Jamf Auto Update vs Jamf App Catalog

[taugust_ric]

Haven't posted in a while... glad to be back, at least to ask this question:

When do normal Jamf Pro customers get this?

https://datajar.co.uk/products/jamf-auto-update/

This seems like something that Jamf App Catalog was meant to be.  This company is now owned by Jamf.  Hoping this product expands from being just for MSP's to Jamf Pro customers soon.  Having automatically updating Mac packaged app catalog for over 800+ apps seems like something all Jamf customers deserve.  The App Catalog in Jamf Pro has not expanded as quickly as hoped, and also continues to be unreliable at times with it using the Apple Enterprise Application install API's.

Thoughts?

[taugust_ric]

The Jamf Auto Update application catalog:

https://support.datajar.co.uk/hc/en-us/articles/360010333638-Jamf-Auto-Update-Application-Catalog

You can see why this made me curious enough to ask the question...

[Tonyyoung]

No ETA on when/if Jamf Auto Update will ever be made available to standard Jamf Pro customers. Best thing to do is to talk to your account manager and detail to them how benefitial this would be to you and your organization w/o having to run it through an MSP

[taugust_ric]

Well that's disappointing news. Thanks for your reply.

[AJPinto]

Jamf Auto Update can be leveraged to provide in-place macOS upgrades for managed Mac devices, with minimal configuration.

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I'm interested to see how they will meet that claim considering OS updates must come from an MDM command and cannot be packaged. You could deploy the install macOS xyz.app, but on apple Silicon you need a Secure Token to run it which MDM cannot do. I'm figuring it will just be another workflow that piggy backs off the beta software update process that is in production but still beta (what is this google?).

[taugust_ric]

Digging around their site to see how the current product works, it looks like there's separate software installed.  It appears they have taken an approach to this product that integrates using Munki, with a separate update application/agent that handles the updates themselves, rather than trying to use MDM, which the app catalog has shown may not be the best strategy or tool for the job.

I personally don't mind this approach if it's expanded in some way to Jamf Pro.  Munki is a great tool, and the only reason I don't use it is lack of official support from a vendor, and the manual work required to integrate it into Jamf.  It looks like datajar handled this integration and configuration on their own, as a service which could be the appeal in Jamf purchasing them.