Category: Deployment

Installomator v10.3 and v11.0beta1

We have released a new minor version of Installomator. Version 10.3 contains several new labels and some very important fixes to existing labels. You can see the details in the v10.3 release notes.

We have also released a first beta for the v11.0 release.

Having a beta parallel to a new minor release is a new approach for us. The way Installomator is built, changes and additions to labels do not (well, should not) affect the hundreds of other labels. This allows us to add and update labels quite easily. (We have added and updated 205 labels since v9.2, and 37 labels since 10.2) The minor updates focus on adding new labels and updating the existing labels, mostly because the names or download URLs change on the vendor side. Since not everyone is comfortable with the intricacies of git and GitHub, frequent minor releases are important to keep Installomator working for everyone that uses it.

However, we want to update the script and functionality in the script, as well. But since any change to behavior of the main script might affect all 500+ applications, we have to tread very carefully here. Last year, we had an extended beta period for v10, which was necessary to identify some problems with the changes. However, we didn’t release new minor updates during that beta phase which means that many labels in the v9.2 release broke over the beta phase.

Because of this, I have studied some new git and GitHub skills. Now, there will be a minor release with new and updated labels, as well as a new beta for v11.0 with some new features, that we are quite excited about. We will keep this up until we deem v11 to be ready for production.

Do not use v11.0beta1 in production! That is what the v10.3 release is for. But please, test the beta in your testing environments and report all issues that you find. This will help us build a better, safe, and stable Installomator v11.0.

As always, many thanks to everyone who is helping to make this project so much better than I could have ever imagined…

Update: Installomator v10.1

Minor update to Installomator, which brings it to version 10.1. Added and updated a bunch of labels. Many thanks to all who contributed!

  • updated Jamf/Dialog scripts icon handling (#778)
  • Readme Updates (#744)
  • new labels:
    • amazoncorretto11jdk (#721)
    • amazoncorretto17jdk (#721)
    • bbeditpkg (#720)
    • boop (#781)
    • camtasia2021, camtasia2022 (#730)
    • jamfcpr (#753)
    • jetbrainsrider
    • lgcalibrationstudio (#763)
    • mendeleyreferencemanager (#713)
    • microsoftofficefactoryreset (#751)
    • microsoftofficeremoval (#755)
    • mist-cli (#733)
    • mist (#732)
    • mobiletolocal (#752)
    • netiquette (#770)
    • todoist (#769)
    • transfer (#773)
    • vpntracker365 (#760)
    • zerotier (#785)
  • updated labels:
    • 1password8 (#759)
    • amazoncorretto8jdk (#721)
    • camtasia (#730)
    • citrixworkspace (#731)
    • code42 (#766)
    • drawio (#725)
    • duodevicehealth (#761)
    • idrive (#726)
    • idrivethin (#727)
    • macfuse (#714)
    • microsoftazuredatastudio (#788)
    • nudge (#754)
    • prism9 (#746)
    • skype (#762)
    • synologydriveclient (#789)
    • ultimakercura (#740)

Installomator v10.0

After three betas and a lot of testing, we have (finally) released Installomator v10.

If you haven’t been following the betas, then you should really read the release notes, as well as those of the previous betas.

Major new feature is integration with Bart Reardon’s excellent Swift Dialog. Installomator can now send download and install progress to be displayed with Swift Dialog. There are several examples made by Soren Theilgaard and myself in the repo.

This update brings Installomator to more than 500 applications. And there are several more queued up in pull requests that we need to test and merge. The feedback from the community has been amazing. Many thanks to everyone who contributed and helped!

Also, many thanks to Søren, Adam, and Isaac, who are co-managing the project with me, I couldn’t do it without them!

macOS 12.4 and iOS 15.5

The updates for macOS 12.4, iOS 15.5 and all the siblings dropped yesterday. Usually I would gather a list of links for these updates in the news summary on Friday, but since I will be on a vacation break and they will seem stale in two weeks, you will get them now. Enjoy!

Update 2022-05-19: added Apple Business and School Manager User Guides.

macOS Monterey 12.4

iOS 15.5 and iPadOS 15.5

watchOS 8.6

tvOS 15.5

Other Updates

User Guides

Community

Support

Update Installomator: v9.2

We have updated Installomator. This brings Installomator to 465(!) applications! Many thanks to everyone who contributed.

Note: Both Google and Mozilla recommend using the pkg installers instead of the dmg downloads for managed deployments. So far, Installomator has provided labels for both. (googlechrome and googlechromepkgor firefox and firefoxpkg, respectively) Since there are problems with the dmg downloads, a future release of Installomator will disable the firefox and googlechrome dmg labels. You should switch to using the firefoxpkg or googlechromepkg labels instead.

  • bug and documentation fixes
  • 40 new, and 26 updated labels

You can find more details in the release notes.

Update: Installomator 9.1

We have updated Installomator. This brings Installomator to 407(!) applications! Many thanks to everyone who contributed.

Note: Both Google and Mozilla recommend using the pkg installers instead of the dmg downloads for managed deployments. So far, Installomator has provided labels for both. (googlechrome and googlechromepkg or firefox and firefoxpkg, respectively) Since there are problems with the dmg downloads, a future release of Installomator will disable the firefox and googlechrome dmg labels. You should switch to using the respective pkg labels instead.

  • added option for Microsoft Endpoint Manager (Intune) to LOGO
  • minor fixes
  • the googlechrome label now always downloads the universal version
  • 16 new labels
  • 6 updated labels

Full release notes in the repo.

