Apple didn’t devote any time in Monday’s keynote to it, but Lion Server will be available on the Mac App Store, when Lion ships in July, for £35.
There’s one caveat, however. You’ll need Snow Leopard Server in order to install Lion Server. And in order to install Snow Leopard Server, you need to be running Mac OS X Server 10.4 or 105. Snow Leopard Server costs £417 from Apple.
The other way to get Snow Leopard Server is to buy a Mac mini or Mac Pro with it pre-installed. Those machines currently command a hefty premium over their desktop OS counterparts. Given Lion Server’s much lower price, it’s possible that the premium for the Mac mini and Mac Pro servers will be significantly less. All of which is a round about way of saying that if you’re planning on buying either a Mac mini or Mac Pro server, it will be worth waiting until July to find out.
Among the features in Lion Server is a new Server app which acts as a set-up assistant and guides you through the configuration process. Profile Manager allows you to set-up and remotely manage Macs running Lion and iOS devices. It’s integrated with Apple’s Push Notification system so it sends out updated configurations over the air, and can be controlled from a web brower.
There are also new versions of Wiki Server, iCal Server, and Mail Server. Lion Server enables file sharing for the iPad, using WebDAV. It also includes an Xsan Admin app for hosting and configuration Xsan (Apple’s storage area network over fibre channel protocol) volumes.
