Managed Preferences

[Mitch260488]

Hi,

What would be the way to set certain system preferences settings.

For example - Scroll Bars = Always on, Ask to Keep changes when closing documents - Yes.

I would like to do this on many different items on System Prefs.

Can you do this in a Config Profile or via Composer in a capture?

Thans

Mitch

[davidacland]

Hi, the settings in system preferences are stored in lots of different places, usually either in /Library/Preferences or ~/Library/Preferences.

To manage each of these settings, you'll want to create a custom configuration profile that sets the relevant xml keys and values.

It is best practice to use separate config profiles for each preference domain (e.g. one profile for Finder preferences), to avoid re-pushing profiles every time you make a change.

I generaly try to avoid managing personal preferences, to keep the OS as close to Apple's intentions as possible, to give the users a choice and to reduce the amount of work required in maintaining the set of configuration profiles. Profile delivery is a little unstable so you need to be careful not to create too much of a headache for yourself.

[Mitch260488]

Hi David,

Could you give me an example of how you do this.

Thanks

Mitch

[davidacland]

The basic steps for a finder setting (for example), would be:

• Configure the Finder setting as you need it on a test Mac
• Copy the ~/Library/Preferences/com.apple.Finder.plist file to your desktop
• Convert it to XML with plutil -convert xml1 /path/to/file
• Open it in a code text editor like Fraise, Sublime Text or Text Wrangler
• Remove all keys and values that you don't want to manage
• Download and use mcxtoprofile to create a .mobileconfig file
• Upload it to the JSS using the web interface

There are a few other ways to get to the same point, but none are simple or straightforward I'm afraid.