Weekly News Summary for Admins — 2019-10-11

Release week! (again)

macOS 10.15 Catalina was released this Monday.

You may be terrified of dialog fatigue or excited about new features like Sidecar. You may be waiting for some critical third party to fix their installers or not planning to upgrade for a year anyway.

Whether you are holding back the update or diving in right away, this means a lot of extra work and learning for MacAdmins. Thanks to all the MacAdmins on Twitter, Slack, and weblogs for helping and sharing information.

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On Scripting OS X

macOS 10.15 Catalina

Adobe and Catalina

MacAdmins on Twitter

  • Jerry Olla: “Need to be able to see Wi-Fi connection details in iOS? Install the “Wi-Fi for iOS” diagnostic profile”
  • Tom Bridge: “Quick PSA based on some feedback from friends: Do NOT notarize someone else’s software, your Developer ID might end up in hot water.”
  • Robert Hammen: “Want to block macOS Catalina from showing up in Software Update preferences on macOS Mojave? sudo /usr/sbin/softwareupdate --ignore "macOS Catalina" prevents it from appearing! Credit to @wegotoeleven”
  • Pepijn Bruienne: “And for those interested in implementing Watch-based auth in macOS 10.15 themselves, take a look at this newly added ACL as part of the Keychain Services API”
  • William Smith: “MacAdmins, if you’ve told your technicians to use the Command-Option-R method to boot into Internet Recovery mode on your Macs to reinstall macOS, be aware this will now install Catalina not Mojave.”
  • Erik Schwiebert: “Mac Office 16.29 and later are fully supported on the new macOS 10.15 Catalina! Version 16.31 (due out in mid-November) will drop support for macOS 10.12 Sierra.”
  • Eric Holtam: “Confirmed by @ClassicII_MrMac – a bricked T2 that failed previous DFU bridgeOS restores can be revived.”
  • Jason Broccardo: “Which OSes are offered 10.15 in the GUI Software Update: – 10.10: 10.13 is offered – 10.11: untested – 10.12: 10.15 not offered in SU or App Store>Updates – 10.13: 10.15 not offered in SU or App Store>Updates – 10.14.x: 10.15 offered in SU GUI but not CLI”
  • Rosyna Keller: “I wanted to clarify a few things that have caused some confusion about the Jan 2020 date. 1. All software created after June 1st, 2019 must still be notarized for Catalina. 2. A notarization ticket issued before Jan 2020 still remains valid forever.”
  • John C. Welch: “Yeah, the auth dialogs in Catalina can be annoying. Anyone got a better method besides “pretend your mac isn’t under constant attack and hope for the best” aka “hopes and prayers” or “get cissp certified before you’re allowed to use a computer”?” (Thread)
  • Nikolaj Schlej: “macOS Catalina brings a small, but important update to Mac Firmware Password mechanism: you can now opt-out (and back in) from password reset mechanism used by AppleCare. It makes FW password harder to reset, use it on your own risk!”

Bugs and Security

Support and HowTos

Scripting and Automation

Apple Support

Updates and Releases

To Watch

To Listen

Just for Fun

Support

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Published by

ab

Mac Admin, Consultant, and Author