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Osxc – Simple configuration tool for OS X

by robinricard on 5/4/14, 12:14 PM with 44 comments

• by zdw on 5/4/14, 1:14 PM

  Another project that uses the same tools (Ansible/Homebrew) to accomplish the same/similar goals:

  https://github.com/32degrees/battleschool

  If you're going to do this on a wider scale (multiple machines, managed in an organization), the best tools right now are AutoPKG and Munki:

  https://github.com/autopkg/autopkg http://code.google.com/p/munki/

• by taylorlapeyre on 5/4/14, 1:12 PM

  I'm struggling to see how this is better than a simple bootstrapping script. Every feature you list can be accomplished in very few lines of bash:

  https://github.com/taylorlapeyre/.files/blob/master/osx/boot...

• by jimmcslim on 5/5/14, 12:55 AM

  One blind spot that all of these OS X configuration tools appear to have is the App Store. Not through any fault of their own I suspect... more that Apple hasn't opened the App Store app to being scriptable. But a command-line way of installing/reinstalling/updating App Store apps would be great.

• by weitzj on 5/4/14, 3:23 PM

  I am using Github's Boxen, which works quite well https://boxen.github.com/

• by rafeed on 5/4/14, 6:18 PM

  This is neat. I think it'd be pretty awesome if it were possible to download all the dmg's/installers/apps in a folder/drive without installing them so at a later date you could a) install everything without having to wait hours to download or require an internet connection and b) keep your packages up to date (almost as a backup) running the script every once in a while to make sure you have the most up to date packages/installers.

• by robinricard on 5/4/14, 12:16 PM

  I think the project is not largely usable for now, I just want some feedback from HN to get it usable for everyone (and not just for me).

• by danieldk on 5/4/14, 1:44 PM

  For some reason I'd never seen Homebrew Cask before, which looks very interesting! Does anyone have experiences with Cask to share?

• by emdowling on 5/4/14, 9:28 PM

  we use Ansible across 300 hosts, including some Mac guests. Well-tested playbooks for Mac are hard to find, so this is awesome.

• by mukundmr on 5/5/14, 5:13 AM

  How is this different from Chef / Puppet?

• by runjake on 5/4/14, 4:20 PM

  The osxc website and documentation is riddled with basic grammar and spelling errors and incorporates slang like "osxc got your back". That doesn't inspire much confidence.

  Edit: Wow with the downvotes. I'm just offering feedback in a polite manner for what a lot of others are probably thinking.