Regarding updates

[makander]

I have a questions regarding updates and admin accounts.

I work as an IT-technician in a Mac environment and our users have admin accounts to their clients because it takes to much time for us on the IT-department to run around to all the users and update Flash and Java on their machines.

At the same time it feels like we're giving up control over the machines to the users by giving them admin rights. How do you manage your users and the constant updates of Java / Flash / Adobe Reader and such?

[rtrouton]

Our users also have admin rights, but you can manage their Flash and Java updates centrally with Casper. Because a couple of mission-critical systems in use run Java applets in a browser, I've been pushing out the latest Java updates, as well as writing scripts to help ensure that my users don't get pop-ups or see the plug-in as disabled.

To help make sure that I've got some time to push out the latest updates, I've written a script for managing Apple's XProtect's Java browser plug-in settings:

https://github.com/rtrouton/rtrouton_scripts/tree/master/rtrouton_scripts/xprotect_re-enable_java_6_...

Another person took the same idea and applied it to Flash:

https://github.com/rtrouton/rtrouton_scripts/tree/master/rtrouton_scripts/xprotect_re-enable_adobe_f...

In the case of updating Flash, it may be easiest to get the Flash update that's designed for distribution as it has a standard installer package embedded inside Adobe's AIR-based installer.

I've written a number of other scripts, to help make sure that Java stays enabled and that Safari isn't blocking it. All my Java-related posts should be accessible via this link:

http://derflounder.wordpress.com/category/java/

[Chris_Hafner]

I highly recommend the CCA course. These issues are really trivial once you're really using the Casper suite. We've got users that are admin and users that are not. Honestly, from a management perspective it matters relatively little.

[makander]

Thank you Rtrouton, I'll look at the scripts!

@Chris_Hafner, eventually I'll go down that road and take the certifications.