Hi guys
Sorry to start off on a moan but I'm sick to death of iPads I seem to waste hours every time I try and do the smallest of things with them because there’s some Apple created obstacle or set of hoops to jump through. Sorry to rant!
I will explain a bit of background: My school has purchased 30 iPads split into two sets of 15 in charge & sync trolleys and a MacBook to manage. This is a secondary school and they’re being used as a recourse available to book out for lessons therefore they’re being used by multiple users throughout the day. We currently have them set up using Configurator with one Apple ID and we’ve locked them down (as much as Apple will allow, not great) and have put a few free apps on.
Sorry if I’m about to sound totally clueless! In all honesty I am clueless when it comes to these iPads. The purchase of them was decided by management without any consultation with IT (surprise surprise) and I have no experience, interest or training/help with iPads, none of us even have one at home. I‘ve got as far as I have with a lot of time wasted online and trial & error.
Anyway, my latest problem(s): I have heard that it would be best to have one Apple ID per iPad instead if we want to silently push and install paid apps. We do particularly need to silently push and install especially if/when the iPads are scaled. Our 3 strong IT team doesn’t have the time to be going through 100s of iPads. After a lot of hoop jumping I have been presented (at last) with a spreadsheet of codes from Apple for the iWork apps that we qualify for. As we have only put a few free apps on using configurator I am now looking for the best way to get these iWork apps out….. Without having to do something on each individual iPad.
Also, if I need 30 individual Apple IDs for the iPads, how does this affect managing the iPads on Configurator? Whether it is the “correct” way or not, we set up the 30 we have by setting up one iPad with the Apple ID and so on, creating a backup, then applying this via Configurator to the other 29. When we need to wipe all the silly photos and other junk the students have left on them, we apply a clean backup to all 30….. Which includes the Apple ID information. Have we gone about this all wrong?
