In this lesson, we're going to discuss building manifests now, a manifest is a list of applications
and mobile configuration profiles that are needed to get a machine into production.
So if you remember from a demo we had to manifest, we had sites default, which had Firefox and a flash
player, and then we had a developer's manifest that had Atum in it and an option.
We had Microsoft remote desktop, but it also got Flash and Firefox installed because it included the
manifest default.
Now, this may seem like a good way to go have a site default that has all of your software in it and
then have manifest named after groups or departments so they can get the remaining software.
Well, if you have many groups or you have many classrooms and you want them all configured differently,
then you may end up with a lot of manifests.
Ideally, you would have this few manifests as possible and still have all your machines configured
the right way.
Now, let's go ahead and take a look at our software.
And first of all, Adobe Flash Player is only needed if Firefox is needed.
So let's go to our site default and let's go ahead and get rid of Flash and then say this.
And then what we want to do is we want to get flesh and we want it to be a requirement for Firefox,
so now in Firefox is installed, then Adobe Flash will gets installed along with it.
Now, that doesn't reduce the amount of manifest that we have, but it does make our manifest easier
to read.
And if you have dozens of applications than anything that you can do to make it easier to read is going
to be a big help.
All right.
So let's go down our application list and we have Adam now.
Adam, we wanted to be in the developer's group, OK?
But in our organization, all of our developers use laptops.
And so what we could do is if we go to site default and we go ahead and we add Adam to our site default,
what we can do is we can create a condition now for this condition.
I want the machine type to be a laptop, and if the machine is a laptop, then I know a developer is
using it.
So let me go over to manage installs and then go to Adam and then create a condition machine type equals
laptop.
And now for our developers, we also have Microsoft.
Remote desktop is an optional install and we only wanted those to be available for developers as well.
So I can go ahead and add that and put on the same condition.
And now with one manifest, all of my developers are going to get add in the Microsoft remote desktop
and are regular users.
Well, so we can go ahead and now get rid of the developers manifest.
All right, so let's keep going so we have audacity and we have a handful of people that use this now
it Asadi is free software and it also has a small footprint.
So if there's no harm in installing it, then you could install it for everybody.
And then you don't need a special manifest for, say, audio or multimedia.
So let's go ahead and add and add audacity to.
Our site to manifest.
All right, so now we have Jianyu cash.
Now I know this is free software, but let's just pretend it's quick books and it only goes into our
accounting department or maybe it's just used by one or two people.
Well, we can go ahead and still put it in site defaults manifest.
So what we can do is we can create a condition.
And we can match it to a specific hostname or we could even match it to a machine serial number.
All right, so now only one machine is going to get quick books.
OK, so now over here, I've got a viewer and so teen viewer is used by people in our tech support department.
So if I go to sites to fall and I create a new condition and I say hostname begins with and then all
of our tech support people are in L.A. and they're in building one and they're in room one 20.
Then I can create that as a condition and now when I go ahead and I add team fever and I give it that
condition, then only people in the tech support department or are going to go ahead and get team viewer
installed.
So the rest of this stuff is are things that I want everybody to get.
I want everybody to have a printer, everybody to be on the domain.
And so here I also have my VLCC preferences and the Velzy preference mobile config profiles.
And so I'm going to want to go ahead and make sure that those are updates for VLCC.
And I'm just going to want to go ahead and add to the list.
OK, so now I have all of my main software, but we know we didn't put in our auto or our mobile can
fix, so let's go ahead and hit hide.
And so we want enable S.H. and we want install printer and we want joint domain.
Just going to skip the wallpaper.
Now, that was a good exercise, but I don't actually want to use that.
And then let's get the put the shares on the desktop.
Now everything else is already in our group.
Adobe Flash is an upgrade in Microsoft.
Desktop is an option in the vasi press or an upgrade.
So now all of our applications and all of our configuration profiles are in a single manifest.
And yet only the people that need the software are are going to get it.
OK, so now we can go ahead and run monkey.
And see that we get all the applications, we're supposed to go ahead and bring this over here and run
it on this one.
All right, so as you can see on the L.A. machine, we've got team viewer, which was only supposed
to go to machines in this room, and then we've got Firefox and we'll see the acidy flash, which was
a requirement of Firefox, even though it wasn't in the manifest specifically.
And we got privacy preferences, both of them.
And we got to see again, those weren't in there specifically, they were upgrades for LC and it looks
like all of our mobile config profiles and other custom packages to install settings are there.
All in all, we got 11 updates.
And then on this machine, looks like we got all the same stuff.
But we've got the Jianyu cache, which was tied to our serial number instead of 10 viewer.
And none of us got Adam nor Microsoft remote desktop as an option because neither of these machines
are laptops.
So the fewer manifest that you can create, the better off you're going to be.
It's just much easier to manage less manifesto than it is to manage more.
Now, you could have a manifest for each group, department or classroom, but you're going to get into
scenarios where you are going to have some manifest that's going to need one or more other manifests
and it will quickly become confusing, trying to stack everything.
So if you could reduce it down to the least number possible and then use filtering, then it's going
to go a long way.
And if you have some really crazy machines out there, you can just create a manifest for that one particular
machine or one or two couple machines.
But when you have a manifest that's unique to a machine, then when you see that manifest, it's just
you're going to know what it's for.
Another reason to reduce the amount of manifest comes down to the installation of monkey itself.
If you don't specify a manifest when you install, Monkey will first look for a manifest named after
its fully qualified domain name, followed by its host name, followed by its serial number.
And then lastly, sites default.
When you install a monkey, if you don't specify a manifest and you have manifests that are just named
after, say, serial number and cite default and these manifest meet all the requirements of your organization
and you really don't have to worry about manifest names when you install monkey.