> For 10-1000 servers that aren't all identical, I prefer Windows because of things like Active Directory, GPOs, DSC, etc...
I run over 1000 Windows boxes and AD/GPOs are terrible. GPOs are spaghetti by design. There are no concepts of infrastructure as code with these tools, and they're quickly becoming liabilities at any scale. There aren't any real ways of making repeatable and reversible changes so these infrastructures via code.
Broaden your horizons a bit and you'll notice these are not the way.
Using Chef on top to manage DSC is the only thing that allows me to keep my sanity, and the more config I pull out of GPO and AD the happier everyone becomes, and the safer all of our systems are. Windows is terrible because it's too heavyweight and too opaque. It is the opposite of an agile choice of operating system.
I run over 1000 Windows boxes and AD/GPOs are terrible. GPOs are spaghetti by design. There are no concepts of infrastructure as code with these tools, and they're quickly becoming liabilities at any scale. There aren't any real ways of making repeatable and reversible changes so these infrastructures via code. Broaden your horizons a bit and you'll notice these are not the way.
Using Chef on top to manage DSC is the only thing that allows me to keep my sanity, and the more config I pull out of GPO and AD the happier everyone becomes, and the safer all of our systems are. Windows is terrible because it's too heavyweight and too opaque. It is the opposite of an agile choice of operating system.