Beyond just getting the devices up and running, ensuring a smooth and straightforward device setup process is essential for both IT teams and end-users. More often than not, the initial setup is challenging for IT teams, with several IT hours spent setting up user accounts, configuring network settings, and deploying necessary software.
One of the major hurdles IT admins face while configuring the ADE/DEP setup for Apple devices is managing account privileges. While the Primary Account should ideally be set as a Standard Account to enhance control and mitigate security risks, it’s often complicated by the need to assign Admin privileges. This not only adds to the complexity of device management but also introduces potential security vulnerabilities.
Additionally, there’s the challenge of maintaining a dedicated management account for routine administrative tasks. This account is crucial for tasks like maintenance and scripting but must also be secure and easily accessible—even in scenarios where the password is forgotten.
We recognized these challenges and to solve them, we’ve introduced the Pre-Stage Setup for Account Creation feature within the ADE/DEP enrollment process.
With this feature, we aim to help streamline device setup on Scalefusion while also significantly enhancing IT teams’ efficiency. By automating the account creation process, IT teams can now minimize the potential configuration drift and reduce manual errors, ensuring consistency across devices. This ultimately saves valuable time for IT teams, allowing them to focus on more strategic tasks.
It supports the creation of an ADE Admin account and enables password changes via Scalefusion MDM, without requiring the Scalefusion Agent. This ensures that the admin account remains consistently accessible on all enrolled devices.
How Does It Work: Simplifying Account Setup During Enrollment
During the ADE/DEP enrollment process, IT admins can now pre-configure primary account details, making the initial device setup more intuitive and user-friendly. Whether you want to prefill account information or skip account creation entirely, the choice is yours.
With this feature, IT teams can choose to:
Create a Primary Account:
Use custom properties (like $device. or $user.) to automatically prefill account details, and decide whether users can modify these details during setup. Additionally, you can control whether the Primary account will be set as an Admin or a Standard account.
Skip Primary Account Creation:
Opt to bypass the creation of a primary account, streamlining the process for situations where it’s unnecessary. This option is particularly useful when IT admins need to set up the device themselves before handing it over to the user at a later point. In such cases, the admin can create an Auto-Admin account and skip the primary user account creation.
And there’s more. IT teams can choose to create an Admin account during the enrollment process. For those who require an admin account during enrollment, the Pre-Stage Setup offers the option to create ADE Admin accounts seamlessly.
Not only can this account be hidden from the end-user, but it can also be configured as the managed or enrolled user instead of the default primary account.
These accounts are displayed as ADE accounts in the UAM section and cannot be downgraded to standard users or deleted, ensuring a consistent level of control and security.
To get started with the configuration, you do not need the Scalefusion MDM agent,
Closing Lines…
The Pre-Stage Setup for Account Creation is set to redefine the enrollment experience for macOS devices, providing IT teams with the tools to create a smooth, efficient, and user-friendly setup process. This enhancement not only reduces the cognitive burden on IT teams but also ensures that end-users have a hassle-free experience from the moment they power on their device.
We’re thrilled to bring you this feature as part of our ongoing commitment to improving device management. Stay tuned for more updates as we continue to innovate and evolve. We highly value your feedback—please share your thoughts and suggestions with us at [email protected].