Tag: Munki

Working around failed Apple software updates with Munki

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For at least a year MacAdmins have been dealing with Apple security updates failing if they are not installed soon after being downloaded. This is especially apparent to Munki admins who have Managed Software Center (MSC) configured to install Apple updates. Munki will invoke softwareupdate to download updates as soon as they are detected but users can defer the installation via MSC indefinitely by default.

If enough time has passed when the user finally decides to allow the logout / reboot for the update it will silently fail. The computer will reboot and the user will find themselves at the login window thinking the update completed successfully. However an hour or so later softwareupdate will again detect the update, download it and MSC will prompt the user to logout and install the same update they think they had just installed.

This is not a great user experience and has led to some frustration here at the newspaper. I’ve written a script that works around this behavior, read on if you are interested in the details.

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Deploying Photo Mechanic 5 with Munki

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Photo Mechanic 5Photo Mechanic (PM) has long been the software of choice for photojournalists worldwide. It has unrivaled speed for downloading, sorting and captioning images on deadline. I have been using PM for almost 17 years and it is an essential part in the workflow of our photographers here at the newspaper.

As our staff has grown so has the need to automate installations of software. In the past we simply emailed the registration information for PM to staff as needed. Of course this is an awful practice in regards to securing our paid licenses.

Thankfully we can programmatically activate and deactivate Photo Mechanic when employees install or uninstall the program via Managed Software Center (MSC). Read on for the details.

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Registering DetectX Swift with a Munki NoPkg

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During a discussion in the #detectx channel of the MacAdmins Slack yesterday AP Orlebeke pointed out that when registering a DetectX Swift (DTXS) Pro or Management license via the command line it is only applied for users that already exist on the system. DetectX Swift will be in an unregistered state for any users created later.

In the ensuing discussion I opined that: “It would be trivial to whip up a Munki on-demand NoPkg that triggers the command line registration as root if the user ever got in a situation where they were using the DetectX GUI and were unregistered.”

DetectX developer Phil Stokes asked if I’d be willing to create an example so I did just that. Read on for the details.

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Coordinating Adobe Creative Cloud updates with Munki

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We need to tightly control the version of InDesign (ID) and InCopy (IC) in use here at the newspaper. As such we disable the Apps Panel within the Creative Cloud Desktop Application (CCDA) and exclusively use Munki to install Adobe Creative Cloud applications.

Yesterday we transitioned from InDesign CC 2014 to CC 2019 in a single day and I wanted to share the details in case it might be useful to others. Read on if you are interested in how we did it.

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Dear Adobe: version numbers should go up!

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When Adobe released their November 19 update to InDesign CC 2019 last week, they broke the most important rule of version numbering: the version should go up!

This wasn’t immediately obvious until today however due to an almost two week delay in the update becoming available to package in the Adobe Admin Console. This alone is a topic for another post…

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Upgrade from Microsoft Remote Desktop for Mac 8 to 10 using Munki

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Microsoft Remote Desktop 10

The upgrade of Microsoft Remote Desktop (MRD) from version 8 to version 10 also involves a change in delivery for many MacAdmins from the Mac App Store (MAS) to a standard package installer.

Since a few extra considerations are involved I decided to share how I accomplished it using Munki. Read on if you are interested in the details.

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On Demand DetectX Swift scanning with a Munki NoPkg

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Another component to my DetectX Swift (DTXS) Management License rollout this week is the ability for users to run a scan and have the results be sent to MunkiReport immediately. This could be useful anytime I don’t have easy access to a user’s computer and am having to walk them through things over the phone or via Slack and I want to verify the results of the scan remotely.

I accomplished this with an on demand Munki NoPkg that any standard user can easily run via Managed Software Center. Read on for the details.

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Hourly DetectX Swift scans and MunkiReport

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This week I began rolling out DetectX Swift (DTXS) with a Management License across our fleet. I first learned of DTXS earlier this year thanks to Zack McCauley and his DetectX Module for MunkiReport.

McCauley covers one option for automatic scans in his excellent Deploying DetectX Swift with Munki article using Outset and a boot-every script. He also helpfully included a sample LaunchDaemon in the module repo, however neither scans as frequently as I’d like. Read on for how I decided to handle automatic hourly scans and reporting.

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A hybrid approach to managing Microsoft Office updates

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Most MacAdmins take an either/or approach to managing updates for Microsoft Office on macOS, utilizing either Microsoft AutoUpdate (MAU) or Munki. However I’ve found that a hybrid approach using both works best for us.

I’ve shared my setup severals times on the MacAdmins Slack, most recently in a direct message, so I wanted to provide more details here. Read on if you are interested in how I’m keeping Office up-to-date and providing for new installs.

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Automating installation and configuration of SSD Fan Control

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This year we started seeing a problem with the hard drives failing inside our 2009, 2010 and 2011 iMacs here at the newspaper. The computers still work fine otherwise and since it is pretty easy to replace them (it can easily be accomplished in under ten minutes without removing the display) that is what we’ve been doing.

The only downside is that the OEM hard drives ship with specific Apple firmware that ties into the thermal management system. Installing a new hard drive or SSD results in the fans running at full blast. Thankfully software exists to work around this and I automated the installation and configuration with Munki, read on to see how.

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