Adobe Creative Cloud Install

Hi @schwartzb, 

I download the dmg from Adobe Console, download the zip from the dmg, unzip it on the machine and upload the contained install.pkg to Jamf cloud. Certainly there will be even better solutions, but this is how it works for me. I'm open to new, easier ways! 😅 🙊 

How interesting. I'm building a package with Adobe Creative Cloud only through our Admin Console and having issues.

Is there a place somewhere in the Admin Console that you just get that file without building a package?

I've created both the Self-Servicing Package and a Managed Package both with the same result. It looks like a .pkg file, but when I try and upload it to Jamf School, it stops it because it looks like a folder.

hm 🤔 🤔, I just tested it with the Intel and the Apple Silicon PKG. The Package Upload to Jamf (Pro) and the installation works on the test devices.

I'm building the self-service package for Adobe Creative Cloud in the Adobe Admin Console.

Are you uploading the install.pkg directly from the Build folder to Jamf?
That's how I do it

Adobe is beyond stupid, and they think they are exempt from following any established practices. 

DO NOT DEPLOY THIS AS A PACKAGE you will just have a bad time, stay away from Composer. Instead get your zip file from Adobe and open JAMF Admin and upload the zip file. If you use composer you will need a post install script to move the files around, and that will have problems because Adobe is stupid.

• When making the package on Adobe's admin page, make sure you are making a "managed package".
• Add whatever you want to it
  • I typically just deploy Creative Cloud to have to keep up with fewer packages and make them smaller.
• Set your options (post install stuff).
• Name your package and build it.
• Open the DMG, and run the Adobe Package Downloader.app within
• This app will download your zip file, upload this zip directly in to JAMF admin. DO NOT ATTEMPT TO REPACKAGE IT
• Build your policy and add the zip to the package payload.

Did I mention Adobe is stupid? just incase I'll say it again, Adobe is stupid. See the links below if you need more guidance. It's not terribly difficult, but Adobe does things in a way only they do them in. 

https://helpx.adobe.com/enterprise/using/package-apps-admin-console.html

https://docs.jamf.com/technical-articles/Deploying_Adobe_Creative_Cloud_Packages.html

There might be some disconnect here between Jamf Pro and Jamf School. Often while working with the community I find there's significant difference in experience here, and while somebody is testing or providing a solution for Pro, there's no equivalent in School, or the behavior is just completely different. I see the same thing in School, often pkg files from what should be trusted publishers just aren't accepted by the uploader. Usually I'll open these in Composer, convert to source, then convert back to pkg and sometimes that helps resolve School accepting the file. But, then there's the issue of separate binaries for Intel and M1. If you try to upload a separate package for each, School thinks it's an existing app in the catalog and won't accept the second one. These are the kinds of constant frustrations that make packaging in house apps so challenging for us as School customers. 

Are you using Jamf Pro or Jamf School? I'm on Jamf School and what you said should work does nothing for me.

This definitely seems to be the case. It looks like Jamf Pro is a little kinder to some of the odd-ball packages.

Starting to see cracks in the "everything is basically the same" explanation they gave me when they sold me Jamf School vs Pro.

Thanks for the feedback AJ. Unfortunately this process does not work for me either. Jamf School errors out when uploading the zip file.

At the risk of ranting, it really is frustraing. 

I'm also trying to work with a trusted method of getting this (and many other non-store apps) deployed through Jamf School. Using AJ's suggestion as an example, where I'm getting stopped is "upload this zip directly to Jamf." In the School interface, when you do this, you drag and drop or browse to the file as an "In House MacOS package". The file uploads to the tenant, but fails at the end with an error:

"The uploaded asset cannot be processed."

There's a pkg inside the zip called install.pkg, but adding this pkg does... nothing. The interface just sits there like there was nothing added. No feedback, no error, just nothing. Maybe the whole folder?

"It's not allowed to upload more than 5 files."

