This is the solution I have come up with after a while. There may be other solutions...
Why and what does it do? (or replace the "it" with "I")
The problem is I could not find any way to manage the Adobe CC credentials from the server by distributing plists or any other kind of file. I would have to give every student the CC credentials if they wanted to work with the programs. I tried copying user folders, settings, looked into the keychain but found no hint. So I had to go another way.
I manage the computers by configuring a master machine as far as possible. Afterwards I use DeployStudio to create an image of this machine which I distribute to my other computers. If I use the System Imaging Tool, the credentials are deleted so I would have to go to every machine and store the credentials manually over and over again...
I noticed that Adobe CC stores the credentials for every user that logs on instead of machine-wide. That gave me the idea to create a bunch of users on my master machine that could be "pawns" to execute CC and therefore load their credentials instead those of the user currently logging on. This required a change in the sudoers' file and a login hook. Another way could be a desktop shortcut. But I wanted it to launch automatically. The script I wrote below runs at max 10 seconds to kill any Adobe process and relaunch with the credentials of the cc users mapped to the machine. I execute several scripts at login time, the Adobe Script runs in the background to not delay the login process.
- This step is as proposed by Romsinha. I created multiple Adobe IDs with email addresses like
student1@somewhere.com
student2@somewhere.com
.... - I created the corresponding users on my iMac that serves as the master image for my other machines. So then I have the users
ccstudent1, ccstudent2, ... - Log in as each of the users and log in to their corresponding Adobe ID via Creative Cloud (student1@... = ccstudent1 etc.). This will store the credentials in each local account of the CC users. I did not find any kind of .conf or .plist file that contained the credentials so I could just copy it somehow.
- Open up a terminal, type
sudo visudo - Add the following lines to the corresponding places or keep the order at least:
# User alias specification - these are the users allowed to execute Adobe CC as another user later on - mine come from an Active Directory
User_Alias MACUSERS = %everyone
# Cmnd alias specification - the application that shall be executed as another user
Cmnd_Alias ADOBECC = /Applications/Utilities/Adobe\ Creative\ Cloud/ACC/Creative\ Cloud.app/Contents/MacOS/Creative\ Cloud
# Runas alias specification
Runas_Alias CCUSERS = ccstudent1,ccstudent2,ccstudent3,ccstudent4,ccstudent5,ccstudent6,ccstudent7,ccstudent8,ccstudent9,ccstudent10,ccstudent11,ccstudent12,ccstudent13,ccstudent14,ccstudent15,ccstudent16
# allow Adobe CC to be executed as a user from CCUSERS by any user specified in MACUSERS without password prompt
MACUSERS ALL=(CCUSERS) NOPASSWD: ADOBECC - Add a login hook to execute the following script. This will kill any Adobe process and launch Adobe CC as the ccstudent?? mapped to the current computer. One could have written it more elegantly, but the number of machines I have to manage is small enough to use a simple case construct. For my case the script is stored in the admin user's folder and another login-hook stored on my Open Directory server executes this script.
#!/bin/bash
# Thilo Enters, Hochschule Karlsruhe 2013
# Version 1.0
USER=$(whoami)
LOG="/var/log/LoginHookHska.log"
COMPUTER=$( scutil --get ComputerName )
CCUSER=""
TIME_LIMIT=10
case "$COMPUTER" in
"iwi-mki-og-01")
CCUSER="ccstudent1"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-02")
CCUSER="ccstudent2"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-03")
CCUSER="ccstudent3"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-04")
CCUSER="ccstudent4"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-05")
CCUSER="ccstudent5"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-06")
CCUSER="ccstudent6"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-07")
CCUSER="ccstudent7"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-08")
CCUSER="ccstudent8"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-09")
CCUSER="ccstudent9"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-10")
CCUSER="ccstudent10"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-11")
CCUSER="ccstudent11"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-12")
CCUSER="ccstudent12"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-13")
CCUSER="ccstudent13"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-14")
CCUSER="ccstudent14"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-15")
CCUSER="ccstudent15"
;;
"iwi-mki-og-16")
CCUSER="ccstudent16"
;;
esac
echo "Running Adobe CC from $USER as $CCUSER on PC $COMPUTER" >> $LOG
STARTTIME=`date +%s`
ENDTIME=`date +%s`
RUNTIME=$((ENDTIME-STARTTIME))
ADOBE_ALIVE=1
while [[ $RUNTIME -le $TIME_LIMIT ]] && [[ $ADOBE_ALIVE -ne 0 ]]; do
ENDTIME=`date +%s`
RUNTIME=$((ENDTIME-STARTTIME))
killall -KILL "CEPServiceManager" >/dev/null 2>&1
killall -KILL "Core Sync" >/dev/null 2>&1
killall -KILL "Adobe CEF Helper" >/dev/null 2>&1
if killall -KILL "Creative Cloud" >/dev/null 2>&1; then
ADOBE_ALIVE=0
fi
done
echo "Adobe was alive $ADOBE_ALIVE and the runtime was $RUNTIME" >> $LOG
sudo -b -u "$CCUSER" /Applications/Utilities/Adobe\ Creative\ Cloud/ACC/Creative\ Cloud.app/Contents/MacOS/Creative\ Cloud