[Casper] School District Smart Groups

Fri Apr 17 08:04:44 PDT 2009

Looks like there are some good answers here already but I thought I'd
throw what we do out too.
We have 36+ different buildings, (schools and admin buildings) each
building has it's own prefix wich is two or three letters based on it's
name for instance Oak Ridge Elementary is OR or the District Office is
DO   Then that is followed by an indicator of what type of users it is
T=Teacher, S=Student, A=Administrator  Then it goes to location based
naming such as room number, lab, or cart number.   If it is a lab or
cart machine the last chunk is then an additional number so for a lab at
Oak ridge it would look something like this OR-S-Lab1-23    For Oak
Ridge Elem. Student machine, Lab 1, seat 23.      I then can build
several smart groups that a particular machine would fall into.
Anything that starts with OR- goes in the Oak ridge smart group, I can
then make anything that is OR-S- fall into a student group, then
anything with OR-S-Lab goes into a lab smartgroup and anything with
OR-S-Lab1 goes into the lab1 smart group.    Another reason I like doing
it that way is if a computer dies or something, if you replace it and
image the new computer with the same naming convention that new computer
will then fall into whatever policies have been applied to that
particular smart group.     
I have smart groups for several buildings that contain all of the labs
and mini labs and then I have management policies applied to them.   And
quit often throughout the year machines are swapped in and out of those
labs and mini labs for other uses.  As long as the building level tech
images it with the correct naming convention they automatically fall
into the smart groups and thus into the correct policies too.  
Works well for us at least.   
Also if you want to then build hardware specific smart groups you can
make the smart group with several variables.  Such as name like OR-S and
hardware architecture is PowerPC.    So when we have to push something
out to all student machines that are PPC we just drop in that smart
group to a policy and tell the building tech to reboot or whatever
trigger we want and it just goes.   

-Dusty-

Dustin  Dorey
Technology Support Cluster Specialist
Independant School District 196
Rosemount-Apple Valley-Eagan Public Schools
dustin.dorey at district196.org
651|423|7971

-----Original Message-----
From: casper-bounces at list.jamfsoftware.com
[mailto:casper-bounces at list.jamfsoftware.com] On Behalf Of Matthew Butch
Sent: Friday, April 17, 2009 9:06 AM
To: Casper List
Subject: Re: [Casper] School District Smart Groups

Yeah we do that as well, but ours has building name, then Mac or PC,  
then T for teacher and no T for student, then the asset tag. IE:

BdgMacT01222

Makes it very easy to pick teacher vs student, as well as the building  
they are in.

-Matt

On Apr 16, 2009, at 10:46 PM, Adam Shepard wrote:

> Each of our schools has their own prefix and asset tag as well.
> CS-123456 would be an example. The problem is that we have that same
> naming convention for all our computers, whether it is a desktop or
> laptop, teacher or student machine. I can easily do smart groups for
> each site and that works well for things that I need to install at a
> site on all their computers but we have some specific software for
> teachers and some for students.
>
> As we have 9 schools the ultimate goal would be to have a group for
> students at each site and a group for teachers giving us a total of 18
> groups.
>
> On Apr 16, 2009, at 7:23 PM, Mark Hughes wrote:
>
>> we have about 6000 laptops that we organize using smart groups based
>> on computer name.  Each high school has a specific prefix for their
>> building
>> and the name contains their asset number that each laptop is assgned
>> ie AAA_KCK01234
>> and the group is made up as Computer Name like AAA.
>>
>> Mark Hughes
>>
>> Mark Hughes, Apple Technician
>> TIS Department, KCKPS USD500
>> Cell 913-449-7791
>> mahughe at kckps.org
>>>>> Adam Shepard <adamshep07 at aol.com> 04/16/09 9:13 PM >>>
>> I work for a school district with ~3500 computers. There isn't a
>> specific model machine that we have for all our staff and our all
>> student computers so that makes creating smart groups difficult. I
>> wanted to see what other school districts are doing doing to create
>> groups either smart or static. Eventually we plan to re-image all of
>> our student machines so they will pass through Casper Imaging in the
>> near future but long term and for policy I would like to have groups.
>>
>> -Adam
>>
>> Adam Shepard
>> Creighton School District
>> Web Developer / System Administrator
>> [Office 602-381-6000][Cell 602-319-8935]
>
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--

Matthew Butch
Technology Support Analyst
Penn Manor School District
717-872-9500 x 2385
http://www.pennmanor.net

Apple Certified Macintosh Technician
Apple Certified Help Desk Specialist 10.4
Apple Certified Support Professional 10.5
Apple Certified Technical Coordinator 10.4 & 10.5
Apple Certified Systems Administrator 10.4

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