How do you deploy Adobe CC 2019 ?

jameson
Contributor II

I have tried to login on adobes sites and create a package for fx Photoshop cc2019 20.05 (latest version)
I try the default way to deploy it cached first and then another policy where it install the caches version. But It does not install

Then I tried a different option I found with a DMG wrap script, but this method calls a syntax error
with following error code

Script result: installPKGfromDMG.sh Variable "dmgName" value is set to: PhotoshopCC2019.dmg Variable "forcesuccessflag" to JSS not explicitly declared, defaulting to NO... Mounting the DMG PhotoshopCC2019.dmg... DMG mounted successfully as volume /Volumes/PhotoshopCC2019 on device /dev/disk1. Installing Package PhotoshopCC2019.pkg from mount path /Volumes/PhotoshopCC2019... Copying PhotoshopCC2019.pkg... Installing PhotoshopCC2019.pkg... Installation failed. The installer reported: installer: Package name is Photoshop installer: Installing at base path / installer: The install failed (The Installer encountered an error that caused the installation to fail. Contact the software manufacturer for assistance.) PKG exit code was...: 1 Exit code 1 was passed to JSS Failed installation Unmounting disk /dev/disk1... "disk1" ejected. Successfully unmounted

So is there a "secret way" to get this installed successfully?

20 REPLIES 20

peternbevan
New Contributor III

You'll be using named licensing now for CC(2019) so if you're managing it for your organisation, login to the Adobe Admin Console and build a named user package there. Somewhat simpler (rather than building install packages) is just to build the Adobe Desktop Application and deploy that, then let your users pick and choose what they want to install, based on their license. If you're not managing Adobe licenses then just deploy the Desktop app from the Adobe web site and let them get on with it.

KRIECCO
Contributor

..

PaulHazelden
Valued Contributor

Hi
I have posted a solution before for the earlier versions, not yet tried the 2019 version myself yet but my solution should work for you.

I take the pkg from Adobe, I put it in a Folder. I put this folder in a location that isn't normally seen, I use a folder in /var
Then I will compress the folder with its pkg payload, using .tar.gz compression. zip doesn't work.
Now I drag the compressed archive into Composer.
I add in a postinstall script to uncompress the tar.gz and then install any pkg files found, then it cleans up after its self.
To compress, in Terminal cd to the parent folder of where your folder is located, then...
tar -zcvf "Photoshop_2019".tar.gz Photoshop_2019
I would set these to both be the same name, it will be clear in the script below.
Post install script would look a bit like this...

# What file is being installed, the ARCHIVE NAME and FOLDER NAME should be the same
csgfile="FOLDER NAME"

# Uncompressing the Installers
# Move to location
cd /path/to/<PARENT FOLDER>
# Uncompress the archive
tar -zxvf "$csgfile".tar.gz

# ---------------------------------------------------//------------------------------------------------------------

# Install the pkg files found in a temp location

for PKG in $(ls "/path/to//<PARENT FOLDER>/$csgfile/" | grep "pkg$")
do
/usr/sbin/installer -pkg /path/to/<PARENT FOLDER>/"$csgfile"/"$PKG" -tgt / -allowUntrusted
# Then it will remove the installers
rm -Rf /path/to/<PARENT FOLDER>/"$csgfile"/"$PKG"
done

# Remove the folder and the archive
rm -Rf /path/to/<PARENT FOLDER>/"$csgfile"
rm -Rf /path/to/<PARENT FOLDER>/"$csgfile".tar.gz

stevewood
Honored Contributor II
Honored Contributor II

@jameson I know this can come off wrong, but I have to ask, did you expand the download from Adobe and upload the PKG file, or did you upload the zip file from the Adobe Admin console web site?

My process, and this has worked for me forever:

  1. Create Named User Licensing, Managed, package on Adobe's admin console and download.
  2. Expand the downloaded zip file.
  3. Upload the application PKG file inside the "Build" folder to Jamf using Jamf Admin.
  4. Create a policy to install the application.

