Speakers: Andrew Laurence
Level: Intermediate, Lecture
Excerpt: When the CIO’s edict for Mac support doesn’t come with a new budget, you use the tools you have. Follow a Windows-based unit’s journey to Mac support, through errors, misguided assumptions, and trials that didn’t work out, to success by embracing the tools already on hand. We rediscover old truths and embrace the practical aspects of Mac management while thinking differently.
Description: “Can we manage Macs with this?”
Follow a Windows-based unit’s journey to Mac support, through errors, misguided assumptions, and trials that didn’t work out, to success by embracing the tools already on hand. The task was to replicate on macOS a Windows-oriented service framework that had evolved over a couple decades. This project required reexamining everything we thought we knew about deployment, patching, security posture, and dynamic services.
If you’re trying to manage Macs with unusual tools, this session is for you.
Tools include: BigFix, Airwatch, Enterprise Connect, Nessus, AnyConnect, and a homespun integration of shell scripting.
About the speaker
Andrew Laurence (Twitter: @atlauren) – Systems Analyst – University of California, Irvine
Andrew Laurence wrangles endpoints at the University of California, Irvine’s Office of Information Technology. He has been a systems analyst and administrator for longer than he cares to admit. His career includes being “the Mac guy”, a linux/Solaris sysadmin, product owner for an enterprise calendar system, developing an IMAP-Exchange migration system, and managing a team of Windows administrators. He has written for TidBITS and Macworld, appeared on the Runas Radio podcast, and presented at the MacIT and IBM Think conferences.