Warning: Apple 'could very easily' cripple Jamf

Apple is preparing to compete unfairly against enterprise device management firm Jamf, an advocacy group claimed on Monday, and has asked regulators to take a stand. "Apple's tight control over which companies can play in its sandbox means that it could very easily choose to break or drop Jamf if doing so could open up a new …

[theOtherJT]

Apple could very easily cripple jamf...

...further.

Apple could cripple Jamf further.

It seems like hardly a month goes by that Apple doesn't release some new update that randomly breaks something we were relying upon in Jamf. Not that I expect that to get any better if Apple do decide to start offering their own management tool - which by the way it is utterly fucking insane that they don't already, and that we have to buy something like Jamf in the first place.

Apple device management in the enterprise space is a total shit-show. Given the incredible level of control Apple have over their devices it continues to drive me up the wall how reluctant they are to provide tools that can actually manage them properly.

[DougMac]

Re: Apple could very easily cripple jamf...

Apple's complete history has been to ignore the enterprise space with prejudice.

[anothercynic]

Re: Apple could very easily cripple jamf...

They had tools. They threw them out with the bathwater when they ditched OS X Server. And the Apple Configurator tool just about does the trick for much of what's needed, except when you have to roll things out. That's why Jamf managed to survive. They've provided the glue. Now Apple plans to make its own...

[Orv]

Re: Street signs

I was gonna say -- if they want to compete with Jamf why did they throw out Profile Manager?

[Frank Bitterlich]

Re: Apple could very easily cripple jamf...

Now Apple plans to make its own...^{[citation needed]}

Jamf: "Theoretically, they could break our product."

CfA: "They will break Jamf's product (sooner or later). Defund Apple!!!1!"

And now we're at "Now Apple plans to make its own..."...

Chinese whispers...

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: Apple could very easily cripple jamf...

Well, to be fair, when we started to do research into enterprise management tools that did not pose a security and privacy risk (or, put a different way, did not set us up for later regulatory problems) we had to take jamf off the list quite early on.

I can't say that our strict criteria apply for everyone, but jamf got an early 'no'.

From what I hear our search has come up with some alternatives, but there's also talk of developing our own now but the review hasn't finished yet.

[Snowy]

An ostensibly nonpartisan left-wing advocacy organization

Does such a thing even exist?

[Claptrap314]

Re: An ostensibly nonpartisan left-wing advocacy organization

CNN? The New York Times? NPR?

Just how many do you want?

[Steve Davies 3]

Re: An ostensibly nonpartisan left-wing advocacy organization

CNN is moving to the right in an attempt to recover some viewers. They want to target those Republicans who find Pox News (Fox News) too extreme.

[katrinab]

Re: An ostensibly nonpartisan left-wing advocacy organization

What Americans describe as "communist", I would describe as centre-right, especially when it comes to healthcare policy.

[M.V. Lipvig]

Re: An ostensibly nonpartisan left-wing advocacy organization

Nonpatisan? Those organizations are incredibly partisan. There hasn't been a nonpartisan news service since the huge media consolodation of the 90s.

[ThomH]

Re: An ostensibly nonpartisan left-wing advocacy organization

In ye standard political aside: do you coincidentally mean more-or-less since the Reagan-era abolition of the FCC fairness doctrine in 1987?

[Anonymous Coward]

Re: An ostensibly nonpartisan left-wing advocacy organization

Hear hear

[captain veg]

Good

I don't use Apple kit. I'm not a sysadmin. i'd never even heard of Jamf before they started spamming my work email address.

Scumbags.

-A.

[captain veg]

Re: Good

Hello downvoters.

Are you OK with random American companies spamming me, or just the one operating in the reality distortion field?

-A.

[VicMortimer]

Why is El Reg quoting right wing sources?

"Influence Watch" is a website created by "Capital Research Center" which is a right wing group founded by people associated with "Heritage Foundation" - a far right organization.

The entire purpose of "Influence Watch" is to astroturf for big business.

