The VMware Workspace ONE Admin Assistant tool helps you to manage applications through Internal Apps (Full Software Distribution) in Workspace ONE UEM. This tool is built using components of Munki, to aid in parsing application installers for the required metadata.
Due to limitations of the Workspace ONE UEM server to natively process the macOS software metadata, the Admin Assistant app was created to help administrators generate the required metadata to upload to Workspace ONE UEM. Using the makepkginfo tool from Munki, the Admin Assistant app extracts metadata from macOS software installers into a plist file, sometimes referred to as a metadata file or pkginfo file.
Workspace ONE UEM requires the pkginfo metadata file along with the application installer file to manage the deployment in the UEM console. The Admin Assistant also tries to extract an icon image file that can be optionally uploaded into the UEM console. The Admin Assistant app allows you to easily upload the .dmg, .pkg, mpkg, and .app files.
In the Admin Assistant 3.0, a command-line interface (CLI) is introduced to work alongside the app interface. Admin Assistant CLI provides a streamlined experience where just one command allows you upload the application and metadata straight to the console. The Admins can now use the GUI to parse packages and use the CLI to upload packages to the console. Future versions of Admin Assistant will add more parity between the app and the CLI functionality.
Admin Assistant CLI Usage Help
Using the CLI, there are several ways to read more about how to use the tool and the built-in subcommands. To access the help information in the CLI, enter the following in the terminal:
/usr/local/bin/adminassistantcli/usr/local/bin/adminassistantcli -h/usr/local/bin/adminassistantcli -help/usr/local/bin/adminassistantcli <subcommand> -helpThe following image depicts the Admin Assistant CLI interface
The following tables lists the basic commands that are used to run the Admin Assistant in the CLI mode.
| Commands | Description |
|---|---|
adminassistantcli config –-signin –-groupID “groupID1” --hostname “hostname1" |
Required. Prompts interactive login terminal. Allows you to perform a successful sign-in. |
adminassistantcli config --list |
Allows you to list the configurations saved in the keychain. |
adminassistantcli upload --installer-path "/Users/example.dmg" --metadata-path "example.plist" --icon-path "icon.png" |
Allows you to upload the files and displays the URL to view in console. GroupID can optionally be changed. Uploading an icon is optional. |
adminassistantcli --signout |
Allows you to signout from the Admin Assistant tool. |
Best Practice to Parse Arguments
Admin assistant CLI accepts information using both double quotes and single quotes. However, the best practice is to use single quotes as it accepts all the arguments as a String. Instead of taking the data and the special characters as commands, it is processed as just the plain text.
