MacOS

I previously posted a munki nopkg script to enable SSH using /usr/sbin/systemsetup This stopped working on newer versions of macOS at some point and I implemented a new method, but never posted it. The new method simply loads the launch daemon to enable SSH. The install_check script <key>installcheck_script</key> <string>#!/bin/bash #check to see if ssh is off (/bin/launchctl list | grep ssh) if [[ $? = 1 ]] then # exit 0 to tell Munki an install is needed exit 0 fi # if not needed, exit 1 exit 1</string> The postinstall_script :

I’m writing down these SSH configuration tweaks because I tend to change them infrequently enough that I forget them :-) Configuring SSH keys Sometimes it might be useful to use seperate SSH keys for seperate purposes. For example, one for work and one for peprsonal. On macOS this can be accomplished using ~/.ssh/config For each host that you want to use a specific key for, you can create an entry like this :

With the 11.1 update, Logic Pro has changed the app bundle from Logic Pro X.app to Logic Pro.app But wait! Didn’t this change happen a few updates back? Yes and no… The file sustem name was Logic Pro X.app but it displayed in Finder as Logic Pro.app If installing Logic Pro from the App Store, none of this is important as it is all seemless to the user. If like me you are managing this on managed endpoints, the path changing is important.

It can be challenging to get accurate version information for MATLAB on macOS. The installer is not a package, so no package receipts to rely on. The next place we might logically look for version info is in the app bundle itself. <key>CFBundleVersion</key> <string>24.2.0</string> Well that at least looks promising… This is an example from an installation of MATLAB 2024b. The 24.x indicates 2024 and the x.2 indicates b version. The problem with this is that the full version of that app is 24.

With version 14.1 of the desktop app, Mathematica.app is now Wolfram.app. In addition to a new path and a new bundle identifier for the application, there is also a new path if you deploy a mathpass file as we do in our organization. /Library/Mathematica/Licensing/mathpass as of version 14.1 becomes /Library/Wolfram/Licensing/mathpass

Good news! As of SPSS 27 IBM is finally shipping an Apple installer package for macOS instead of their Java based silent installer. Looking at the installer, it has a few minor issues but is for the most part sane. The package can be imported into Munki without much fuss. As in the past, activation will need to be scripted post install to license SPSS. The format of the path to the application has changed a bit, my postinstall script now looks like :

I recently needed to be able to test connectivity from client systems in a number of locations to some new infrastructure. Obviously being able to remotely login to these systems is a lot more efficient than traveling around to all the locations. We do not have SSH enabled by default on our managed macOS clients. I wanted to use Munki to enable SSH on select systems for testing, and then be able to disable it after testing was completed.

I previously wrote about a script to license SPSS for Mac silently . In version 25 of SPSS Statistics, the path to the bundled Java has changed. It now no longer has the version of the JRE in the path. As a result the script now looks like this : #!/bin/bash -x VERSION=25 AUTHCODE=<redacted> APPPATH="/Applications/IBM/SPSS/Statistics/$VERSION/SPSSStatistics.app/" cd "$APPPATH/Contents/bin" "$APPPATH/Contents/JRE/bin/java" -jar "$APPPATH/Contents/bin/licenseactivator.jar" SILENTMODE CODES=$AUTHCODE If SPSS keeps a consistent path to the bundled Java, it will make it a little bit easier to update the script for each new version of SPSS Statistics.

I previously posted a method for scripting the activation of SPSS Statistics 23. My method has changed for version 24, so I thought it would be a good idea to write up my notes. First up, repackaging. Due to the SPSS silent installer being notoriously bad, I had already decided I would just repackage version 24 and use a postinstall script to activate. It really is the best way to ensure that it will deploy properly.

It’s not hard to find discussions online about installing SPSS silently. I have a working install based on this discussion . I needed to re-license a number of machines with a new authorization code and had a bit of trouble, so I thought I’d write it up… I built a payload free package with The Luggage to distribute with Munki, and my first attempt at the postinstall script looked like this :