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I hope this is the right stackexchange site for my question.

My workplace is a 30 person company with majority of workers using macbooks as their workstation.

I am wondering what is the proper way to deploy applications on OS X that will be scalable as my company grows. Especially applications that are only available on the App Store like Keynote, Pages, Numbers

Currently, I simply have a new Apple ID created under the staff's office email address and add in gift card credit (to avoid tying down a company CC to the account). And then manually download the relevant apps.

There were ideas of just having one Apple ID shared across all macbooks, but I am sure there are legal/licensing issues behind that.

MechaStorm
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  • You can start as [small as ARD](https://www.apple.com/remotedesktop/) or look at [other deployment options](http://www.cultofmac.com/160154/thousands-of-macs-in-the-enterprise-how-the-big-companies-roll/). It really depends on how much client management your company is expecting. – jscott Oct 08 '13 at 18:02

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The JAMF Casper Suite of products is the industry leader for OS X deployment and management. Think of it as being very similar in function to SCCM for Windows machines.

That said, SCCM 2012 and later can deploy applications to OS X in a very similar way to how it deploys applications to Windows clients. If you're already leveraging SCCM, you can extend it to support OS X with minimal effort and maintain a single pane of glass into your client configuration.

MDMarra
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An option that I know of would be to use Novell ZENworks as it supports the OSX environment. You can research more about it here:

http://www.novell.com/media/content/mac-management-with-zenworks-application-management.html

Novell typically is less expensive than Microsoft solutions. But is also less reliable in my professional experience. This option may not be feasible as you're dealing with a relatively small client base (cost x users).

Colyn1337
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The answer depends on the source of the application.

If the apps are desktop apps that you install from an installer, then you can use a a setup like RADMIND (http://rsug.itd.umich.edu/software/radmind/).

If the apps are iTunes/AppStore apps that you install from iTunes/AppStore, you should be able to share that app via a single AppleID (https://apple.stackexchange.com/questions/6283/can-i-install-apps-bought-on-the-mac-app-store-on-multiple-computers).

A better solution would be to subscribe to the Apple Volume Purchase Program (http://www.apple.com/business/vpp/). You can also read this for more detail: http://www.techrepublic.com/blog/apple-in-the-enterprise/how-to-create-an-apple-vpp-account-and-distribute-apps/

In either case, you should consult the vendors of the applications for licensing, before you approach the solution.

Community
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