I have been installing Adobe this way (used CCP before 2019 version) for many years and have had no issues. I have over 14,000 Macs under management and I'll bet we've deployed Adobe apps to several thousand Macs.

jameson
Contributor II

@stevewood I go to adobe admin console - Packages and create fx a Adobe Photoshop package

The Zip is downloaded that I extract and Iupload the pkg inside the build folder. However when the pkg file is uploaded it again is pkg.zip -something jamf do

But when trying to install on the client it just fails with the following error

Installation failed. The installer reported: installer: Package name is Photoshop installer: Installing at base path / installer: The install failed (The Installer encountered an error that caused the installation to fail. Contact the software manufacturer for assistance.)

Running Jamf 10.10 Cloud - and Mojave latest

jkaigler
Contributor II

@jameson I package the apps exactly like you and have not seen any issues yet.

stevewood
Honored Contributor II
Honored Contributor II

@jameson that error may not be related to the way you are installing the package or the package itself. That could be the Adobe installer having a fit. I've seen that happen plenty of times. Check the PDApp.log file that is in the user's ~/Library/Logs folder and the install.log file in /var/log for errors. You may find that in the PDApp.log file you find that there are conflicting processes that are causing the failure.

With older Adobe installs I found that often, where something was still open and causing the failure. If you're installing on a system that already has Adobe products, I would definitely try to make sure all Adobe apps are closed down first. You probably already know that, but again, just have to state it.

jameson
Contributor II

Arh found the root course. What I am actually trying to do is to upgrade from earlier Version like CC2015 to CC2019. But it seems that is the issue that there is something left from the old installation as it works on a clean machine. Really did not think that could be an issue that things are stuck because of an old version

So, do any have a best practise in upgrading from an older to a new version. Is it needed run complete uninstall tool to get rid of the old version, but just thinking that some preferences than would be lost, so will not be quite user friendly

fishbackn
New Contributor

Adobe installers are notoriously finicky when there's existing Adobe software installed. If your new installer package is giving errors when attempting to install on top of other existing Adobe products, but works fine on fresh systems, then you'll likely need to completely uninstall the old version before installing the new. We have to do this on the majority of the machines that need new version installs.

jameson
Contributor II

So what when new Adobe CC version is applied. Do admins have to manually uninstall earlier CC versions since it seems to be an issue

I try to get an baseline as we are running several older versions, but to connect to each and every mac and uninstall it quite a job. But with existing CCloud on, the new installation fails for me

Anyone has some good ideas how this can be processed ?. So right now we are on Adobe CC 2019 - so what when going to CC2020, how can update be done as adobe remote update manager as far I know only can update patches and not complete upgrade for new versions of Cloud

mav_eric_jx
New Contributor III

Since we are just startint with JAMF I don't know how the steps in JAMF are but at my former company I used a script which called

#!/bin/sh
/Programme/Dienstprogramme/Adobe Creative Cloud/Utils/Creative Cloud Uninstaller

After the uninstaller has finished there is still a lot of Adobe CC stuff left so I added the step 2 described here Remove Adobe in two steps to the script. Most of the time this gave me a clean environment and I could install the CC 2018.

I don't have a copy of the script any more but it should look like this

#!/bin/sh
/Programme/Dienstprogramme/Adobe Creative Cloud/Utils/Creative Cloud Uninstaller
sudo rm -rf /Applications/Adobe* /Applications/Utilities/Adobe* /Library/Application Support/Adobe /Library/Preferences/com.adobe.* /Library/PrivilegedHelperTools/com.adobe.* /private/var/db/receipts/com.adobe.* ~/Library/Application Support/Adobe* ~/Library/Application Support/com.apple.sharedfilelist/com.apple.LSSharedFileList.ApplicationRecentDocuments/com.adobe* ~/Library/Application Support/CrashReporter/Adobe* ~/Library/Caches/Adobe ~/Library/Caches/com.Adobe.* ~/Library/Caches/com.adobe.* ~/Library/Cookies/com.adobe.* ~/Library/Logs/Adobe* ~/Library/PhotoshopCrashes ~/Library/Preferences/Adobe* ~/Library/Preferences/com.adobe.* ~/Library/Preferences/Macromedia* ~/Library/Saved Application State/com.adobe.*

