Thursday 21 February 2013

deploying Flash Player on OS X using Apple Remote Desktop

So, all computer suites now have outdated flash players. To deploy I found it VERY difficult to find the official solution. Adobe tend to want each computer to be installed by a user:

http://www.adobe.com/devnet/flashplayer/enterprise_deployment.html


But of course students log in and do not have permission to install! Luckily someone found a quick solution here. Turns out the flash installer (.app!!!) comes with a pkg file. Solved. (haven't tried it yet!!)

Just tried it on OS X 10.6 and worked perfectly!!

Don't know why this isn't documented very much.

Basically:

  1. download flash player
  2. right click on the install flash player.app file and select "Show package contents"
  3. go to Contents > Resources > Adobe Flash Player.pkg
  4. copy this and use Apple Remote Desktop to deploy!
Cheers


The latest news is that you're best off applying for the latest distribution, which involves filling out a small form, confirming your email address, and then waiting for approval. Takes about 1 hour. Here's a link:

http://www.adobe.com/uk/products/players/flash-player-distribution.html

They then send you a link to the installer (pkg file) Yay!

1 comment:

  1. This worked for me until this last update. I now get an errro Adobe Flash Player.pkg could not be installed. No error message was returned. In reading the Flash Player admin manual

    Silent installation of Flash Player
    Do the following to silently install Flash Player 11.3 on Mac:
    1 Extract the Adobe Flash Player installer bundle (Install Adobe Flash Player.app) from the .DMG file.
    2 Open a terminal window and change to the directory where the .app file is saved.
    For example, if the .app file is saved on the Desktop of the current user, type: cd ~/Desktop
    3 Run the installer contained in the .app file using the following command:
    sudo ./Install Adobe Flash Player.app/Contents/MacOS/Adobe Flash Player Install Manager -
    install
    4 Type the password to proceed with the installation.
    Note: You need to be a super user to proceed with the installation.
    Note: This is the only supported method to install Flash Player silently on Mac. Other methods, such as extracting and installing the .pkg file, are not supported and not recommended.

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