WWDC Tidbits: iDisk iPhone App, No ZFS Support in Snow Leopard Server?

[MacRumors]

In the wake of yesterday's big announcements from Apple's Worldwide Developers Conference, several smaller items of interest have managed to fly under the radar.

- iDisk iPhone Application: Apple's "More Features" pages for the iPhone 3G and 3GS contain a section entitled "iPhone and MobileMe", which highlights several iPhone-related features for customers of Apple's MobileMe service. In addition to the "Find My iPhone" feature previewed during the keynote, Apple is also prominently featuring a forthcoming iDisk application that will allow users to easily access files stored on their iDisk from their iPhone.

The free iDisk app lets you view files on your iDisk right on your iPhone. Microsoft Office or iWork '09 documents, PDFs, video files, and more are viewable in landscape or portrait. Even access Public folders of other MobileMe members with a few taps.

The free application also allows for easy sharing of files with others.

With the iDisk app -- free on the App Store -- you can share files that are too big to email. Choose your recipients and iDisk sends an email with a link to download your files.

- No ZFS Support in Snow Leopard Server?: Apple's interest in Sun's ZFS file system as a possible replacement for OS X's current HFS+ file system has been an item of interest for several years, with rumors even suggesting that ZFS would be the default file system for OS X Leopard. While that change did not come to fruition, Apple has continued to signal its interest in ZFS and has long mentioned ZFS support as a feature of Snow Leopard Server. Apple, however, has now removed mention of ZFS from its revamped Mac OS X Server Snow Leopard specs page and makes no mention of it on its new OS X Server File System page.

Article Link: WWDC Tidbits: iDisk iPhone App, No ZFS Support in Snow Leopard Server?

 

[Morod]

We don't need no stinkin' ZFS support!

 

[vassillios]

Cool, except iDisk doesn't exist on the app store...at least it didn't an hour ago when I saw this on apple.com

 

[bbeers]

Cool, except iDisk doesn't exist on the app store...at least it didn't an hour ago when I saw this on apple.com

it will be release along side of iPhone Software 3.0

 

[auburnfan24]

Cool, except iDisk doesn't exist on the app store...at least it didn't an hour ago when I saw this on apple.com

read fine print "application to be released alongside 3.0 firmware."

is this only to be used with mobileme?

 

[BornAgainMac]

Is ZFS finished as far as anyone implementing it as a main filesystem? It sounds like vaporware to me. BeOS was suppose to have a filesystem that was all the rave and it disappeared too.

iDisk makes much more sense compared to having to email yourself documents as attachments to view them on your iPhone.

 

[scottishwildcat]

We don't need no stinkin' ZFS support!

Well, not if we want to stay stuck in the last century with our Mac filesystems, anyway... I wonder if they're waiting to see how ZFS fares from the Sun/Oracle merger.

 

[Sky Blue]

iDisk app looks good. Looking forward to that one.

 

[mrtune]

As a mobileme customer, I'm looking forward to the idisk app. It would be so much better than simply attaching files and emailing myself so I can have access to those files on the phone.

 

[WhySoSerious]

I'm am definetely loving all this MobileMe integration! Keep it coming!!!!

 

[ifjake]

my guess is Apple is considering using ZFS (or some other highly modern file system) throughout it's entire OS line, and not just the server version, thus it is saving that change for the next major OS release after Snow Leopard. maybe.

 

[overcast]

Is ZFS finished as far as anyone implementing it as a main filesystem? It sounds like vaporware to me. BeOS was suppose to have a filesystem that was all the rave and it disappeared too.

Are you kidding, Solaris and Opensolaris use it even on the boot partition. I've built many large scale implementation with 100's of terabytes. The Large Hadron Collider project uses ZFS for its filesystem and volume management. Nothing else supports that amount of data in a filesystem.

 

[Drumjim85]

I'm am definetely loving all this MobileMe integration! Keep it coming!!!!

it's nice, but i still don't see it being worth $99

 

[xyz01]

Is ZFS finished as far as anyone implementing it as a main filesystem? It sounds like vaporware to me. BeOS was suppose to have a filesystem that was all the rave and it disappeared too.

iDisk makes much more sense compared to having to email yourself documents as attachments to view them on your iPhone.

Yes, ZFS has been in production use on Solaris for a couple of years now. It's also available on some BSDs. There are some implementations for Linux, but license issues keep it from being a viable main file system for the time being.

 

[Brien]

my guess is Apple is considering using ZFS (or some other highly modern file system) throughout it's entire OS line, and not just the server version, thus it is saving that change for the next major OS release after Snow Leopard. maybe.

With the new Marble UI pushed back, it does look like 10.7 could be one hell of an upgrade.

 

[zombitronic]

It's hard to vote positive or negative on this article. iDisk is cool but no ZFS is not. We've already got a short thread started about the lack of ZFS read/write support. (Oracle? Boot problems?) Should these threads be merged?

 

[stagi]

im happy they released some mobile me features!

 

[ricosuave]

The iDisk app is very similar to this one http://itunes.apple.com/WebObjects/MZStore.woa/wa/viewSoftware?id=304673686&mt=8

I managed to grab it when it was free.

 

[Morky]

I wonder if oracle's aquisition of Sun could have anything to do with it.

 

[twoodcc]

looking forward to iDisk on my iPhone.

but no ZFS? i was really looking forward to that

 

[kironin]

iDisk, meh, don't need it.

use app "Files Lite" to have up to 200 MB on phone for free and
SpiperOak.com to share up to 2GB free with anyone I choose.

great tech and if you need what the paid versions do, certainly worth it.

 

[Mr.damien]

Are you kidding, Solaris and Opensolaris use it even on the boot partition. I've built many large scale implementation with 100's of terabytes. The Large Hadron Collider project uses ZFS for its filesystem and volume management. Nothing else supports that amount of data in a filesystem.

JFS2 from AIX support that and you can even shrink a filesystem. ZFS can't ...

 

[OriginalMacRat]

Are you kidding, Solaris and Opensolaris use it even on the boot partition. I've built many large scale implementation with 100's of terabytes. The Large Hadron Collider project uses ZFS for its filesystem and volume management. Nothing else supports that amount of data in a filesystem.

And Sun products require a pricey support contract so Sun engineers can custom tweak on site as Sun products rarely "just work" right out of the box.

 

[RyanFromQA]

Ah well that bites. Not that it will impact me much. I'm still waiting for the county to upgrade my school's XServe to Leopard.

 

[SpinThis!]

I've built many large scale implementation with 100's of terabytes. The Large Hadron Collider project uses ZFS for its filesystem and volume management. Nothing else supports that amount of data in a filesystem.

But does the average Mac user 1) need that much storage and 2) know how to set it up? Until Apple works out a way or GUI that's brain dead simple, I wouldn't expect to see ZFS support any time soon.

I'd be interested in hearing from some ordinary Solaris admins who've used it on a daily basis and get their thoughts on it. ZFS has a lot of potential but it's certainly not without problems, especially on other OSes. Everything I've read seems like ZFS is still not quite ready for prime yet and seeing as Apple just dropped it from the supported features list gives this theory even more credibility.

Apple may not be advertising this as a feature but may be including it for geeks to fiddle with (read command line, unsupported).