by , 8:30 AM EDT, August 7th, 2003
Terra Soft Solutions, an authorized Apple Value Added Reseller, has been awarded a contract for 260 Apple Xserves by United States Navy contractor Lockheed Martin. The Xserves will not be running Apple's OS X, however; Terra Soft will instead ship the Xserves with its Yellow Dog Linux operating system. As an article at The Register notes, Terra Soft is the only Apple distributor licensed to sell Macs with anything other than OS X preinstalled. Lockheed Martin will be using the Xserves with the AltiVec optimized PPC Linux distribution as a platform to run a sonar imaging system for the US Navy. From Terra Soft:
Terra Soft Solutions, Inc., leading developer of integrated PowerPC Linux solutions, has been awarded the contract to fulfill a unique sonar imaging system for the United States Navy through defense contractor Lockheed Martin.
As an Apple Proprietary Solutions Provider and developer of the Yellow Dog Linux for PowerPC, Terra Soft Solutions provides a unique, integrated turn-key solution to Lockheed Martin which meets the Navy's requirements for form-factor, density, performance, and use of Linux.
Since March, Terra Soft has provided software engineering and support services which include device driver enhancements, kernel development, tuned firmware allowing serial (RS-232) port-based control; performance testing, and management of third party engineering and systems integration.
Terra Soft will provide support and development services to the Lockheed Martin engineering staff on the units provided under this contract.
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The full 260 units recently ordered by Lockheed Martin will be delivered by the close of October 2003. This marks the largest Apple VAR Xserve sale to date.
You can read more about the sale from Terra Soft Solutions. C|Net and The Register are also carrying the story.
Though most of those reading this think of the Mac as the software that runs a Mac, Apple is first and foremost a hardware company, a fact that is oft forgotten. With Apple fighting to gain traction in the server and corporate space, any sale that gets that Apple hardware installed is absolutely a Good Thing�.
Of course, 260 Xserves is also a drop in the bucket in the grand scheme of things. HP, Dell, and IBM sell as many high-end servers in a day, but Apple at this point is fighting for mind share and any kind of presence they can possibly get. The battle for a significant place in this market will be years in the making, and again, this sale to the US Navy is a significant step forward for the company. Hopefully this will open more doors for the company and Mac hardware, and perhaps even the Mac platform.
If it just makes room for more Yellow Dog installations, however, that too is a Good Thing�. Our opinion is that the Mac benefits the bigger Linux gets. In this battle for mind share, we think that Windows becomes less of "The Only Choice" when the Mac is an alternative, as opposed being the only alternative.
After covering things like Windows bringing a US destroyer to its knees, it's a pleasure to bring you this story.