Setting Up XCreds for Labs

Lab environments provide some interesting challenges for management of user passwords. If you are managing a lab of Macs with XCreds installed, below are some recommendations.

1. Set up the preferences to automatically sync the cloud password to the local account. This will prevent the user from being prompted for the prior local password. To set this up, XCreds needs access to the local admin passwords to reset the local password and re-key the keychain. To do this, set the local admin password using the command line interface for XCreds. Send this command to each lab machine using your management system:
   
   xcreds set-admin-user --adminusername <adminusername> --adminpassword <adminpassword>
   
   
2. Set the preference in XCreds to silently overwrite the password. When a user logs in and their cloud password does not match the local password, the user will not be prompted for their prior password, a new keychain will be created, and the local password will be updated to their cloud password.
   
   PasswordOverwriteSilent: true
   
   
3. It is recommended to clear out any local accounts once they have exceeded 200 user accounts created. The easiest way to clear out the accounts is to wipe and restore the Mac at the end of the school semester or school year.