OK. Let's use Composer to repackage the signed package from the publisher that doesn't work. Composer returns that there are unsupported scripts for "flat packages". Cool. Cool cool, so now I'm going to spend some time researching flat packages versus non flat packages, because it looks like I need to know in order to deploy and run an installer from a trusted publisher like Adobe, when distributed from Jamf. (Assuming repackaging in Composer was actually the correct course of action here.) Is the time to do that expected when using Jamf School? If I do that, and I find that flat packages are xar archives, will I then need to know the specific format and options for xar archives that are compatible with School in case, I don't know, School doesn't like the way an XML table is formatted, let's say... 

We've been with the product for years now, and it kind of feels like Jamf bought a competitor not to incorporate a working low cost and lightweight option for EDU, but it force them into Pro. I do my best to RTFM for solutions I'm involved with, but here there's just no info here. No troubleshooting options, no additional info, no mention of errors in the admin guides. 

@zschwartz @MasterNovice are you guys making the Apple Silicon package or Intel Package? I am using JAMF Pro 10.32.1 on prem (not JAMF School for whatever the differences are). What errors are you seeing?

For testing sake I grabbed a new set of packages from Adobe, one for Intel and the other for Apple Silicon. JAMF Admin is saying unknown format which is interesting. I have not tried installing the zip package yet, though I will be doing that in a bit.

The zip file just contains 2 packages, a text file whatever .ccp (looks to be the installer based on the scripts) is and an empty directory. 

The package has not payload files, and just 2 scripts.

 

@zschwartz @MasterNovice are you guys making the Apple Silicon package or Intel Package? I am using JAMF Pro 10.32.1 on prem (not JAMF School for whatever the differences are). What errors are you seeing?

 

For testing sake I grabbed a new set of packages from Adobe, one for Intel and the other for Apple Silicon. JAMF Admin is saying unknown format which is interesting. I have not tried installing the zip package yet, though I will be doing that in a bit.

 

The zip file just contains 2 packages, a text file whatever .ccp (looks to be the installer based on the scripts) is and an empty directory. 

The package has not payload files, and just 2 scripts.

 

 

I'm getting stopped at the upload to Jamf. School users do this through a web interface only. I'm getting stopped at "upload this zip directly to Jamf." In the School interface, when you do this, you drag and drop or browse to the file as an "In House MacOS package". The file uploads to the tenant, but fails at the end with an error:

"The uploaded asset cannot be processed."

Many other posts for Pro users suggest extracting the install.pkg from the build folder in the main zip, the uploading that instead. Jamf school does not recognize this file and does nothing if you try to upload it, no feedback from the system at all. 

In some of these cases, we've been directed by Support to repackage the app, previously with Packages App, and more recently with Composer. Repackaging the install.pkg file also results in the error: 

"The uploaded asset cannot be processed."

I was looking at the package in the zip file. It looks like the package only contains 2 scripts, no payloads beyond that. The scripts in the zip file references that .ccp file which is probably the actual installer. I have not gone through the scripts yet but I am betting they are building the application from source.

This is the preinstall script

This is the preupgrade script

Ya, its beyond me why JAMF keeps different products for no real reason. JAMF School and JAMF pro should be merged. The existence of JAMF Now should be reconsidered and should probably be moved in to a more limited functional version of JAMF Pro. Also all of these products have different UI/UX and totally different ways to do the same thing which makes it super confusing when you find documentation for the other product.

Either way. I am betting we have a JAMF Product issue. I can get the zip in to JAMF Pro, but it errors on the install. If JAMF Admin did not want to upload the zip I would have tossed it on my distribution point directly (fight me JAMF). I bet something either Adobe changed or JAMF changed is causing JAMF to not know what to do with the file. Using composer to repackage will not end well, you probably need to tell the helpdesk to escalate your ticket. I will be making a ticket shortly. We pay JAMF for support, I remind people of that a lot and need to take my own advice before I get knee deep in to something stupid.

Apologies for the vent; I appreciate the info and testing. For our part, the only distribution point we use is the hosted repository of Jamf School. I don't think we have access to work with or upload to it directly. I'll open with support and see if they can assist here, will return to thread with any new information. Thanks again.

