Setting preferences for all users on OSX?

Soldato
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How do you go about setting (and locking) settings for all users on OSX? I need to set up colour calibration settings, photoshop settings etc, then lock them down and have them applied to all users.
 
If you go in to System Preferences and edit the Colour profile can you just click the padlock?

Assuming they don't know the password it'll prevent them changing it. However, I am not sure about Photoshop.

I use it myself, but not with other users on the same machine. Sorry.
 
How do you go about setting (and locking) settings for all users on OSX? I need to set up colour calibration settings, photoshop settings etc, then lock them down and have them applied to all users.

You can set preferences to be inherited for all users using this folder:

/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Library/Preferences

You need to be logged in as root in a terminal in order to access the User Template folder.
 
If you go in to System Preferences and edit the Colour profile can you just click the padlock?

So just log in as Admin and lock it? Will that save it for all users including network users?

You can set preferences to be inherited for all users using this folder:

/System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Library/Preferences

You need to be logged in as root in a terminal in order to access the User Template folder.

Thanks for that. Not sure if IT will give me root access though and I've got no experience of using the terminal. Surely there is an easier way of setting system wide user preferences. Thanks for the help though guys.
 
Just to bump this a little. So if I enable root user and log on as root, then go to /System/Library/User Template/English.lproj/Library/Preferences will this have all the preferences for Photoshop CS2 as well? Once I've sorted the preferences, will they all be picked up by Active Directory users logging in? Also how are the preferences edited? Are they preferences panels or do I need a binary file editer or similar?
 
Right, Ive sorted it now. The way I did it was;

Log in as admin
Create a new user called 'default'
Log in as default
Set everything to how I wanted (dock items, colour profiles, photoshop setting etc)
Clear the cache, trash etc
Log in as root
copy the 'default template' and replace /System/Library/User Template/English.lproj

This works fine for new users, but it seems I need to delete any existing domain users if I want it to apply to existing users. Not a problem apart from loads of them have saved stuff on the desktop. :(
 
Right, Ive sorted it now. The way I did it was;

Log in as admin
Create a new user called 'default'
Log in as default
Set everything to how I wanted (dock items, colour profiles, photoshop setting etc)
Clear the cache, trash etc
Log in as root
copy the 'default template' and replace /System/Library/User Template/English.lproj

This works fine for new users, but it seems I need to delete any existing domain users if I want it to apply to existing users. Not a problem apart from loads of them have saved stuff on the desktop. :(

Using Applescript, you could do something like this:

Code:
on adding folder items to thefolder after receiving theAddedItems
set ext to {"app", "txt", "doc"}
set dest to {"Path:to:Apps folder:", "Path:to:text files folder:", "Path:to:Word files folder:"}
set n to count of ext
repeat with fle in theAddedItems
repeat with i from 1 to n
set extn to item i of ext
set this_info to info for fle
set the current_name to the name of this_info
if current_name ends with extn then
set source to quoted form of POSIX path of fle
set destfolder to quoted form of POSIX path of ((item i of dest) & current_name)
set cpy to "mv " & source & " " & destfolder
do shell script cpy
exit repeat
end if
end repeat
end repeat
end adding folder items to

:)
 
Thanks guys. That would be fine for the future. My issue now is to backup all of the files on the desktops, then get people to stop using the desktop as a dumping ground. Whats wrong with using your network drive dammit!
 
I use a shell script to remove all user accounts on logout which is a lot less complicated than EVH's example.

It's not a user account script.

Thanks guys. That would be fine for the future. My issue now is to backup all of the files on the desktops, then get people to stop using the desktop as a dumping ground. Whats wrong with using your network drive dammit!

FYI: My script looks at files with a specified extension e.g. ".doc" and moves them to the appropriate folder, which you can also specify.

Just thought it might be handy for you Messiah Khan..

I.e You could tell it to move all ".psd" files saved on the desktop to "Photoshop projects" on a network drive ;)
 
It's not a user account script.



FYI: My script looks at files with a specified extension e.g. ".doc" and moves them to the appropriate folder, which you can also specify.

Just thought it might be handy for you Messiah Khan..

I.e You could tell it to move all ".psd" files saved on the desktop to "Photoshop projects" on a network drive ;)



Ah ok. Nice, cheers for that. I really need to get my head around apple script me thinks. I've just about got my head around my problem, but there are a few things bugging me; The colour profile keeps resetting to 'cinema display'. Ive got around this by putting it directly in the Library>coloursynch>Profiles>Displays folder. But it would be nice if I could just use one saved in the user templates folder.

secondly some of the photoshop 'preset' files don't seem to be stored in the user templates folder as I have to set them up on each machine. Anyone know where the preset file is stored for the print settings preset? Im guessing its directly in the applications folder, but im not quite sure which file.
 
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