix commands well, go for it. Mac OS X client version is for "the rest of us" who like to point and click to set up a server (90% GUI + a few editing config files). Your speed will also naturally depend on the speed/memory of the Mac you use and the size/load of the class(s) you have using it. If you post that information, I can comment on how well you can expect an OS X server to handle it. Cheers!
Yes, many people use OS X as a Moodle server. Was this the installation hints you found?... http://moodle.org/mod/resource/view.php?id=3858
I have one server using 10.3.9 and hope to upgrade to 10.4 soon--no problem with the small groups I use it with. Linux is faster because it does not have the GUI overhead that OS X does--I estimate that it could be a 20% overhead. So if the best speed is what you want and you can dig into Unix commands well, go for it. Mac OS X client version is for "the rest of us" who like to point and click to set up a server (90% GUI + a few editing config files). Your speed will also naturally depend on the speed/memory of the Mac you use and the size/load of the class(s) you have using it. If you post that information, I can comment on how well you can expect an OS X server to handle it. Cheers!
Hi Don
yes those were one of the install information sets I found.
Unfortunately I am not a big Mac user so it is all a bit new to me but I am reliably informed that we are using Panther 10.3.x. This is run direct from a G5 not a Xserver unit. The G5 is Dual 2 GHz with 512 DDR.
Not sure what the bit about G5 means yet, I'll go away and look it up. In terms of intended class size. Assuming we don't allow remote access then the max class size will be about 40 mac users. If we do allow access then we are onto the how long is a piece of string type of answer, but I think we will cross that bridge when we get there
A thought that just occured to me if I have moodle on a mac server will I be able to access the moodle from a pc. I know I can do it the other way round, just wondered.
Thanks. 
Oh, Heather, you have a very good situation. I can only dream of a G5, dual2.0ghz. 
In my case, I used a G4, single967mhz, 768mbRAM--about one third the power you have. I could handle up to 60 simultaneous users, up to 40 before slowing somewhat. You will be able to handle well over 100 simultaneous users and perhaps 1000+ intermittant users (accessing not at same time). The one thing you must do is raise the DDR memory. I recommend 2GB DDR, but you might get by with 1GB. Your present 512mb is just enough to run the OS alone. Servers love memory, so the more you give it, the happier they are.
It does not matter whether PCs or Macs will access your Moodle. All of them can. They all use an internet browser (IE, Firefox, Safari, Mozilla) to view your Moodle site.
In my case, I used a G4, single967mhz, 768mbRAM--about one third the power you have. I could handle up to 60 simultaneous users, up to 40 before slowing somewhat. You will be able to handle well over 100 simultaneous users and perhaps 1000+ intermittant users (accessing not at same time). The one thing you must do is raise the DDR memory. I recommend 2GB DDR, but you might get by with 1GB. Your present 512mb is just enough to run the OS alone. Servers love memory, so the more you give it, the happier they are.
It does not matter whether PCs or Macs will access your Moodle. All of them can. They all use an internet browser (IE, Firefox, Safari, Mozilla) to view your Moodle site.
Hi there
many thanks for your help. It is very reassuring to know that what we are trying to do is not actually going to cause more problems than it solves before we start doing it!
Again, many thanks
Heather
Of course! Check out the detailed install instructions--Mac OS X is perhaps the easiest way to install Moodle. Do a search of forums for Mac OS X and you will find lots of discussions.
i have an installation of moodle in Mac os X server (www.itivolta.pa.it/elearning)
it's same as any Linux. Only attempt to path of installation (tipically (User/Library/....)
Sorry for my English!
Salvo
it's same as any Linux. Only attempt to path of installation (tipically (User/Library/....)
Sorry for my English!
Salvo
This seems to be an old forum but as it is the only one I can find relating to Mac OS server I thought I'd give it a try. Where do I locate the moodle folder on the server and how do I access the install.php page? I've already installed moodle on my Powerbook and I used the 127.0.0.1/~admin/moodle/install.php protocol to access the set up but this does not work on the server. I'm using Mac OS X Server 10.2.8 and I think I've set up Apache/MySql/php correctly but now I am totally lost.
Any ideas?
Any ideas?
We're running moodle on a MacOS X server (mind that's OS X server and not regular OS X).
MySQL comes with OS X server as does PHP 4.x. However it didn't seem to have GD precompiled so I got PHP 4.3.10 from entropy.ch
Make sure you use the OS X gui admin tools for changing the PHP module in the web server. If you try the usual UNIX way of editing httpd.conf you'll be frustrated because OS server puts its module includes in a different file. I banged my head on this one for a while until I used the gui admin tools.
MySQL comes with OS X server as does PHP 4.x. However it didn't seem to have GD precompiled so I got PHP 4.3.10 from entropy.ch
Make sure you use the OS X gui admin tools for changing the PHP module in the web server. If you try the usual UNIX way of editing httpd.conf you'll be frustrated because OS server puts its module includes in a different file. I banged my head on this one for a while until I used the gui admin tools.