MacTech Deployment Discussion/BOF/Q&A Notes
At MacTech Conference 2014 in Los Angeles, Graham Gilbert and myself conducted a discussion / birds-of-a-feather session on the broad topic of OS and software deployment for OS X and iOS. Allister...
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More about suppressing diagnostics submissions popups in OS X Yosemite
With OS X Yosemite, Apple added an additional phase to the Setup Assistant: the offer to submit diagnostics info to Apple and third-party developers, which is displayed either as part of a initial...
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Keeping your OS X VM guest tools current with Munki
I use VMware Fusion to test client software, deployment workflows, and using virtual machines allows me to frequently take and roll back snapshots. Over time, the VMware guest OS tools tend to drift...
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OS X admins: your clients are not getting background security updates
Have I got your attention? The more accurate (and longer) qualifier for this title should actually be: “admins who configure clients to not automatically check for software updates.” From recent...
View Articledarwinup, Apple’s Darwin Update utility
Yesterday in ##osx-server, Pepijn Bruienne mentioned having stumbled upon an OS X system binary he’d never seen before, which was new to me as well: darwinup. This tool is used (or was used – public...
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Security Updates leaving mach_kernel visible
In the past, there have been cases where system updates for 10.8.5 (and possibly earlier versions) leave the OS X kernel (at /mach_kernel) visible to users in the Finder. This file has since moved to...
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Experiments with AutoDMG, System Image Utility and OS version compatibility
I use AutoDMG to build restorable system images for OS X, which uses a technique similar to System Image Utility’s NetRestore: run the OS X installer on one machine, but targeted at a disk image which...
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Reclaiming inodes from Jenkins
A pet project I maintain is ci.autopkg.org, a Jenkins instance that runs all AutoPkg recipes in the autopkg/recipes repo on a schedule, and reports any cases where recipes are failing. There are...
View ArticleUpcoming conference talks for 2015
Pepijn Bruienne just posted a nice summary of the Apple administration-focused conferences coming up in 2015. I’m also happy to be a small part of several of those coming up: Anthony Reimer has...
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Adobe Creative Cloud Deployment – Overview
Adobe’s Creative Cloud licensing models add some new layers of complexity surrounding large-scale deployment in organizations. As I’ve been planning and testing our rollout in areas with managed,...
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Adobe Creative Cloud Deployment: Packaging a License File
In the previous post, we covered the scenarios in which you might want to deploy a Creative Cloud device license or serial number separate from the actual applications, as a “License File Package”....
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Adobe Creative Cloud Licensing and Deployment – Managing Licenses with Munki
Previously we covered some boring details about Adobe Creative Cloud licensing and how this impacts deploying it to managed clients. We also covered a process and script I came up with that makes it...
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Adobe Creative Cloud Deployment – Pushing Installers with Munki
We previously covered a few aspects of Adobe Creative Cloud from the perspective of deploying it to OS X clients. We spent the whole time dealing with the licensing aspects but never talked about the...
View ArticlePython For Mac Admins session resources
On June 18 and 19, I’ll be giving a talk at the MacDeploy and MacDevOpsYVR conferences, respectively in Calgary and Vancouver. The talk is a whirlwind introduction to “Python for Mac Admins” and is...
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Disabling First-run Dialogs in Office 2016 for Mac
Welcome dialog on first launch of Word 2016.This post is part useful tidbit and part lesson in interacting with application preferences on OS X. Office 2016 for Mac presents “first run” dialogs to the...
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What’s Wrong with the Office 2016 Volume License Installer?
Office 2016 for Mac comes in an installer package that has been causing several issues for Mac sysadmins deploying it in their organizations. At least a couple posts exist already for how to “fix” the...
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MacSysAdmin Tools Smörgåsbord
Theatre entrance to the Folkets Hus. CC Image courtesy of Metro Centric on Flickr. The MacSysAdmin 2015 conference is taking place this week in Göteborg, Sweden. In a session titled MacSysAdmin Tools...
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The Office for Mac 2016 Volume License Installer, Two Months Later
It is now over two months since Microsoft has made the Office for Mac 2016 Volume License installer available for customers in the VLSC (Volume Licensing Service Center) portal. I have previously...
View ArticleEasy Version Comparisons with Python
This is just a little taste of why sysadmins find Python so approachable. If you’ve managed systems for long enough, you’ve probably had a need to compare two versions of something. For example, you...
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Deploying Xcode – The Trick With Accepting License Agreements
If you’ve ever gone through the process of automating Xcode installations, you’ve no doubt run across the issue of making sure that the license for Xcode and included SDKs has been accepted. An...
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