You might want to centrally manage various Mac OS X settings that affect the operation of Microsoft Office 2008 or the security of users' computers. Some preferences are stored in the form of Mac OS X system preferences; other settings are in the form of mechanisms such as the Keychain Access application.
The following table provides examples of system preference settings that it might be useful for you to manage centrally. These settings can be configured for the Internal Modem, Built-in Ethernet, and Built-in FireWire interfaces.
System preference setting | Description |
|---|---|
Search Domains on the TCP/IP tab | Domain information for completing user-entered URLs that are not fully qualified |
DNS Servers on the TCP/IP tab | Preferred Domain Name System servers |
The proxy settings on the Proxies tab | Proxy server port settings |
To access these settings, on the Apple menu, click System Preferences, and then under Internet & Network, click Network. On the Show pop-up menu, click the interface that you are configuring.
Several tools are available that can be used to set system preferences on users' computers:
Apple Workgroup Manager
Apple Remote Desktop command-line interface
AppleScript written to control the Mac OS X Terminal utility and deployed by using Apple Remote Desktop. Terminal is located in /Applications/Utilities.
For information about Workgroup Manager, see
Client Management
in the Mac OS X
Server area of the Apple Web site (www.apple.com/server). For detailed information about managing preferences with Workgroup Manager, see the
Mac OS X Server User Management documentation available for download from the Apple Web site (www.apple.com/server/documentation).
For an introduction to Apple Remote Desktop, see
Apple Remote Desktop 3 on the Apple Web site (www.apple.com/remotedesktop). For detailed information, see the
Apple Remote Desktop Administrator's Guide documentation available for download from the Resources page in the same area of the Apple Web site.
For information about the Terminal utility, see Terminal Help.
