Author: alanysiu
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Unloading Santa’s system extension when uninstalling using Munki
What the problem is System extensions in place of kernel extensions For macOS 10.15+, Apple has deprecated kernel extensions in favor of system extensions, but system extensions can’t be unloaded silently by script. If you try to unload Santa’s system extension using the command: systemextensionsctl uninstall EQHXZ8M8AV com.google.santa.daemon you’ll get this: At this time, this…
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Known Networks settings moved in Big Sur
In earlier (10.15 and lower) versions of macOS, Apple put the list of known networks in the /Library/Preferences/SystemConfiguration/com.apple.airport.preferences.plist file. In Big Sur (macOS 11.x), Apple moved the known networks to the /Library/Preferences/com.apple.wifi.known-networks.plist file.
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Firmware passwords of all kinds disabled for Silicon-chip Macs
I knew that firmware locks sent via MDM command didn’t work on the new Silicon-chip Macs, but I didn’t realize that the manual setting of a firmware password was also disabled (makes sense, since the two are probably linked in terms of how they’re implemented or the firmware mechanisms they use). If you try to…
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Managing macOS Notification Center settings using a Jamf profile
There’s a feature request called Add support for new Notification Settings payloads for Catalina, originally created 19 August, 2019 and currently marked as partially implemented in Jamf Pro 10.19.0, the details being Starting in Jamf Pro 10.19.0, admins may automatically whitelist notifications in macOS Catalina for the Jamf Management Framework and Self Service application bundle..…
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Semi-automating profile installation in Big Sur
It’s pretty well known among Mac admins that, starting with Big Sur (macOS 11), Apple has removed the ability for the profiles command to silently install .mobileconfig profiles. Apple wants you to use an MDM to deliver profiles silently… or have users themselves manually install profiles. If you try to install them silently the old…
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If you can log in and use sudo but can’t unlock Sys Pref prefpanes in Big Sur
I and at least one other person on the MacAdmins Slack saw situations in which a known working password (can log into the computer, can use sudo to escalate privileges in the terminal) on an admin account is not working in System Preferences to unlock a prefpane. Special thanks to owen on the MacAdmins Slack…
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Rolling back versions in Munki and using blocking applications arrays
Downgrading software in Munki can be a bit tricky. One of the tricks you can use is to remove the higher version number from your Munki repo, and replace an .app bundle–based installs array with a binary-based one. So, after removing the higher version from your repo, replacing the lower version’s pkginfo with something like…
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Munki can get into a notification loop if root is using the Persian calendar
The Problem At some point, this blog post may be obsolete, because I’m hoping this will be fixed soon, but in the meantime, I’ve filed an issue on GitHub: Using Persian calendar results in notification loop at every next Munki run If you have users who claim to see notifications multiple times a day, even…
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Installing Rosetta 2 on M1 Apple Silicon Macs (why checks matter)
Actual guides This isn’t really a guide to how to install Rosetta 2. There are already much better guides for those: Rich Trouton’s Installing Rosetta 2 on Apple Silicon Macs Graham Gilbert’s Installing Rosetta 2 on Apple Silicon Macs Rich Trouton’s blog post has some checks to make sure the Mac is running at least…
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How to check the Carbon Black version installed
Update Thanks to Clay Haynes for pointing out you can get the version more easily by running /Applications/VMware\ Carbon\ Black\ EDR.app/Contents/MacOS/CbOsxSensorService -v Back story In Carbon Black 6.3.0 and 7.0.1, it isn’t super obvious how to check for the version installed. For example, if you run defaults read /Applications/VMware\ Carbon\ Black\ EDR.app/Contents/Info.plist, you’ll see CFBundleInfoDictionaryVersion…
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Scripting changing user icons: dsimport prompts for password in zsh
2 June, 2021 Update Special shoutout to Armin Briegel for pointing out that the zsh version runs just fine if you use a different variable name from USERNAME. I’ve tried it with USERACCOUNT instead, and I’ve confirmed it works fine with zsh. Original Post Apple is moving toward making zsh the default shell instead of…
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Using installinstallmacos.py to get beta installers
Usually, if you use installinstallmacos.py, you’ll get the already-released installers: # ProductID Version Build Post Date Title 1 001-15219 10.15.5 19F2200 2020-06-15 macOS Catalina 2 001-04366 10.15.4 19E2269 2020-05-04 macOS Catalina 3 061-86291 10.15.3 19D2064 2020-03-23 macOS Catalina 4 041-91758 10.13.6 17G66 2019-10-19 macOS High Sierra 5 001-57224 10.15.7 19H4 2020-10-27 macOS Catalina 6 061-26589…
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Updates to the AutoPkgReviewAndRun.py script
3.5 years ago, I created a script to automate running AutoPkg recipes while also verifying trust info and prompting the user to approve or deny any changes. With some prompting from some folks on the #autopkg channel of the MacAdmins Slack, I made a few changes to the script: You can now run the script…
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Fix for VirtualBox Extension Pack postinstall script hanging in Munki
The problem If you’ve been running the VirtualBoxExtPack.munki.recipe AutoPkg recipe, and you’ve noticed the VirtualBox Extension Pack postinstall script in Munki hanging indefinitely (30 minutes and beyond), it’s because the license hash has changed. The fix According to @jessepeterson (the maintainer of that AutoPkg recipe), the license hash doesn’t change very often, but it did…
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Allowing Outset-run scripts to have access to user folders
Because of TCC/PPPC, which Apple introduced in macOS 10.14, scripts and applications have to ask for permissions to do certain things, especially things like reading user home directory files. If you have an Outset login script that tries to access something in the home directory, you may find in the ~/Library/Logs/outset.log that you get a…