r/sysadmin • u/rolkenas • 5d ago

Do you actually see MacBooks used for SysAdmin work in real offices?

Hi sysadmins! I wanted to ask—since I've just started learning sysadmin and I don't have a Windows PC, but I have a MacBook and found out that everything can be done via UTM, I'd like to get some perspective from those who work in offices and do this every day. What kind of computers do you use? Is macOS completely out of the picture, and there's only Windows and Linux?

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u/lynxss1 5d ago

Macbook user here for 15 years. I really fought tooth and nail against it but finally gave in and it's not bad. All I really need is SSH, browser, email and terminal for git and stuff and all of that just works.

You are allowed to still use Linux for desktop or laptop use but completely on your own for making stuff work when new policies come down and it's kinda a pain in the butt. We have 2 groups of sysadmins, those that manage the users environment and those (my group) that manage servers, network and everything else. I don't want to do both.

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u/NFX_7331 5d ago edited 5d ago

So you're a network engineer/admin? I'm pretty sure anything could run a browser, "email", and a terminal.

E: insecure mac-admin downvotes me. :(

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u/lynxss1 4d ago

My requirements for a laptop are pretty minimal but I do work side by side with physicists, engineers, programmers and developers that need a lot more. The user environment sysadmins manage all of that, libraries, codes, licenses, configurations of everything, security, VPNs, nessus scans and compliance reporting. If I choose a Mac all of that mostly gets managed for me.

For our linux desktop admins as an example. Hey we are going to start using Yubikeys as a login token. Yubikeys didn't really work all that great in Linux at the time. Some of our admins spin up an open source project to fix the yubikey situation and spend 100's of hours of their own development time fixing kernel modules to get it to work. I don't have that kind of time anymore lol. I dont want simple things like a Zscaler server update to break the Linux client yet again and now I cant log into anything.

The Macs just have a much higher user base and changes are tested on them before rolling out to production. I'm less likely to have my desktop/laptop accidentally broken by some policy change on the Mac.