Update: Installomator 9.0.1

We found a bug had snuck in to Installomator 9.0 which broke applications that download as pkgs wrapped in dmgs, so we have a bug fix update. While we were at it, there were a few other minor changes as well:

  • improved logging levels throughout the script
  • fixed a bug for pkgindmg style labels
  • changed the criteria used to locate an app in the case the it cannot be found in the default locations, this should help with some apps with similar name (Virtual Box and Box Drive)
  • new label: WhiteBox Packages (packages)
  • modified label: loom (added Apple silicon download)

You can get more details and download the pkg installer from the Installomator repo’s release page.

Update: Installomator v9.0

We have updated Installomator to version 9.0. This brings Installomator to 404 labels (390 apps). This update also brings with it many changes in behavior:

  • We have moved the root check to the beginning of the script, and improved DEBUG handling with two different modes. DEBUG=0 is still for production, and 1 is still for the DEBUG we previously knew downloading to the directory it is running from, but 2 will download to temporary folder, will detect updates, but will not install anything, but it will notify the user (almost as running the script without root before).
  • Added option to not interrupt Do Not Disturb full screen apps like Keynote or Zoom with INTERRUPT_DND="no". Default is "yes" which is how it has worked until now.
  • pkgName in a label can now be searched for. An example is logitechoptions, where only the name of the pkg is given, and not the exact file path to it.
  • LSMinimumSystemVersion will now be honered, if the Info.plist in the app is specifying this. That means that an app that has this parameter in that file and it shows that the app requires a newer version of the OS than is currently installed, then we will not install it.
  • New variable RETURN_LABEL_NAME. If given the value 1, like RETURN_LABEL_NAME=1 then Installomator only returns the name of the label. It makes for a better user friendly message for displaying in DEPNotify if that is integrated.
  • Changed logic if IGNORE_APP_STORE_APPS=yes. Before this version a label like microsoftonedrive that was installed from App Store, and that we want to replace with the “ordinary” version, Installomator would still use updateTool, even though IGNORE_APP_STORE_APPS=yes. So we would have to have INSTALL=force in order to have the app replaced, as updateTool would be used. But now if IGNORE_APP_STORE_APPS=yes then updateTool will be not set, and the App Store app will be replaced. BUT if the installed software was not from App Store, then updateTool will not be used, and it would be a kind of a forced install (in the example of microsoftonedrive), except if the version is the same (where installation is skipped).
  • Added variable SYSTEMOWNER that is used when copying files when installing. Default 0 is to change owner of the app to the current user on the Mac, like this user was installing this app themselves. When using 1 we will put “root:wheel” on the app, which can be useful for shared machines.
  • Added option curlOptions to the labels. It can be filled with extra headers need for downloading the specific software. It needs to be an array, like curlOptions=( ). See “mocha”-software-labels.

Logging

  • Introducing variable LOGGING, that can be either of the logging levels
  • Logging levels:
    0: DEBUG Everything is logged
    1: INFO Normal logging behavior
    2: WARN
    3: ERROR
    4: REQ
  • External logging to Datadog
  • A function to shorten duplicate lines in installation logs or output of longer commands
  • Ability to extract install.log in the time when Installomator was running, if further investigations needs to be done to logs

Fixes

  • Fixed a problem with pkgs: If they were mounted with .pkg in the name, then we would find the directory and not the pkg file itself.
  • Minor fix for a check for a pkgName on a DMG. We used ls that would throw an error when not found, so the check was corrected.

Many thanks to Søren Theilgaard who did most, if not all, of the heavy lifting for this release. Also many thanks to everyone else who contributed a new label, issue or other help.

You can get Installomator from the GitHub repo.

Update: pkgcheck

The macOS Monterey 12.3 beta release notes say that the Python 2.7 binary (located in /usr/bin/python) will be removed. Since you follow this blog, this should not come as a surprise. We have been warned about this since Catalina. (Or longer)

That said, the removal of Python 2 in a minor macOS release is surprising. Minor updates should not have breaking changes or removals. Admins and developers may not expect removals and other breaking changes in a minor update and therefore not be paying as much attention to changes. Also, the time a minor update is in beta is usually 6-8 weeks, which leaves us and developers much less time to find and fix problems than a major update beta phase, which is usually 4-5 months.

Nevertheless, we have to work with what Apple deals to us. MacAdmins have been investigating their own tools and scripts since the Monterey release or earlier to avoid the prompts. But when you get vendor pkgs, these might contain anything. While you can inspect pkgs with tools like pkgutil, Pacifist or Suspicious Package, it can get tedious with many packages.

A while back I built a script called pkgcheck to automate this check. Since I (and many others) have started using it again in the recent days, I have added a few more checks to it.

The earlier version would flag files in the installer’s resources that had a /bin/bash, /usr/bin/python, /usr/bin/ruby, or /usr/bin/perl shebang. (the first line with the #!) I have now also added check for a shebang with /usr/bin/env [python|ruby|perl] because when run from an installer pkg, this will also resolve tousing the built-in, deprecated runtimes. Also, using python in the shebang will now be shown as a red error, rather than a yellow warning.

The script will now also grep for use of python in installation scripts and show those scripts. This might generate a few false positives. You will have to use your judgement. For example using python3 in an installation script will also trigger this. But then, it probably should, since python3 is not installed on macOS by default. (What you see in /usr/bin/python3 is a shim that prompts you to install the Command Line Developer Tools, unless they or Xcode are already installed.)

I hope this is useful!