MacAdmins Conference 2024: Full Schedule

MacAdmins is the premier East Coast conference for anyone who deploys and manages devices in the Apple ecosystem. Over the last 14 years we featured hundreds of sessions and many workshops with top notch speakers in the MacAdmins community. MacAdmins offers an incredible level of expertise, value, entertainment, and a great opportunity to network with your fellow admins!

Registration is now OPEN!

9:00am EDT

Dive into PowerShell on the Mac

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A workshop that will help you learn about Microsoft’s cross-platform scripting language, PowerShell, and how Mac admins can make use of its features to make their day so much easier

Any prerequisites: Yes – it’s required. A reasonably current MacBook, Visual Studio Code, and the current version of PowerShell for macOS. Scripting experience, especially in non-Mac environments is a big help.

Remember: You've already selected your workshop during registration. Adding this workshop to your sched agenda does not count.

Speakers

John Welch

Lead Software Engineer, Honeywell

John's been a part of the Apple world for decades, focusing on automation, network monitoring, and badgering companies about their install experience. He's worked in multiple industries including: Higher Ed (Private & Public), Finance, Advertising/Marketing, Datacenters, City Government... Read More →

Tuesday July 9, 2024 9:00am - 4:30pm EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Workshop

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-04

9:00am EDT

Maximizing macOS: Insider Tips for Efficient Mac Administration

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Have you ever watched a conference presenter or YouTube tutorial about a topic, but while the presenter is talking, you notice them do some keyboard shortcut magic to complete a task that normally takes you 3 times as many steps?

In this session, we hope to teach you some of those shortcuts, tools, tips, and tricks to help you be a more efficient Mac Admin.

Speakers

Nathan Felton

Senior Client Platform Engineer, Flywire

Senior Client Platform Engineer @ Flywire, Father, casual gamer, nature and green advocate, and technology enthusiast.

Dennis Wurster

Associate Director of Computing, Eastman School of Music - University of Rochester

Dennis provides Apple-focused expertise in his role as Associate Director of Computing at Eastman School of Music. He has written for technology journals and presented at several conferences. Away from the keyboard, Dennis enjoys cycling, automotive technology, and travel.

Wednesday July 10, 2024 9:00am - 10:15am EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Toolbox Fundamental

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-15

10:45am EDT

macOS application packaging 101

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This session will discuss the various ways Apple recommends for packaging applications, with a focus on installer packages.

Speakers

Rich Trouton

IT Technology Senior Consultant, SAP

Rich Trouton has been doing Macintosh system and server administration for over twenty years and has supported Macs in a number of different environments, including education, government, research, and software development._x000D_ _x000D_ Rich has also written for Peachpit, Apress... Read More →

Wednesday July 10, 2024 10:45am - 12:00pm EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Deployment Fundamental

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-17

1:30pm EDT

A Contemporary Wi-Fi Toolkit for Apple System Administrators

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This session provides a survey of the current landscape of built-in and third party Wi-Fi analysis and troubleshooting tools available to administrators of Apple platforms.

Speakers

Chris Dawe

Fighting Tiny Fires

Chris Dawe is an independent consultant specializing in Apple technologies and networking. Chris speaks regularly on industry topics such as Wi-Fi networking and IT management, acts as Board Secretary for the Mac Admins Foundation, and helps lead the regional meetup group Apple Admins... Read More →

Wednesday July 10, 2024 1:30pm - 2:45pm EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Toolbox Fundamental

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-28

3:15pm EDT

How Apple Rolls: A Guide to Understanding What’s Next

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Come learn how Apple constantly iterates and how it affects MacAdmins in this history lesson in Cupertino-ology, as we take a look at technical milestones and transitions such as MDM and Apple silicon and learn how to see what’s coming next.

Speakers

Adam Selby

Senior Platform Engineer, Mac Engineering

Adam Selby is a Senior Platform Engineer working in the Financial Services Industry, after spending a decade managing Apple platforms in Higher Education.

Wednesday July 10, 2024 3:15pm - 4:30pm EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Toolbox All Levels

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-33

9:00am EDT

macOS 15: What You Need To Know

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Need the lowdown on what's up with the latest version of macOS? This session will be your guide into the new features and changes coming in macOS 15, and how they'll affect you and your users, and what you can do to prepare!

