Setting up OS X Server has never been easier. Neither has upgrading OS X Server. In this article, we’ll look at upgrading a Mac from OS X 10.8 running Server 2 to OS X 10.9 (Mavericks) running Server 3. The first thing you should do is clone your system. The second thing you should do is make sure you have a good backup. The third thing you should do is make sure you can swap back to the clone should you need to do so and that your data will remain functional on the backup. Once you’re sure that you have a fallback plan, let’s get started by downloading OS…
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Promote A Replica To A Master In Mavericks Server
You’ve got Open Directory running and humming beautifully in Mavericks Server (Server 10.9). You show up to work and the hard drive has died on that perfectly configured Open Directory Master. Luckily, you have a replica and you have an archive of your Master. You can restore or you can promote your Replica to a Master. What to do? Well, I can’t tell you what you should do, but I can tell you that Apple has planned for this. Here, we’re going to look at promoting that Replica to a Master. Because after all, hard drives fail. Let’s look at what all this looks like. Create An Open Directory Archive…
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Using Profile Manager 3 In Mavericks Server
Profile Manager first appeared in OS X Lion Server as the Apple-provided tool for managing Apple devices, including Mobile Device Management (MDM) for iOS based devices as well as Profile management for OS X based computers, including MacBooks, MacBook Airs, Mac Minis, Mac Pros and iMacs running Mac OS X 10.7 and up. In OS X Mountain Lion, Apple added a number of new features to Profile Manager and revved the software to Profile Manager 2.0, most notably adding the ability to push certain types of apps to mobile devices. In Mavericks Server (Server 3), Apple provides new options and streamlines a bunch of things, most notably App Store and…
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New Startup Profiles In OS X 10.9 Mavericks Profiles Command
I wrote an article on using the profiles command awhile back, available at https://krypted.com//mac-security/profile-manager-and-profiles/. There is a nifty new feature in the profiles command in Mavericks, where you can configure profiles to install at the next boot, rather than immediately. Use the -s to define a startup profile and take note that if it fails, the profile will attempt to install at each subsequent reboot until installed. To use the command, simply add a -s then the -F for the profile and the -f to automatically confirm, as follows (and I like to throw in a -v usually for good measure): profiles -s -F /Profiles/SuperAwesome.mobileconfig -f -v And that’s it. Nice…
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Setup the DNS Service in OS X Mavericks Server
Under the hood, OS X Server has a number of substantial changes; however, at first the Server app (Server 3) appears to have had very few changes. The changes in the Server app were far more substantial in the Mountain Lion version of OS X Server. All of the options from Mountain Lion are still there and using the new command line interface for managing the service, there are far more options than ever before. The DNS service in OS X Server, as with previous versions, is based on bind 9 (BIND 9.9.2-P2 to be exact). This is very much compatible with practically every DNS server in the world, including…
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Managing DNS Services From the Command Line in Mavericks Server
DNS is DNS. And named is named. Except in OS X Server. The configuration files for the DNS services in OS X Server are stored in /Library/Server/named. This represents a faux root of named configuration data, similar to how that configuration data is stored in /var/named on most other platforms. Having the data in /Library/Server/ makes it more portable across systems. Traditionally, you would edit this configuration data by simply editing the configuration files, and that’s absolutely still an option. In Mavericks Server (Server 3), a new command is available at /Applications/Server.app/Contents/ServerRoot/System/Library/PrivateFrameworks/DNSManager.framework called dnsconfig. The dnsconfig command appears simple at first. However, the options available are actually far more complicated…
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Ender’s Game
Insert My 14 Year Old Sci-Fi Nerd Love Here
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OS X & Recent Servers
Click on your Apple, then click on Servers. Here, you’ll see a list of the recent servers you’ve logged into. Now open a Connect to Server dialog (Command-K) and then click the disclosure triangle for the recent servers. There are two different values here. How’s that possible? Well, the first list mirrors the ~/Library/com.apple.NetAuthAgent.plist contents. To view the contents use defaults to read the domain: defaults read com.apple.NetAuthAgent Which shows the following information, mirroring the list shown in the first screenshot (Servers under the Recent Items list of the Apple menu): { PreviouslySelectedShares = { "10.1.1.6" = ( "_JOBS1" ); "192.168.210.175" = ( Desktop ); "192.168.55.2" = ( 318SERVER, "Disk Images"…
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Connect to Currently Logged In User Using ARD
When you’re kickstarting ARD/Screen Sharing, you might notice times when you are asked if you want to connect to the local logged in user or to a new session, which shows the login window. In most cases, I want to connect to the console user, or that locally logged in user. To go right there, instead of seeing the OS X login window, you can use the defaults command to write a VNCAlwaysStartOnConsole key (boolean, true) into com.apple.RemoteManagement.plist in /Library/Preferences, as follows: defaults write /Library/Preferences/com.apple.RemoteManagement VNCAlwaysStartOnConsole -bool true The newer features here are pretty cool and really nice to have, but I’ve now added this to a lot of my…
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PCU