Composer 8.6 ahhh another bug!

[tkimpton]

I have had to revert to using the last known good Composer 8.51!

Composer 8.6 has a flaw to make unflattened pkgs to install to the top level of the disk.

For example iWork 09 preinstalled software pkg creates

/ROOt
/Snapshots
/Settings

Etc etc and even does this point and click manually installing the pkg!

This is a Major Major flaw and this has happened to me about a dozen times now.

Please can you guys stop messing with Composer and just keep it at 8.51! I use this every single day and I have to go through this pain every time a new release happens.

[jarednichols]

Did you rename your package before building it? Curious if the same bug in Composer 8.52 is still there as the symptoms sund the same. Rename your package, then quit and relaunch Composer before building it. If it then works, it's the same bug.

[jake]

Hi Tim -

Sorry to hear about the troubles with Composer 8.6. As Jared mentioned, Composer 8.52 did have a defect that sounds very similar. This was addressed with our latest release. We did some testing internally and unfortunately are not able to reproduce the symptoms stated above.

Our testing was done with the iWork 09 preinstalled software template on 10.8 using both flat and non-flat pkgs. We also renamed the source before creating the pkgs but were not able to reproduce the issue.

Can you please first confirm you are using 8.6 and then provide some specifics on how to recreate this issue? We would be happy to take a look and hopefully get this fixed if it is a defect. We would love for everyone to be using Composer 8.6 to take advantage of the ability to sign packages and download the latest manifests from JAMF Nation.

Thanks!

[tkimpton]

OS=10.6.8

Composer=8.6

Reproduce with = iWork'09 preinstalled and I can reproduce with anything!

Description = Same bug as Composer 8.52. If rename (good practice for version control!) the pkg before building it in Composer then when installing, instead of installing properly, items will install on the top level of the disk.

/Root
/Settings
/Snapshots
/Scripts

Workaround = Before building the pkg quit Composer and open it again.

Problem with workaround = As best practice my account isn't an admin account and so I have to re-authenticate again as an admin account.

Considering I use Composer on avererage 20 times a day, this is a real pain.

Outcome = Bug in 8.52 isn't fixed. I am thinking my machines are managed correctly but they are not because the desired items are not installing properly!

[jake]

Thanks for the details Tim. This is not a reproducible issue in our labs on 10.6, 10.7 or 10.8.

Your account manager will be in touch with you shortly and we will get this worked out.

Thanks!

[mm2270]

FWIW, I just ran a test with Composer 8.6 on 10.7.4 using the Pre-Installed manifest for Firefox and I don't see this issue at all. I renamed the Source after capture to Firefox 14.0.1, built both a PKG and DMG and both install files in the proper place, or I should say, the PKG installs fine and I assume the DMG one does based on the fact that when I mount it I see

/Applications
/Library
/Users

as the folders inside it. So I have to assume it would install fine when run through a Casper Suite policy.

I did not quit and relaunch Composer after renaming it. As far as I can see the bug from 8.5.x is fixed in this release.

I don't doubt what you're seeing tkimpton, but I'm not sure why you'd be seeing that behavior. Hopefully your JAMF rep can get it worked out for you.

[Matt]

This problem is still here for me too.

I hate having to quit and reopen Composer in order to get it to work :(

[#8]

I've just gotten in the habit of building in Composer, quitting it, renaming the .dmg and then adding that to Admin. Saves a step.

[bentoms · Accepted solution]

@ Tim & Matt,

What if you redowload the Casper Suite.dmg to a mac that has never had composer installed? Does it work then?

[mm2270]

I was thinking you should redownload it again too, but somehow I don't think that's the reason. I've run lots of versions of Composer on this Mac, which is now running v 8.6 with no issues.

Another thought, Tim, you mentioned using a non-admin account earlier. Have you tested this when using Composer under an admin level account? I'm wondering if something about that is causing your issue. Maybe its attempting to write to some location that it still doesn't have proper access to, despite you authenticating.

[tkimpton]

its strange cant reproduce it now. only thing is it must have been from corrupt sources created using the dodgy 8.52.

[fritz_schlapbac]

I had the same problem several times with different packages on different systems and with Composer 8.52 and 8.6.

My workaround is to import every package again in Composer after creating it and convert it to source to check if there is a ROOT folder in it. If yes I move everything of the ROOT folder out to to the real root of the package and delete the other folders (/Root, /Settings, /Snapshots, /Scripts). Then create the package again. This solved the problem every time.