Having the same software on all user accounts

[al3000]

My sister has got a new iMac and I am setting it up for her later this week. I will be installing Microsoft Office & the software that comes with the printer. The iMac will have about 4 or 5 (if possible) user accounts, and I need a way to install these onto all of the users areas at once, instead of doing it manually on each one which will take a while.

Is there a way to do this? Thanks in advance

 

[SilentPanda]

As long as you install it in the default Applications folder all users can use all programs unless you restrict it otherwise. You don't need to install them for each user. You will only have to drag the icon from the Applications folder to that persons Dock if they want it on their Dock.

 

[yellow]

The software (should be) gets installed in /Applications, which is accessible to all users logged into the Mac. You should not be reinstalling for each user's local home directory. Unless you're talking about the icons in a user's Dock, not the actual installation of the software?

 

[al3000]

How stupid of me, didn't realise it was this easy! Thanks for your help.

 

[SilentPanda]

How stupid of me, didn't realise it was this easy! Thanks for your help.

There is no such thing as a stupid ques... well... yeah there is but... being new to the Mac is intimidating at first... when I got my first Mac (iMac Lampstyle) I reformatted it about once a week for a month as I thought I was messing it up past a point where I could never fix it again... now I know that aside from being pretty hard to do that such thing I wasn't doing too shabby for the first Mac tryout.

Search then ask! You'll be fine.

 

[SmurfBoxMasta]

Made the switch!

Since you are a switcher, we forgive you

Just keep on forgetting all that windblows stuff, open your mind to the mac way, and you wil be fine

 

[smwatson]

Is this the same for files like photos and music? I will have two accounts me, and the rest of my family and i need them to be able to access all music and photos, but not my files and not be able to change stuff. So, when my iMac returns from repair after 2 days mad: ), is there a way to achieve this???

 

[m-dogg]

Is this the same for files like photos and music? I will have two accounts me, and the rest of my family and i need them to be able to access all music and photos, but not my files and not be able to change stuff. So, when my iMac returns from repair after 2 days mad: ), is there a way to achieve this???

Sorry to hear you had a problem 2 days after you got it. That definitely isn't the norm.

Regarding music & photos, those are not shared between users. Each user will maintain their own separate library. For some people this is the preferred approach, for others it is not.

If that isn't what you want, there are some freeware/shareware apps that can help you work around it, but I do not have any personal experience with those. You can try searching for sharing 1 music/photo library across multiple users and you should find some info - It has been discussed many times before and should give you some options...

 

[SilentPanda]

There is a user directory called "Shared" under the User directory. I'm pretty sure if you tell iTunes to organize your music folder here along with iPhoto organizing your photos there then all users who also organize their photos and music there will be shared. Play around with it a bit with 1 song or 1 picture.

 

[yellow]

How to share music between different accounts on the same Mac: http://docs.info.apple.com/article.html?artnum=93195

Unfortunately, it's a bit more complicated for Photos (iPhoto).