"Heritage Foundation" is essentially a hate group. Their stated aims include advocating for racist homophobic, and transphobic laws.

[Claptrap314]

Re: Why is El Reg quoting right wing sources?

You know, from mid-2002 to Jan 2016, we were constantly told "Bush = Hitler". Then, suddenly, Trump became Hitler.

You're going to need to up your insult game a lot if its going to impact anyone after the last couple of decades.

[ronspencer314]

Re: Why is El Reg quoting right wing sources?

Trump was way more of a wannabe Mussolini. A blazingly incompetent fascist dictator. The deep coordination between Trump and Murdoch's publishing empire also made the combination into a combination of Mussolini and Berlusconi. I'm not sure why the two are so in love with the worst of Italian leaders over the last century.

[katrinab]

Re: Why is El Reg quoting right wing sources?

Hitler's policy was to blame the Jews for everything and use that as a means to gain power. His actual economic policies, other than the stuff about targeting Jews which he is rightly remembered and vilified for, were pretty unremarkable.

Mussolini was more about government support for big corporations at the expense of individuals as a way to achieve economic growth.

The end-game for both was of course the same, but if you were looking at them in the early stages, they looked very different. They took a very different route to the same destination.

Looking at Trump, I would say it looks more like an incompetent Hitler than a Mussolini.

[katrinab]

Re: Why is El Reg quoting right wing sources?

Trump didn't invade any foreign countries, Bush did, so in that respect Bush is more like Hitler.

But, in terms of domestic policy, Trump is certainly closer to Hitler, though Bush definitely doesn't a free pass here.

[M.V. Lipvig]

Re: Why is El Reg quoting right wing sources?

Perhaps because The Register is reporting a story and these organizations said something relevant to the topic? A proper journalist reports a story and lets the reader draw their own conclusions. An opinion writer does what you want.

A perfect journalist is one who can do political reporting for years without anyone knowing their political leanings by reading what they write. If you can determine who they voted for by reading what they report, they're really a political opinikn writer.

[DesktopGuy]

Apple Business Essentials is currently US only and so based off their acquisition of Fleetsmith which I was testing for iPad deployment.

At the moment, it is not competition to literally any of the MDM providers - even MS InTune.

Considering Apple don't support large enterprise and never did, I don't think this is too much of a concern.

Remember Apple had configurator and Profile Manager and did not really extend that out for years.

Do an Apple Deployment course and they teach you all about Profile Manager then at the end say, go get JAMF if you actually want to manage macOS properly.

Most of the changes admins complain about is standard Apple giving more power to users by not allowing remote access with accepting etc…

The big change lately has been the bootstrapping and encryption of FileVault. The first logged in user get's the token so that ruins fully automated setup workflows.

You need to log in at least once before you can deploy all the rest of the goodies successfully.

[Richard 12]

At the moment

If Apple decide they want to take enterprise seriously, Jamf will be dead within seconds.

Don't forget that Apple get alpha and beta copies of every single piece of commercial iOS and macOS software, because you cannot deploy them without sending them a copy.

So they know what Jamf are doing, and they have infinite money to throw at whatever they feel like.

They've done it before.

[Anonymous Coward]

Why is Jamf blaming Apple?

I thought Microsoft InTune was eating Jamf's lunch? I doubt it's got much to do with Apple. If you're doing Enterprise software, then don't compete with Microsoft...

[Subhi]

It has happened before

Phones4u anyone ?

[Anonymous Coward]

Apple's M.O.

I think this is pretty spot on and complete bs on Apples part, but isn't this very much "Apple", though(expect for some key exceptions)? Adamantly refuse to take part or do things your own way, see how things go, let someone take the first x trys/fails/risks, take whats made and "polish it up" change it just enough all the while freezing others out, then present it as the greatest solution to all the short comings that theyve created to others, then fully take over? A so-to-speak "Authoritarian" tech company, if you have a more accurate/better example im all ears.