Can Fog image Macs?
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A (hopefully) simple question… can Fog be used to image Macs?
I’ve found a number of posts from 2012 stating that the biggest reason for lack of Mac support at the time was because partimage could not work with HFS+ file systems. Now that Fog uses partclone, I’m hoping it supports Mac imaging, but I’ve been unable to find a clear answer, let alone any guides on the subject. Found [URL=‘http://www.fogproject.org/wiki/index.php?title=How_to_get_Macintosh’s_Netboot_working_with_your_FOG_server’]an old guide[/URL] about setting Fog as a NetBoot server, but it looks like Fog doesn’t do the actual imaging in that scenario.
Any information on this subject would be much appreciated. Thanks in advance!
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ever hear that the simplest questions have the most complicated answers?
fog does support the file systems used for macs, but macs do not use normal network boot methods. there are users that have fog working on macs, but it isn’t something that is straightforward and i haven’t had a chance to work with it yet myself. hopefully someone who knows more will chime in. -
DeployStudio ?
[url]http://www.deploystudio.com/Home.html[/url]
I don’t think FOG would be able to bind OSX to Open Directory (correct me if I’m wrong), but DeployStudio can.
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Yeah, DeployStudio is the other option I’m looking into. Certainly looks capable. I would just prefer to use Fog since I’m in a mixed Windows and Mac environment and it’d be simpler to manage images for both in the same system if possible. But it sounds like it’s probably not simple to get Fog to image Macs.
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[quote=“AlvinLorus, post: 42513, member: 28646”]Yeah, DeployStudio is the other option I’m looking into. Certainly looks capable. I would just prefer to use Fog since I’m in a mixed Windows and Mac environment and it’d be simpler to manage images for both in the same system if possible. But it sounds like it’s probably not simple to get Fog to image Macs.[/quote]
I’ve used DeployStudio a lot, back when I was stationed at an exclusively Mac school.
It’s an amazing product, really is, and I’ve seen it work amazing. BUT, in that particular school at that particular time, the network performance wasn’t really acceptable and DeployStudio performed poorly as a result (not it’s fault though).
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I can tell you, for a fact, FOG will work with Macs, but it does take a little extra work.
Right now I only know of one person who’s natively capable of imaging Mac’s with fog.
The methods used are already prepared in our ipxe files but I have not come up with a nice method to dhcp.
The way the one person did it was to install isc-dhcp server on the system and through the use of user-classes, was able to point the mac’s to download the ipxe.efi file. This file, from there on, works just like our normal fog menu minus the pretty interface stuff.
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[quote=“Tom Elliott, post: 42523, member: 7271”]Right now I only know of one person who’s natively capable of imaging Mac’s with fog.[/quote]
Make it two on your list Tom! I’ve successfully tested imaging our mac minis with FOG and I am in the process of making it all working in our normal lab scenario.
So to answer the initial question: Yes it can be done and I love it for the exact same reason (mixed linux, win, macos environment!). HFS+ is not an issue (anymore). Network booting is a bit different to PC-BIOS style but can be done en mass! WOL is even more tricky.
Please let me know if you run into trouble and I’ll point you the way.
