iWorks/iLife and Managed Distribution

[Schmidty]

Last year was our first year with Jamf and just to get things going we pushed out iWorks and iLife in our image and it was tied to a general school Apple ID. Now that we have more time to play around with it we are trying to see what fits us best. The way our 1:1 works now is we collect the student laptops in the summer and install a clean image, when they graduate we do another image with just the iWorks/iLife apps installed.

Is VPP Managed Distribution the best way to handle this? If I understand it correctly their personal Apple IDs would be tied to the Apps then every new school year when they get it back they would just have to go to purchases and re-download? Is there another/better way to do this?

Thanks for any input

[jarednichols]

Yes, migrating to VPP managed distribution and device-based VPP is the best way to do this. We have a way for you to request that those original bundled apps be moved to VPP MD so you no longer need to tie them to an Apple ID.

Request iOS apps through the Volume Purchase Program

[Chris_Hafner]

I'll agree that VPP is the proper route, however it's not your only option. I find the iLife/iWork titles to be the one exception to this and distribute them as per Rich's method:(http://derflounder.wordpress.com/2013/08/22/downloading-apples-server-app-installer-package/). However, I've yet to explore the new ways of distributing MAS apps via the JSS directly without VPP (http://docs.jamfsoftware.com/9.91/casper-suite/quickstart-computers/Distribute_a_Mac_App_Store_App.html)

[Schmidty]

Thanks for the feedback.

Jared, so when the student's graduate we would revoke the apps and they would use their Apple IDs to get their own apps or they would just take the one assigned to them with them?

Chris, with Rich's method you have to do that every time there is an update to the app correct or would you suggest not updating it during the school year and get the latest versions during the summer?

[jarednichols]

@Schmidty Your first scenario is correct. When you remove the managed distribution license, the user will receive a notification as such. They'll have a 30 day grace period to purchase the app on their own before the app is removed from their device.

[Chris_Hafner]

@Schmidty We do our best to convince the users to run their own updates via the MAS. In doing this they associate those copies with their AppleID and all is resolved (they had the software prior to our imaging anyways). Otherwise, they would continue to be offered the updates until they accepted them. It's part of what we try to teach the students about proper computer upkeep and maintenance before they get to college. Sometimes we change the updates and frequency to guide them along.

One of the reasons we do this is because we have a fast off-boarding process (dubbed De-Brewsterization) usually the afternoon before graduation each year. I've built a process that removes all of our institutionally licensed apps, restrictions, profiles (VPN, desktop settings, etc) while elevating student accounts to admin, removing both of our adminsitrative accounts, the JAMF binary AND the JSS record. The process takes about 2-4 min depending on the unit and optionally installed software (Creative Cloud usually) without touching user files or preferences.

Our parents far prefer their student NOT having to do anything to their computers once the school year is over and this includes re-installing something they had before they left the school ;-)

[McAwesome]

@jarednichols The problem with the VPP approach is that you must request it per device. This is fine if you're adding it for each newly purchased device, but it's a nightmare if you're trying to move a lot of machines over to it at once. I don't have the time to fill and and send in hundreds of individual requests. I really, really wish Apple had a better way to request those licenses.

[Chris_Hafner]

Yea... at this point I feel like it's just a way for Apple to get folks within the AppleID auth environment. Not that i necessarily have an issue with that. It's just that at this point, every machine we support comes with the ongoing licensing for iLife/iWork. I just wish it was part of the native OS package and we could be done with the whole bit.