CS4 Install

I hate answering questions with questions - but this is very close to On Mar 14, 2009, at 11:27 AM, Michael Curtis wrote:
the topic at hand so I thought I would keep it in the same thread.

Has anyone here on the Casper list actually created a successful Adobe Creative Suite 4 (any version) package with Composer? I've been googling the last couple of days, and checking a few of my other mailing lists, and it doesn't sound like there has been success yet. I know it was mentioned in January that someone used the Adobe Deployment Toolkit, but I find that piece of software unacceptable (and I've let Adobe know!).

Does anyone have a workflow they can share for installing Adobe CS4 with success using Casper/Composer that doesn't involve the deployment toolkit?

Thanks,

-- Ted August
Salve Regina University

I have got Adobe CS4 working as a Self Service Policy (which means I can deploy it by any other means as well).

I copied everything off of the DVDs (individually for each app) to "/ Library/Application Support/UWSP/" and then used the Adobe Deployment Toolkit, which I agree is substandard, to create the xml files, saving them along with the files in that directory. I had toyed around with putting stuff in /tmp but this caused some problems with Casper.

Anyway, I then wrote a script like so:

#!/bin/bash

## Adobe Photoshop CS4 Installer Script
# Written by Ryan Harter, 09-01-2009

"/Library/Application Support/UWSP/Adobe Photoshop CS4/ AdobeUberInstaller"

rm -r "/Library/Application Support/UWSP/Adobe Photoshop CS4"

exit 0

It's not very robust and does no checking, but I haven't had any problems with it so far.

Then all you have to do is set the script to run after and make sure the package is installed before it runs.

Note: There is also an uninstall script like so:

#!/bin/bash

## Adobe Photoshop CS4 Uninstaller Script
# Written by Ryan Harter, 09-01-2009

"/Library/Application Support/UWSP/Adobe Photoshop CS4/ AdobeUberUninstaller"

rm -r "/Library/Application Support/UWSP/Adobe Photoshop CS4"

exit 0

As you can see, I've been using these since the 9th of January without any problem, granted we're just letting out Art faculty test it out now so my install base is only about 15.

I prefer this to the packaging approach because the installer handles the licensing so my better, IMHO.

Ryan Harter
UW - Stevens Point
Workstation Developer
715.346.2716
Ryan.Harter at uwsp.edu

Does by any other means include an install of it at FirstRun like CS3 does?

I have a "working" master collection image install, but it still has some issues. One of them being it will NOT run at FirstRun, only when someone is logged on and installed by Policy or Self Service. Another being that I'm still forced to repair Acrobat Pro 9 even after it JUST installed it. POS. And even though I've selected particular portions of the suite to just install in Casper Admin it still installs them all so I do some cleaning out with scripts after the fact. So a one step process becomes 6.

Casper Admin will also not recognize CS4 updaters, at least in their current form with 6.01. So I also have a traditional overlay package at the end that "patches" everything.

NOTE: My DMG that Casper Admin is using is the single DMG electronic download from Adobe that's been modified. I know that not everyone seems to have that option.

I'll have to take a look at what you have Ryan.

"We'll get the installer fixed in CS6"

Sure you will...grumbles. And that means it will be diferent for CS5 before then, too?

Suffice it to say there isn't a pretty way to do it, but it's possible. Written up work flow I don't have.

Craig Ernst
Systems Management and Configuration
+-------------------+
University of Wisconsin-Eau Claire
Learning and Technology Services
105 Garfield Ave
Eau Claire, WI 54701
Phone: (715) 836-3639
Fax: (715) 836-6001
+-------------------+
ernstcs at uwec.edu

Thanks for the tip Ryan. I was really hoping to avoid the CS4 Deployment Toolkit, but it looks more and more like I'm going to be forced to.

--
Ted August
Salve Regina University

I've used this method successfully to install CS4 Design Premium on more than 100 computers over the past month. I cached it first then modified the policy to "install all cached software" once the computers in the specific policy cached it.

The only problem I've noticed with the installation was that CS3 Design Premium licensing stopped working, and I haven't really investigated if I accidentally installed something else before installing CS4, so it's possible something else broke the licensing for CS3. This was done with all the options turned on in Casper Admin, so it was a silent install with the dock icon being suppressed and so on.

The work around was to install CS3 DP after the CS4 DP on a broken computer and then copying the Adobe PCD, caps, and FLEXnet Publisher folders and contents into each computer that exhibits this problem. Both CS3 and CS4 work properly now.

Dave

--
David Lundgren
IT Systems Administrator

27 East Cota Street
Santa Barbara, CA 93101
888.304.3456 (toll-free)
805.690.7615 (office)
http://www.brooks.edu

I haven't tried running it at first run, only from Self Service. What kind of errors do you get. I've got plenty of package that are "First Run", but all that really means is that I've created a Startup Item that deletes itself. That's a pretty easy process to do.

I have seen some problems with firstrun failing before while using the NetBoot image because Casper Imaging copies everything that should go in the first run directory to /tmp on the local machine, and then copies it over the the /System/Library/StartupItems/FirstRun. This poses a problem in the NetBoot environment because the netboot's /tmp directory can't get very big because of the whole network aspect of it. In addition to that, we had problems with machines that have been imaged a lot because it backs up the logs to the netboot and they get too big.

If you're using a master collection DMG like it sounded, then I would be wary of using that in first run.

I've gotten around this by using a policy with custom triggers that copies the "Please wait while adobe apps install" application from Casper Imaging (/Contents/Resources/), then activates it, installs the adobe products, and then deletes all trace of itself. This is useful because only the script needs to be copied to the netboots /tmp directory and the adobe dmgs get copied to the main hard drive, so I know there will always be enough space.

Ryan Harter
UW - Stevens Point
Workstation Developer
715.346.2716
Ryan.Harter at uwsp.edu

Installing Adobe CS4 Products with Casper Suite 6.01
http://www.jamfsoftware.com/kb/article.php?id=196

As well as:

Combining Multi-Disc Adobe CS4 Installs
http://www.jamfsoftware.com/kb/article.php?id=195

Sweet...it's not the world, but it's a start. =)

Craig E

I'm now starting to package up CS4 and have begun following the Jamf directions in KB article 196. One thing I have a question about, though, is where you're supposed to rename install-en_US.xml and uninstall-en_US.xml. So far, I've taken disk images of Photoshop and Illustrator CS4 but have found that the files aren't named what is provided in the documentation (deployment.xml and uninstall.xml in the case of Illustrator). Should I just rename this to install.xml and uninstall.xml?

Also, we don't purchase "suites" of the products, but rather individual titles, so therefore they all have different serial numbers. Will this install method handle this approach ok with respect to the licensing?

Thanks!

j

Good question, perhaps the documents only deal with suites and not point products. Hello, JAMF?

We purchase one copy of Master Collection for a reason, licensing database issues. The other good reason is that you then have a single source of all the applications to use for multiple types of deployments with the JSS. By being able to use a single Master Collection license code we don't run into issues of other installs breaking each other as the license database gets rewritten. Everything is just licensed under that number. This also takes in to account you have the ability to track or restrict the applications that do run with the number of licenses you have. We, like several on the list use KeyServer to manage that piece and stay compliant with our concurrent licenses. We do have X number of suites purchased, but we also purchase additional point licenses for more widely used applications like Dreamweaver and Photoshop.

Craig E