Thoughts about Imaging
My transferable thoughts about imaging which have can combined from Mac and the MS world. It’s all about the thin and scripting. I like many were using Full disk golden clones, every time a new update came out or a new department was made this equaled a headache. I also found issues with incremental updates and adhoc builds.
At one of my employers we were Mac heavy using the above methods and rapidly increasing. I then put a plan into action but how did I get from 1hr+ with manual work to 27 minutes with a cup of tea config? Easy when I look back at it but it did take some work. I did some testing with Deploystudio & Munki and soon learnt this allowed for incremental updates and workflows to live client and deploying clients. With a massive brucie bonus of manageable departmental builds.
How did VMware help me here. Simple I put everything on my MacBook Pro Lab from the magic triangle for joining Mac’s to the domain and Mac servers to catalogue the apps and deploy them to clients.
Sure there are paid tools like JAMF Casper Suite but again you may not be big enough to justify this due to your Mac estate and its another thing to learn. The best part about Munki and Deploystudio is they are free apart from some of your time to get your first image right. There are also plenty of documents out there to get you started or drop me a tweet and I will do my best to help!
To help get you started head of to a great set of guys Amsys. This guide is for V1 but really best to start at the beginning with this stuff . Who needs a massive training course!
You don’t get this with an AD plugin! Also remember your time this is a major justification for a shiny new Mac server. It probably less than you building all these mac by hand each time☺
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