Sometimes it was neccessary to additionally run the Adobe Removal tool. You can get it plus a informative how to use it from here Adobe CC removal tools.

mhasman
Valued Contributor

I always make sure Adobe application is not open when installing the update. All those huge installation packages do not know to check and close application if open

ts85
New Contributor III

@stevewood I cannot for the life of me get the pkg into the JCDS. Since the packages are not flat, I've zipped the installer pkg myself. However, when attempting to upload with Jamf Admin it always fails with a "connection lost" error. I then attempted uploading the zipped pkg via the browser and I get an immediate fail. If I try to upload the pkg via Jamf Admin, I get a failure after it attempts to zip it.

stevewood
Honored Contributor II
Honored Contributor II

@drew.diver Since we are on-prem and hosting in AWS, I couldn't speak to the JCDS and any time out issue. You shouldn't need to zip prior to uploading, but I know that will work since Jamf Admin sometimes times out. I would attempt the following:

1) Zip the package (you are uploading each app individually, right?)
2) Use Jamf Admin to upload the zipped package to JCDS

Hopefully that will get you past the timeout/connection issues.

cdenesha
Valued Contributor II

@drew.diver I would open a ticket with Jamf. There may be a size issue with uploading to the JCDS and they hopefully can guide you.

FutureFacinLuke
Contributor II

I used to have a problem with Adobe in that it used to be done as a single 20GB install that inevitably failed on some labs on slower connections or when to many were coming from the JAMF server at once.f

So I switched to a modular install and now we are on JamfCloud.

For Student Machines we use Shared Device Licensing and deploy the Apps that are requested (I package them all anyway)
For Staff they can get the Lab Versions on Request (we tend not to incrementally update the Labs) but I install the Adobe CC and users can install and update what they need without Admin Privs from there.

bsuggett
Contributor II

Hi all,

the new InstallPKGsfromDMG is available.

Passed parameters are
5(forcesuccessflag)
6(useinstallerapp)
7(allowUntrusted)
8(applyChoiceChangesXMLFile)
9(multipkgs).

If you need/want to bypass an untrusted installer. Supply parameter 6 with "YES" without quotes, and parameter 7 with "YES" without quotes.

If you want to install multiple pkgs from a single DMG, supply parameter 9 with "YES" without quotes.

Parameters 5, 6, 7, and 9 can be used in conjunction with each other.

There's just some packages that just don't like being installed using the jamf binary.

Hope this helps...

thch_jamf
New Contributor II

@stevewood What would you recommend of setting in adobe adminconsole?
Do you let the user update software the self? or do you har an inhouse updateserver.
I most concerned of Premiere, AfterAffects and mediaEncoder to keep the on the same version. We also have a lot of windows Computers running Adobe and there are sharing projects.
Cheers Thomas

stevewood
Honored Contributor II
Honored Contributor II

@thch_jamf

My recommendation is to deploy Adobe CC Desktop with elevated privileges, which Adobe calls "Self Service". We have several agencies that do not do that and instead deploy Managed simply because they want to control versions of InDesign primarily. Whenever I talk with the leadership of those agencies I suggest Self Service and explain that they can handle the version difficulties via written/spoken policy. If a user upgrades to a new version before the team, then that person is responsible for opening the project in the older version and saving it so the team can work on it. Most don't really fall for that, unfortunately.

To accommodate the agencies that do want Managed we download the updated apps and place in Self Service for the users to install on their own. We do not push any Adobe updates, as I consider Adobe to be the third rail of software in an agency/creative environment. We will use the Patch settings in Jamf to present the updates, but just so there is more visibility to the fact that there is an update. We download any updates to Adobe apps the first week of each month and update in Jamf. If an agency/user needs an app updated before then (I'm pointing at you XD) then they just need to submit a request and we will update that app in Self Service at that time.

Hope that helps!

thch_jamf
New Contributor II

@stevewood Thanks for the info.