Adobe Audit custom report missing from resource kit?

Hi Ben,

That was broken (learnt the hard way).
I have worked with Jamf and Adobe to created a report.
I have a documented the process. I will have to edit it first then post it here probably by Monday (if I can find some time).

Cem

Thanks Cem.

But sadly that is not giving any results :(

as I have said , you will need the list from Adobe. so you keep those unsuppressed. Then run it...

I know this is a pretty old post, so sorry for digging it up, but Cem, were you able to pull your audit report in a csv format? Were you able to add certain fields to display?

I ask because, as you probably guessed, we're going through an Adobe audit right now, and following what you outlined doesn't allow me to meet Adobe's criteria for this. For instance, they want to see the application path in addition to the version, and if possible the executable size and I need to include a unique identifier field for each Mac (I'm using the JSS ID for this) I can only do all of the above when using a Advanced Application search, and if I do that I can't include multiple search criteria. Just one app at a time.

This is incredibly frustrating because the JSS seems so terribly limited in how one can use the Application inventory search. Why there isn't a way to add multiple Application Name > Like > sections is a puzzle to me. It obviously works since I can add them in the main Application search with the spaces between each, But trying the same under Advanced yields nothing.
And using the plain old Application search field I can't add those display fields in my result, so I can't get things like the installation path and bundle size. The inventory Display options have no way to customize the Application search. It just uses the computer display fields, amazingly.
Arrgg!! Come on JAMF! Give us some better options here. (I can't wait for Casper Suite 9 and really hope reporting gets beefed up majorly, because right now its kind of lame) Its a bit of a black eye for us on the Mac side here. Our SCCM team was able to generate a report for them in days and its taking me weeks because I have to create an individual report for each application Adobe supplied us with and merge them all at the end. Makes us the laughing stock here because we can't do this more efficiently.

Sorry for ranting and ragging on JAMF as I really don't like doing that, but I just can't help but feel the whole reporting aspect has not gotten the attention it deserves. Again, really hoping 9 brings some much needed enhancements here. Unfortunately it will come too late for me with this audit.

@mm2270 i share the pain :)
I suggest do this on your lab environment. Just upload the latest db to your test JSS. In Settings go to Inventory Display Preferences and select / unselect as desired. BTW you can be creative with the paths to show using extension attribute perhaps.
Then when you do the • First Suppress Application titles from reports in JSS Casper Console:
• Go to settings => Inventory Options => Suppress Application
• Select all Applications and deselect Adobe Mac executable/apps from the list (supplied by Adobe, sorry I don't feel comfortable to post it here)
• Then go to Inventory => Applications
• Search these words with spaces between them. That will bring the result:
Adobe Acrobat Bridge Dreamweaver Extension Flash Freehand Illustrator Indesign VersionCue

the result will appear in html format. Select All then copy & paste in to Excel

NOTE: try adding cs6 to the search criteria to add the cs6 item and compare if anything Adobe related additional items pop up...

I hope this helps a bit?

I don't have access to my JSS right now, but I'm pretty sure you can get the application path
by enabling "Application Details" in the Inventory Collection Preferences.

I am running 8.6 and only shows "Application Collection" and under it "Manage Search Paths for Applications..." . If it is selected it shows as below:
Search Path /Applications/ (Built-in)

Also gives you an option to add new path.

@Cem and @Chris - regarding the application path, its a built in function, but you can only display it when using the Advanced Search under Inventory => Applications. The Application Details in inventory collection actually adds extra stuff like the bundle size, company info, copyright, etc. Even with that off, application path is still an option to display, but, its not currently possible to add that as a default column in the Inventory Display Preferences. For the regular (not Advanced) Application search, its default display preferences just uses the one that a regular Computer search uses. It doesn't have it own, which is where my frustration comes in. in essence, the "Computers" link in Inventory is the big cheese and every other link across the top is second rate, with far far less features and functionality.

I had thought about using Extension Attributes, but it seems impossible, since its not just one app I'm looking to report on, but potentially dozens. I would have to create an EA for every Adobe app I'd want to report on and then include each column in the resulting report, which is totally unfeasible.

Bottom line is, there is no easy answer here. I'd really like to see some better ways of doing things like software audits. Right now they are painful.

Edit: Thank you both for the suggestions though.

Ah, my bad, sorry for the confusion.

I guess using Adobe's own audit tool isn't an option for you?

@ Chris, link?

We received it from Adobe via email, not sure if i may distribute it...
It's called "Adobe Lister 2009", maybe your Adobe rep can hook you up with that.

Thanks I'll ask.

@ Chris. Adobe Lister appears to be a tool that requires the end user to run. Is that the case?

See http://itd.utc.edu/adobeaudit2013.php

There is an Info.plist inside the .app-bundle that you can use to configure how the tool acts.
You can make it run silently and have it upload the resulting file to a network share, or save it somewhere on the machine from where you can collect it later.
You should be able to configure it, deploy it to your clients and execute the app or binary via a script, loginhook, launchdaemon, whatever...

Thanks Chris. That sounds a bit more useful.

Ugh, we're being audited too. Adobe sent us a list of apps as an XML file, and a separate XSLT file to run against each client individually. According to the instructions they sent, it's supposed to come up with a neat little list of executables, but with a command like ```
xsltproc keywords.xslt keywords.xml | while read LINE; do echo "Searching for '$LINE'..."; find / -type d -name "$LINE"; done
```, I don't see how.

We're getting a ton of garbage, such as:

Searching for 'Acrobat'...
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Acrobat Distiller.app
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Acrobat Distiller.app/Contents/MacOS/SelfHealFiles/Help/APP_Adobe/Help/de_DE/Acrobat Pro
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Acrobat Distiller.app/Contents/MacOS/SelfHealFiles/Help/APP_Adobe/Help/en_US/Acrobat Pro
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Acrobat Distiller.app/Contents/MacOS/SelfHealFiles/Help/APP_Adobe/Help/fr_FR/Acrobat Pro
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Acrobat Uninstaller.app
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Adobe Acrobat Pro.app
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Adobe Acrobat Pro.app/Contents/Frameworks/Acrobat.framework
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Adobe Acrobat Pro.app/Contents/MacOS/SelfHealFiles/Help/APP_Adobe/Help/de_DE/Acrobat Pro
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Adobe Acrobat Pro.app/Contents/MacOS/SelfHealFiles/Help/APP_Adobe/Help/en_US/Acrobat Pro
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Adobe Acrobat Pro.app/Contents/MacOS/SelfHealFiles/Help/APP_Adobe/Help/fr_FR/Acrobat Pro
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Adobe Acrobat Pro.app/Contents/MacOS/Updater/Adobe Acrobat Updater Helper.app
/Applications/Adobe Acrobat 9 Pro/Adobe Acrobat Pro.app/Contents/MacOS/Updater/Adobe Acrobat Updater.app
/Applications/Adobe Reader.app/Contents/Frameworks/Acrobat.framework

I'll be pushing for this Adobe Lister app if I can..