Speakers

Robert Hammen

IT Systems Engineer, macOS & iOS Platforms

As a former IT manager, consultant, Apple Certified System Administrator, and Apple Certified Trainer, Robert has been managing Macs since before the days of OS X. For the last 4+ years he's been responsible for managing all of the Apple devices both on earth, and in space, at a reusable... Read More →

Thursday July 11, 2024 9:00am - 10:15am EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Toolbox All Levels

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-37

10:45am EDT

Building Support Tools with a Purpose

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Support and troubleshoot Mac and macOS with a small, remote team, remote clients, and excellent customer satisfaction. Empowering users, translating problems, asking the right questions, and building a team to do more.

Speakers

Justin Henderson

Technical Services Director, Alectrona

Justin is the Director of Technical Services at Alectrona with over 8 years of experience in the Apple Consulting world in various roles. He’s a member of the Apple Consultants Network, a JAMF Services Partner, and an evangelist for remote work. He is a music, travel, technology... Read More →

Andrew Myers

Client Platform Engineer, Alectrona

Andrew is a seasoned Mac Admin working within multiple MDMs, open-sourced MacAdmin tools, and just getting Macs into organizations. Before Alectrona, he worked in higher education for over 10+ years.

Thursday July 11, 2024 10:45am - 12:00pm EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Toolbox All Levels

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-40

1:30pm EDT

Unified System Logs - The key to root cause

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sysdiagnose and Unified System Logs are one of the corner stones to good root cause analysis. Learn how MDM vendors like Jamf and Addigy use these logs internally for anything from support cases to better understating OS features where documentation is not as detailed as it could be. We will cover use cases for macOS, iOS, iPadOS, and tvOS. Additionally we will cover best practices in submitting Apple Feedback to ensure full details and the right logging is included and useful to Apple.

Speakers

Bryce Carlson

Senior Product Manager, Addigy

After my family's iMac G4 in 2002 changed the course of my life to focus on Mac management I have worked for K-12 and Higher Education organizations in macOS and iOS deployment, and evolved that into directly working in the MDM sector. First, at Jamf in 2016 and now Addigy since... Read More →

Thursday July 11, 2024 1:30pm - 2:45pm EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Toolbox Intermediate

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-47

3:15pm EDT

Jamf App Installers & Software Update: Reclaim your time and sanity

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Since last years engaging session Jamf app installers have grown up, with plenty of new features. And now it has a new sibling; Software Update

Hear first hand from David (Horizon BCBS) how both work in the real world, saving precious time, and sanity while increasing productivity

Adam (Jamf) will discuss new features and enhancements, and see where we are going in the future. There will be time for attendees to share their experiences and feedback with Jamf App Installers and software update

Speakers

David Goldberg

Desktop Engineer, Horizon BCBS of NJ

Mac Admin specializing in Jamf Pro

Adam Derrick

Apple macOS and iOS Professional, Jamf

Hi there! I started using a Mac while in school back in the early 90s. I thrived on helping others with their Apple devices and became "The Apple Guy" at my first employer. I've since spent the last 16 years wearing many hats supporting Apple devices in Education, Commercial, and... Read More →

Thursday July 11, 2024 3:15pm - 4:30pm EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Deployment All Levels

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-49

9:00am EDT

Optimize DNS for Cloud Service Performance

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Solid DNS is needed to allow high performance access to cloud services. This session will review how to test DNS, optimize DNS and provide high performance DNS access.

Speakers

Ben Greisler

Owner, Kadimac Corp.

Over a quarter century in the tech world building, fixing, writing, training and still always learning.

John Soward

Research IT, Dataseam & University of Kentucky

John has been working in IT since 1988, spending most of it with Unix-like systems including NeXTSTEP and MacOS. He's worked in startups in the insurance, VR and film industry, and spent over 20 years in higher ed. He currently teaches computers science at the University of Kentucky... Read More →

Friday July 12, 2024 9:00am - 10:15am EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Toolbox Intermediate

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-56

10:45am EDT

Return to Service Interactive Lab

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It's summer. Are you refreshing your student or classroom iOS devices and want to do it quickly? Return to Service eliminates the need to manually guide an erased device through certain Setup Assistant screens that could previously not be skipped, including the screens for setting the language and region, and connecting to Wi-Fi.

Join us for a hands-on tour of our latest iOS and iPadOS apps and workflows that simplify and scale mobility at large.

Speakers

Adam Derrick

Apple macOS and iOS Professional, Jamf

Friday July 12, 2024 10:45am - 12:00pm EDT
TBA 4 Penn Stater Conference Center Hotel, 215 Innovation Blvd, State College, PA 16803, USA

Deployment All Levels

Feedback Link https://bit.ly/psumac-2024-59