Third Party Print Installer force quits all applications - Composer cannot capture

phillippe99
New Contributor

Hi All

This may sound a dumb question. I was using Composer to capture a print driver install. Alas part way through, the installer force quit all other running applications including Composer. Naturally when I re-opened Composer it had failed to capture the install. Is there anyway of using composer to snapshot installs which force quits all running applications?

The installer was a xerox phasor 3320 for Mountain Lion

Thanks in anticipation.

3 REPLIES 3

mm2270
Legendary Contributor III

So, when you relaunched Composer it didn't come back up to the "install your software" stage? If not, I guess that could be because the installer ungracefully force quit it, because normally its not an issue for Composer to start where you left off.
If so, you can try this instead-
Do your initial pre-installation capture, when Composer tells you to run your installer, quit Composer normally (don't let the installer do it for you), run your printer driver installer, relaunch Composer and it should come back up to the point where you can do your "after" capture.

That said, I would strongly advise not using Composer captures as they can miss stuff and not be the most reliable (queue a donmontalvo rant on Composer :D )
If this driver is in pkg or mpkg format, try using it that way. Of course, I assume if it quits apps when you run it it may do the same when pushed via policy or whatever, which could be a problem. (talk to the developer about that - shame on them)

If its not a standard installer, but is one of those custom "app" installers (man I hate those) then you might not have a choice but to do the Composer capture.

hkim
Contributor II

Ugh. It's a VISE installer. *FACEPALM*

donmontalvo
Esteemed Contributor III

mm2270 wrote:

That said, I would strongly advise not using Composer captures as they can miss stuff and not be the most reliable (queue a donmontalvo rant on Composer :D )

I'm hoping JAMF Software is considering making an offer to Stéphane Sudre to roll in his most excellent Packages applciation into Casper Suite. Or at least make it a supported option. ;)

Xerox bought ACS, so not surprised they've got a wonky installer development team using depreciated (read: cr@ppy) installer technology that requires touching/sneakernet. That's what happens when a company decides to eat at McDonalds...

If you've got a Xerox rep, open a formal ticket, asking for guidance on automated deployment.

http://www.support.xerox.com/support/phaser-3320/file-download/enus.html?operatingSystem=macosx108&f...

LOL...depending on the competency level of their OS X dev team, who knows, they may tell you to "snapsnot" things (yea, good luck with that), or they may provide a script...

Don

--
https://donmontalvo.com