Thank you. I did find these in the deployment package from Adobe, but parsing them to understand how to get the app deployed and installed on the endpoint is outside my scope of knowledge. I'll try to catch up and engage with support to see if they can lend a hand. 

Everyone: Thanks for your feedback and support. I will also be pinging support about this issue. Hopefully if we make the wheel squeak enough we'll get some answers from Jamf.

I would love to go without Adobe Creative Cloud. I very, very much share the same feelings about Adobe that @AJPinto has. But, our users will be rolling without admin rights and we need to be able to leverage Jamf to push out packages.

Hey @MasterNovice did you ever get this fixed or still going through support with Jamf? I haven't used the School version of Jamf, but, I have never been able to upload a Adobe CC package to my Jamf Pro instance via browser, and seeing as Jamf School that's your only option that's gotta be a problem with both products. 

I have only ever been able to upload my Adobe CC package via Jamf Admin. For the record, you have to extract the install.pkg from the .zip the adobe admin console makes you, trying to upload that .zip with the installer and uninstaller fails. Anway, if you have anything I'm interested to see what Jamf did or is doing. 

Thanks for the check in @Levi_ unfortunately I did not. I was spinning my wheels with workarounds. We reverted to a manual install under admin on machine for this application. I've had some challenge with getting response from support recently and we had to move on. We could really use a trusted method of deployment for this though if the community find a way!

I'm here with the exact same problem, giving this thread a little bump, see if that achieves anything.

This is the reply I got from support, hopefully its of some help:

You would need to upload the .pkg however it may need to be uploaded by a Mac as a PC will see a .pkg as folder and not allow you to upload the folder. Thers is also a 5GB limit on upload size for Jamf so if your deploying the entire Adobe create suite you'll need to slit out the apps into smaller packages.

That's interesting that they told you 5 GB. The Jamf School documentation states "5 TB per package". I tend to believe support over their own documentation in this instance though... I don't even want the full Adobe suite installed. I just want Creative Cloud and the users self-manage from there. Isn't that the point of the whole self-service thing we are working towards? 🙃

I have tried uploading from both a Mac and PC. Just like in my original screenshot, the also sees the "pkg" as a folder and doesn't allow you to choose it.

Thanks @MarkDixon . The package I'm attempting to upload into Jamf School is just under 2GB. Here are the steps I follow:

1. Navigate to https://adminconsole.adobe.com and create a package. I use the preconfigured "Adobe" template that is set for self service and non admin install options. 

2. The download is presented as a DMG. This file is a downloader that will download a full installer to the local client. 

3. Within the Build folder of this downloaded local install, there is a pkg file. 

4. Uploading this pkg file fails with the error "No more than 5 files can be uploaded at a time."

Yeah I'm pretty sure I tried it in the first instance, and just to 100% make sure I done exactly like you did with the exact same results, so I have gone back to support with this, will let you know if I find out more.

This should be deployed as the ZIP, with both packages within it. Each package just contains scripts that do things. I have also noticed issues with JAMF Pro, I am figuring something is fishy. Our old package for Adobe CC works fine, but if I upload a new package JAMF does not know what to do with it. Knowing Adobe they changed something and knowing JAMF they are dragging feet at adjusting to those changes. This is probably something you want escalated past the helpdesk.

https://helpx.adobe.com/enterprise/using/package-apps-admin-console.html

https://docs.jamf.com/technical-articles/Deploying_Adobe_Creative_Cloud_Packages.html

Only one method worked for me.. 

create the downloader from adobe

run downloader to get install package, unzip

copied the installer to /private/var/tmp/

drag that location into composer

in composer add a post install install script, that used the installer command then add a line to delete the installer from that same location 

Build as pkg (note if installing more then the desktop app there is a 8GB limit to pkgs, if over it must be rolled up as a DMG) 

**** edit I happen to be trying to do the entire CC app stack right now.. the given method does not seem to work rolling up as a DMG, which gives you a warning that the scripts will not work. I have succeed with the CC desktop self service app though.