Deploying AppleMail settings via ARD - is it possible?

Question

Hello,
I want to set AppleMail settings for about 50 Users via ARD.
First of all IMAP settings, next account details based on the local non-admin user.
Any idea?
Thanks a lot!
Jochen

Answer 1

ARD cant do this directly, but you can send an OSA script to do this. Here is one I use. You send a UNIX command:
osascript -e 'tell application "System Events"' -e 'keystroke "q" using command down' -e 'end tell'
You can string together commands by using -e. This comes in really useful for product serial numbers, for instance:
osascript -e 'tell application "System Events"' -e 'keystroke "Company Name"' -e 'keystroke tab' -e 'keystroke "Company Location"' -e 'keystroke tab' -e 'delay 2' -e 'keystroke "REALLY long pointless serial number"' -e 'delay 2' -e 'keystroke return' -e 'end tell'
In this example, "delay 2" means wait two seconds. Older systems / apps will actually have an issue with receiving the keystrokes to fast, and do nothing. Quark is the worst offender here, and I need to run a delay of 5 seconds, even on mac Pros.
I also use it for logging in a bunch of system as a maintenance user. I will log out everyone, and then issue:
osascript -e 'tell application "System Events"' -e 'keystroke "Service User"' -e 'keystroke tab' -e 'delay 2' -e 'keystroke "myPasswordHere"' -e 'delay 2' -e 'keystroke return' -e 'keystroke return' -e 'end tell'
You will notice here that you need to hit enter twice... This is a bug in the login system. 50% of your systems will not continue with hitting enter only once in script (although they work perfectly fine hitting enter once at the keyboard).
Hope this helps.