TIE 2016 Presentation Materials

iPad Classroom Management using Meraki Systems Manager 

Monday, 10:55AM -  11:50AM

Fontenelle A

Thanks to everyone who attended the SME session.  Below are some resources that cover what was discussed.  Feel free to contact me if you have any questions on what we covered.

Meraki - Teacher's Assistant Introduction
https://meraki.cisco.com/blog/2015/05/systems-manager-your-new-teaching-assistant/

Meraki - Teacher's Assistant Posts
https://meraki.cisco.com/blog/tag/teachers-assistant/

Display Device-Assignable Status in Meraki SME

One of the most common questions I have had with app assignment since Meraki introduced support for iOS 9 is deployment problems with apps that are not device-assignable.  If an app is not device assignable and you have not granted a VPP license to the AppleID that is signed in on the device, the user will be prompted to enter an AppleID and password.  If a developer has opted to allow their app to utilize device assignment, Device-Assignable will be displayed on the app description page from the VPP portal.  (See Below)

If the app is not yet device assignable, I would recommend contacting the developer and requesting that they update their app and enable device-assignment.

If you want to see which apps are device assignable from the Meraki SME Dashboard perform the following steps.

• Go to Systems Manager > VPP
• Click the + symbol on the right side of the column headings
• Check the box next to Device-assignable

The Device-assignable column should now be visible and display a "Y" or "N" to show whether an app is device assignable.  Of course Y=Yes and N=No.

Meraki SME Device App Assignment

Apple made a huge announcement at WWDC 15 that iOS 9 would support device app assignment.  Gone are the days of using Configurator, VPP codes and multiple AppleIDs for those of us who manage carts of iPads as well.  Meraki quietly released an update that added this feature to organizations who have Systems Manager Enterprise.  Sorry, if you are still on Legacy Systems Manager this feature will be unavailable.

I've been testing it this week and it has been solid thus far.  I'm going to give a brief overview on the setup below.

Enable Device Assignment

Before you can use Device Assignment you must enable it for your organization.

Go to Organization > MDM

Under the Apple VPP Managed Distribution there is a new column titled Device assignment.  You have the option to disallow access, allow any network, or only specific networks to utilize the VPP licenses.

Assign Apps to Devices

This is where iOS admins will save a lot of time.  Since we no longer need to assign a license to an AppleID, we can go right to the App assignment page.

Go to Systems Manager > Apps

Click Add New > iOS App

Search for an app you already have a VPP license for.  Remember, you need to "purchase" licenses from VPP even if it is a free app.

Click the Add button next to the app you want to add.

Now we need to set the scope for the app and the purchase method.

First, set the scope for the devices that you want to receive the app.

Next, change the purchase method to VPP Device Assignment

If you want the app to install automatically, make sure the Disable auto-install box is unchecked.

Click Save Changes

The app should now push out to the device within a few minutes.  If you are impatient like me, you can click on the Re-push to missing link to speed things up.

Troubleshooting

• Device prompts for AppleID
• Make sure you have VPP licenses available for the apps you are pushing out.
• Ensure you have enabled the VPP account for device assignment on the correct network.

TIE 2015 Slides

Hello everyone,

Thanks for attending the session at TIE 2015 on Meraki Systems Manager.  I have updated the slide deck and made some changes in response to some of the questions from the sessions.

Jordan

Slide Deck

Disable LanSchool Audio (Speak) Feature on Macs

To disable the ability to listen to the microphone on client computers as well as the ability to speak to client computers follow these steps:

• Download the installation source from Stone-ware.
• Launch the lanschool_teacher.dmg and navigate to the Mac > Utilities folder.
  
  
  
  
  
  
• Double click on DisableAudio.zip to extract the file.
• Use Apple Remote Desktop to copy the utility to the teacher machines.
• Copy the utility DisableAudio to the teacher machines.  We use /var/tmp as our location.

• Run DisableAudio with no parameters to disable the ability to listen or speak with client machines.
• Use ARD to send a UNIX command to the client to run DisableAudio as root.

• The teacher will need to quit and relaunch LanSchool for the change to take effect.  The Speak button should now be greyed out in the Teacher console.

Enable the Audio (Speak) Feature

To enable the audio speak feature, we will use the same procedure except for the UNIX command.  This time we want to add the FALSE parameter.

The teacher will need to close and reopen LanSchool for the change to take effect.  The speak button should now be available.

Adding Keychain Menu to the Mac Menu Bar with Profile Manager

Now that support has all but been dropped for MCX and Workgroup Manager, it is time to start pushing out our settings and customizations with Profile Manager.  I will be making a series of posts on using Profile Manager to apply settings to the menu bar in OS X.

I am using user groups with nested AD users to apply the settings, your environment may be different.

• Login to Profile Manager
• Click on Groups and select the group you want to apply settings to.
• Clic Settings
• Scroll all the way to the bottom and click on Custom Settings.
• In the preference domain type com.apple.systemuiserver.plist
• Under Property list values, type the following in the key field:  /Applications/Utilities/Keychain Access.app/Contents/Resources/Keychain.menu
• Select String for the type.
• Click OK.
• Be sure to click Save to apply the settings.

The clients should have the Keychain menu icon the next time they login.

Add Users to VPP in Meraki

When using Meraki Systems Manager, free apps will push out just fine without being assigned a license.  The users will simply be prompted for their Apple ID and password.  To use managed distribution and deploy paid apps the users have to be invited to VPP.

To invite users to participate in VPP:

1.  Login to Meraki Systems Manager

2.  Go to MDM > VPP

3.  Click the User Management tab

4.  Click +Add User

5.  Enter the name and email of the user.

6.  Check Send invitations automatically and click Save

From the user's iOS device:

1.  Access the user's email account.

2.  Open the invitation email from Meraki.

3.  Click the invitation link.

4.  After being redirected to the App Store, agree to the terms and conditions.

5.  Click Ok after the VPP assignment has been confirmed.

Now app licenses should be able to be assigned to individual users for paid apps.