imaging questions

[Dalmatian]

Imaging computers with the Casper Suite involves booting computers to a startup disk other than
the target drive and then using the Casper Imaging application to deploy a configuration.
Some common startup disks used for imaging are USB or FireWire drives, Restore partitions, and
NetBoot images.

1. how to make a s local USB working as a startup disk?
2. what is the capacity requirement for USB drive?
3. after enter the startup disk, how could using casper imaging application on the same computer?
4. if the computer is not enrolled yet, is it possible to do the remote imaging?

[bentoms]

@Dalmatian AutoCasperNBI can be used to create a Restorable DMG that could be restored to a USB stick.

This will take an OS.dmg created via Composer, Casper Admin or AutoDMG & creates a DMG that meets some of the needs of Casper Imaging.

Basically, the OS needs to boot into the root user.. & CasperImaging needs the JSS URL at in its preferences.

[davidacland]

Hi @Dalmatian

1. @bentoms has pretty much covered it, you just need to install an OS and have Casper imaging run. AutoCasperNBI is a nice easy way to do this
2. Pretty minimal really. Although the OS and Casper imaging app will only consume 20-30GB, I wouldn't go below 80GB to be sure its got enough elbow room. Given that most external drives are 500GB at a minimum these days you shouldn't have an issue
3. I'm not sure what you mean on this one. Once you boot to the external drive, launch Casper imaging, select your configuration and options and Install
4. You can, but you still need to tell the remote Mac to startup from something other than the target drive. This can be done with SSH and the right terminal commands, or Apple Remote Desktop, both of which require you to have enabled one of the options beforehand. If the Macs are coming right out of the box, a human (or an elaborate robotic device) has to press at least one button to get started. Creating a PreStage in the JSS can help automate things though.

One extra thing to note is the distribution point. External drives and Netboot can be used to get the Mac started up from something other than the target drive, but you can also have a synced copy of the distribution point on that same drive. If you combine this with one of the thunderbolt SSD drives on the market you can create a very quick deployment process.