[gorickey]

I have a situation within a school district where iBooks are being deployed to students...the problem is, the custom images we got made from Apple a few months back obviously are needed to be updated with the latest Apple software updates. Does anybody know how to make a script that will allow non-admin users the ability to install software updates that we will supply in a Metapackage installer?

[Xeo]

Non-admin users can install software updates, but they need the admin username and password to do it. There is no way for a non-admin user to otherwise gain access to the proper system files to install OS X updates. If the iBook-using students come together, maybe you can have an "upgrade party" where they start the install, each bring their iBook forward one at a time, and you type the password in.

Anything else would require you (or someone else with the admin password) to spend more time at each machine than that. Do the students take the machines home with them?

[Arkham_c]

Originally posted by gorickey:
I have a situation within a school district where iBooks are being deployed to students...the problem is, the custom images we got made from Apple a few months back obviously are needed to be updated with the latest Apple software updates. Does anybody know how to make a script that will allow non-admin users the ability to install software updates that we will supply in a Metapackage installer?

There's no way to do it without compromising the security of the system. If that's not a concern, then I'm sure something could be worked out by setting softwareupdate to be setuid.

[gorickey]

Yes, the kids take the iBook's home. We are working with our Apple SE on how to figure something out, I know Maine has got it working and Henricho (sp?) does as well in one form or another...

[Art Vandelay]

ARD will let you install updates remotely on their computers without them even knowing it. However, you will have to get ARD on there somehow.

[gorickey]

Originally posted by Art Vandelay:
ARD will let you install updates remotely on their computers without them even knowing it. However, you will have to get ARD on there somehow.

We thought of that, but we are an all wireless network....you don't want to push out 28 MB or more via ARD to all those computers....sure, we could do a few at a time...but we are trying to avoid that route and not kill our network while doing it...

[Jellytussle]

Originally posted by gorickey:
We thought of that, but we are an all wireless network....you don't want to push out 28 MB or more via ARD to all those computers....sure, we could do a few at a time...but we are trying to avoid that route and not kill our network while doing it...

Well, that data has got to get there somehow - what were you going to do with it? The problem with ARD is you can't deliver on demand.

Have a look at radmind , or see if Joel at afp548 has finished his push-installer. You could even run installer in the CLI using a LoginHook - they run as root. All my setups have a local loginHook script that checks for a network mount and script - you can do all kinds of fun stuff then.

[gorickey]

Originally posted by Jellytussle:
Well, that data has got to get there somehow - what were you going to do with it? The problem with ARD is you can't deliver on demand.

We were going to burn the data onto a CD after combining all the updates into a Metapackage installer....hand out 30 CD's to a classroom, have the kids push a single "Click Me" script and voilá, done.

I'll look into your suggested options a little bit...I fear that "radmind" is very network intensive though, it seems to be the OS X replacement for OS 9's "Assimilator" program and therefore would NOT be an option over the airport network.

Thanks.

[ibookuser2]

Really 28MB over a wireless network is nothing. And it doesn't really matter if you do one or thirty at the same time - the data is sent via broadcast. If 28MB will kill your network, then you need to think about redesigning your network.

[gorickey]

Originally posted by ibookuser2:
Really 28MB over a wireless network is nothing. And it doesn't really matter if you do one or thirty at the same time - the data is sent via broadcast. If 28MB will kill your network, then you need to think about redesigning your network.

How about 1700 at a time then? Trust me, you don't want it going over wireless...a redesign may be the answer down the road; however, not right now...

[Art Vandelay]

Originally posted by ibookuser2:
Really 28MB over a wireless network is nothing. And it doesn't really matter if you do one or thirty at the same time - the data is sent via broadcast. If 28MB will kill your network, then you need to think about redesigning your network.

Not quite. It's a shared network, but it does not broadcast the data. It will have to send that 28MB file to each connected computer. So, if there are 20 computers connected, it will have to send 28MB twenty times. Because it's a shared network, each computer will see that 28MB file twenty times. It wouldn't be a problem if you could multicast the file, but Software Update doesn't use multicasting.

[gorickey]

Originally posted by Art Vandelay:
Not quite. It's a shared network, but it does not broadcast the data. It will have to send that 28MB file to each connected computer. So, if there are 20 computers connected, it will have to send 28MB twenty times. Because it's a shared network, each computer will see that 28MB file twenty times. It wouldn't be a problem if you could multicast the file, but Software Update doesn't use multicasting.

Exactly....hence our "put on CD" idea.

I guess if worse comes to worst, we could have the teacher go to each of her students computers and type in the admin password and they could get the updates from the Metapackage...but we would really like to make it as easy as possible...