• Microsoft Exchange Server,  Windows Server

    Exchange Server 2010 PowerShell Mailbox Exports

    Need to export mailboxes from Exchange? Hate using exmerge to do so. Gone are the days of exmerge. Well, not entirely. But welcome to the days of New-MailboxExportRequest. Much longer and cooler command than exmerge ever thought about being. C:\>New-MailboxExportRequest -Mailbox cedge -FilePath \\kryptedexchange.krypted.com\pst\cedge.pst You then receive confirmation that the export has been queued: Name Mailbox Status ---- ------- ------ MailboxExport https://krypted.com//Users/cedge... Queued To view the status, swap New with Get (Get-MailboxExportRequest): Get-MailboxExportRequest The output is as follows: Name Mailbox Status ---- ------- ------ MailboxExport https://krypted.com//Users/cedge... InProgress To get even more info, use the -Name option with Get-MailboxExportRequest, identifying the actual process name. Get-MailboxExportRequest -Name MailboxExport | fl The output…

  • Mac OS X,  Mac Security,  Mass Deployment

    Restoring the Default Gatekeeper Database

    As I’ve mentioned previously, spctl is the command line tool to manage signing for Gatekeeper. This file edits the information stored in /var/db/SystemPolicy. Regrettably, this information can become corrupted (like all information in a database. And when it does, Apple has done us a favor by making a hidden default database with this information in the same directory, called .SystemPolicy-default. To restore the default database, we just copy it over the top of the old one. Here, we’ll rename the old one first: mv /var/db/SystemPolicy /var/db/SystemPolicyOLD And then we’ll copy the defaults to make it the production database: cp /var/db/.SystemPolicy-default /var/db/SystemPolicy Then reboot and you should be good to go.

  • Mac OS X,  Mass Deployment

    FaceTime Failing In OS X Mavericks 10.9 With “The server encountered an error verifying registration”

    After updating to Mavericks (OS X 10.9) I’ve seen a few instances where “The server encountered an error verifying registration” errors appear when trying to open FaceTime after an upgrade. I think this comes down to the GUID/username entry for the Accounts not matching the AuthID in ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.ids.service.com.apple.madrid.plist file. It seems as though the accounts that work have a consistent entry here and those that don’t have random or missing information. If some of the keys are filled in and the Status for each alias is 3 it doesn’t appear to try and connect again. The easiest and quickest way to fix this for me has been to delete the…

  • Mac OS X

    Repair Permissions From The Command Line

    I’ve long been a supporter of building tools in self service portals such as those provided by JAMF and Munki to provide users who don’t have administrative permissions to perform tasks that wouldn’t typically otherwise be destructive. One such example is a simple repair permissions. An administrator can simply open Disk Utility, select their disk and then click Repair Disk Permissions But if you want to do this as a user who doesn’t have administrative privileges you would need to elevate your privileges before doing so. In a larger environment this would be incredibly annoying for dozens, hundreds, thousands or even tens of thousands of users to bring their computer…

  • Mac OS X,  Mass Deployment

    Debugging and Deploying iBooks

    Just got to do my first troubleshooting for the iBooks app in OS X. Wasn’t a ton of info, so went digging for the debug menu that has become a staple of so many Apple apps. And it turns out that it was there. Looking at the plist for iBooksX prefs: defaults read com.apple.iBooksX This shows that we can go ahead and deploy a key to suppress the welcome screen (nice little deployment note made there) and a few other things. But what I was looking for is that BKShowDebugMenu key { BKAlreadyDisplayedWelcomeExperience = 1; "BKBookshelfCategoryManager~012384" = 1; BKBookshelfViewControllerFilterAction = 5; BKBookshelfViewControllerSortAction = 1; BKShowDebugMenu = 0; BKSimulateCrashDuringMigration = 0;…

  • Wearable Technology

    Table Comparing FitBits, Nike+, FuelBand and Jawbone Up

    As many of you may have noticed, I’ve been number needing the time I spend running, walking, sleeping and pretty much anything else at this point. As such, I’ve been testing a lot of little devices that help me track such things. So when it comes to personal fitness tracking, I wanted to write up an article comparing all these devices to answer a common question I get: which one is the best? The problem with that question is that some of us value certain features more or less than others. So I took a stab at putting those features into a table. If you think of anything I missed…

  • Mac OS X,  Mac OS X Server,  Mass Deployment

    Command Line Finder Tags

    Neat. So you can associate a file with a tag by dragging it into the appropriate TAGS section of a sidebar. You can tag a file while you’re saving it. You can also Tags are kept in Extended Attributes. In com.apple.metadata:_kMDItemUserTags to be exact. xattr /Users/krypted/Desktop/Test.pdf The output of xattr with no options is as follows: com.apple.FinderInfo com.apple.metadata:_kMDItemUserTags com.apple.quarantine Or use -l to get a more detailed output: xattr -l /Users/krypted/Desktop/Test.pdf The output of which would include the tag: com.apple.FinderInfo: 00000000  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 1C 00 00 00 00 00 00  |................| 00000010  00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00 00…

  • Mac OS X,  Mac Security

    View Power Consuming Apps In Mavericks

    Mavericks allows you to look at power hungry apps, so you can keep track of what’s draining your batter. To do so, click no the battery icon in the menu bar and then look in the Apps Using Significant Energy section. If you’re concerned about an aggregate of apps using too much energy, hold down the option key when you click on the icon. When you do so, the Condition will be listed; hopefully as Normal.

  • Mac OS X,  Mass Deployment

    Mavericks & Show Hidden Files

    I noticed this because part of my postflight imaging task for my lab systems is to show all files, but in Mavericks, the com.apple.finder defaults domain is case sensitive. So if you have com.apple.Finder you’ll need to edit it in such a workflow. So, for example, if you need to see hidden files, use the following commands: defaults write com.apple.finder AppleShowAllFiles -boolean true killall Finder The problem with seeing hidden files is that you see a lot of stuff that you really probably don’t want to see. So to get back to a state where you don’t have to see all of the invisible files, use the following commands: defaults…