Where have I been for the last few months? And why have I not been posting? I’ve had a lot on my plate, both personally and professionally, but it was time to dust off the typewriter and share some of what I have been up to. I had saved in the drafts an article aptly named “Winter is Coming, Sonoma is almost here.” I never got a chance to actually push publish.

It is almost here! Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), and with it will come the announcement of the new version of macOS 14 Redwood. (Of course I’m guessing about the name). A lot of enterprises are now fully on macOS Ventura or have most of their fleets on the latest OS. This is the time when the Engineering teams are well versed in the new features and bugs and are also starting to look ahead at what is next.

Every once in a while we experience a network problem on an iOS or iPadOS device that requires deeper troubleshooting. For example, a VPN client that is not connecting and has limited logging capability. On the other side, the network team is saying: “It’s not us, it’s the client.” The only way to approach this is with data. On a macOS device you would fire up tcpdump and get what you need, but what about iOS and iPadOS?

Controlling the idle time before the Screen Saver activates is a common sense security practice. It is one of the first items that auditors ask for. For a long time we have been able to control this setting via MDM profiles, but Ventura introduced a welcome change. Let’s take macOS Monterey as an example. In the screenshot below, a profile is being applied to set the Screen Saver to activate if the device is idle for 900 seconds (15 minutes).

Screen Recording during Enrollment and setup. We often have to create screen recordings for training, documentation or troubleshooting purposes. I was surprised at a mac admins meeting when someone asked how they should do it and using a cell phone to record was suggested. Yes, you could do that in a pinch, but the quality is not great, especially for training material or for a larger audience. The other idea included video capture devices and external streaming hardware and software, like you would use for live streaming a gaming session.

When using Workspace ONE for modern management of macOS devices, most of the time I live in the UI, but once in a while it makes sense to just use the API. You can use any method, from PowerShell in Windows to the terminal, but for this example I’ll use Postman , you can check out my post for more of my commonly used tools. I won’t go into the process of downloading and setting up Postman or creating the necessary permissions for an API account on your WS1 instance.

This week I got to play a little with OpenAI ChatGPT bot, and wow, we have to talk about this… Any time there is a fundamental leap in technology, it comes with the usual responses: apprehension, denial and most often fear. OpenAI’s ChatGPT chat bot is no different, it is by no means the first, but it is definitely one of the most advanced that has been opened for the public to try out.

CUPS has changed! And it may have gone unnoticed to some. One of the many challenges of integrating a new OS is testing compatibility with all of your existing software stack. Sometimes you know what to expect. For example, an architecture change like Intel to Apple Silicon, or KEXT to System Extensions. But it is the quiet changes that can hurt you the most. The sometimes undocumented deprecations in API, cyphers, etc.

macOS Ventura is here! Ready or not! The day we have been preparing for is finally here! For the last five months we have been testing, preparing, and testing again. Now, eleven Betas and two Release Candidates later, we have arrived. For many though, Ventura is coming whether they want it or not. For years we have been accustomed to getting an “Install OS Name.app” being downloaded to /Applications and then starting the update from that location.

What’s in your toolkit? Over many years of working on Apple Devices we tend to acquire a set of tools, very specialized tools, that fit our purpose. I thought it could be fun to share what is in my toolkit and why. Packages I build a lot of custom packages, anything from a single script to a complex deployment package with pre-install and post-install scripts as well as payloads consisting of multiple embedded installers.

What is new with macOS Ventura and security We are all looking forward to the new features and stability of the new macOS, but with it usually come new challenges for Mac admins. Let’s just examine two of them. Login Items Software Updates Login Items It is an essential part of many software packages to be able to start services behind the scenes. Most of these are necessary and benign.

“macOS Ventura is coming…." It is only July, but don’t let that lure you into a false sense of security. Before you know it, it will be October, and your org will be asking, “When can I install the shiny new OS?” “Maybe not today." Here are some things that you can be doing to prepare now. Download and install the betas - yes all the betas. Prepare an install plan, use the AppleSeed for IT if you have it.