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

    iOS 9.3 Update Now Available

    iOS 9.3 is out, with lots of new, cool features. For a list of them: With this update your iPhone, iPad and iPod touch gain improvements to Notes, News, Health, Apple Music and a new feature called Night Shift that may even help you get a better night’s sleep by shifting the colors in your display to the warmer end of the spectrum at night. New features, improvements, and bug fixes include: Night Shift When enabled, Night Shift uses your iOS device’s clock and geolocation to determine when it’s sunset in your location, then it automatically shifts the colors in your display to the warmer end of the spectrum and may even help you get a better night’s sleep. Notes improvements Protect notes…

  • Mac OS X,  Mass Deployment

    Manage Recent Places In OS X

    There are two defaults keys that can be used to manage the recent places options in the OS X Finder. Both are in the .GlobalPreferences. The first is NSNavRecentPlaces and the second is NSNavRecentPlacesLimit. The NSNavRecentPlacesLimit key limits the number of items that are stored in the list. To increase the default to, let’s say, 20, use the defaults command to set the NSNavRecentPlacesLimit key to an integer of 20: defaults write .GlobalPreferences NSNavRecentPlacesLimit -int 20 Then use defaults to read the setting: defaults read NSNavRecentPlacesLimit You’ll need to “killall Finder” in order to see this in a Finder Save dialog. You can also inject items into the RecentPlaces array, called NSNavRecentPlaces, or delete…

  • iPhone,  JAMF,  Mass Deployment

    AppConfig.org, A Standardization Community For MDMs

    When building an MDM, you look for a lot of workflows to make the lives of end users easier. One of those is Managed App Config, which is a technology from Apple that allows an MDM to inject information into an app when the app is sent to a device. Because all apps are different, it’s up to the application developer to build in support both for the feature itself, as well as for any variables they’d like to make possible for an MDM to send to an app. For example, an app might make server and username available, so that when a user opens the app, they need only…

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

    My 16 Mac Security Advances Article On TechCrunch

    Ever since the kids from Silicon Valley went to TechCrunch, I’ve been thinking that at some point I’d want to put a piece there. Luckily, I recently got the chance. Today, 16 Apple Security Advances To Take Note Of In 2016 went up on TechCrunch. You can access the article here. The original article actually listed the year that each was introduced in order. It was a lot of work to go back in time and piece the timeline together, so since the years didn’t make it through editorial, I list them here (not that anyone actually cares): 2002: Managed Preferences 2003: FileVault 2004: Require all software installers that need system resources…

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

    IT Administrator’s Guide For OS X Now Available On Lynda.com

    It can be tough to get information about larger Mac deployments. I’ve written a few books on it. Apple has built some pages on it. But many prefer to consume their content through video. As such, Sean Collins has teamed up with Lynda.com to put together an IT Administrator’s Guide for El Capitan. With topics ranging from SIP to DEP, and all the acronyms in the middle, Sean’s soothing voice will guide you through what you need to get started with a new Mac deployment. Many a job can seem daunting, but with this latest addition to our arsenal, you’ll instantly feel less intimidated. It’s like the Sun A of…

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

    Securely Erase Freespace and Volumes In OS X Without Disk Utility

    One of the options thats a tad bit hidden in OS X is the Secure Erase option, which runs a multi-pass erase on a volume. Additionally, there’s no option to Secure Erase free space on a volume. But you can still securely erase whatever you’d like (other than you boot volume obviously), when needed. To do so, use the diskutil command along with the secureErase option. The format of the command to secureErase freespace is: diskutil secureErase freespace [level] [device] The levels are as follows (per the man page as not all of these are specified in Disk Utility): Single-pass zero-fill erase Single-pass random-fill erase US DoD 7-pass secure erase…