Program Sharing in OS X

[PixelSmith]

Hi All,

Quick question: how do you go about program sharing in OS X? Probably a dumb question, but I can't seem to find anything on this in the sharing section of system preferences like there was in OS 9...

I need to allow Mac workstations in our studio to access an Excel spreadsheet to update workflow progress details - the sheet is kept on the management Mac which is the only machine that has Excel. The other workstations are for artworking and imposition so I'd rather they just link in a terminal like fashion to the management Mac rather than being loaded wth more software.

Any Suggestions?

Cheers

Pixel

 

[Doctor Q]

The one choice you do not have is to legally let many people use one copy of Excel at once.

In general, you have a number of choices for letting people view the spreadsheet:

* You can purchase and distribute copies of Excel (or all of MS Office) to the other machines (the most expensive choice).

* You can use remote control software to allow any Mac to "take over" the management Mac and run Excel on it, one person at a time.

* You can distribute a free Excel-file viewer to the other Macs, so they can open the file but not edit it.

* You can save all Excel files on the management Mac in a "public" format, such as PDF files, which any other Mac can open over the network. This type of process can be automated.

* You can distribute a low-cost spreadsheet application that can read Excel files.

If you want people to edit the spreadsheet, that limits your choices:

* You can purchase and distribute copies of Excel (or all of MS Office) to the other machines (the most expensive choice).

* You can use remote control software to allow any Mac to "take over" the management Mac and run Excel on it, one person at a time.

* You can distribute a low-cost spreadsheet application that can read/edit/write Excel files.

* You can use a low-cost spreadsheet program instead of Excel.

* You can have the other Macs prepare data to be imported to Excel in, say, tab-delimited format, and have only the management Mac process that data.

Do any of those choices suit your purposes?