Fetch Softworks

Bonjour in Shortcuts (11 posts)

• Started 16 years ago by jimkirk
• Latest reply 15 years ago from Scott McGuire

• jimkirk Member

  Hi,

  Is it possible to disable Fetch 5.3 from displaying Bonjour computers in the shortcuts? I don't see a specific preference setting related to this; however, if there is some backdoor method, I am all ears.

  Thanks,

  Jim

  Posted 16 years ago #

• Scott McGuire Administrator

  Hi Jim,

  No, I'm sorry, but there isn't such a preference, backdoor or otherwise.

  We'd like to hear why you'd like to disable this feature, though - we're always interested in feedback.

  Thanks,

  Scott McGuire
  Fetch Softworks

  Posted 16 years ago #

• jimkirk Member

  Hi Scott,

  I work for a University, and we're interested in disabling for computers running in our computer labs to prevent an easy way for students to browse through shares that may be unintentionally left open on student machines in the dorms, such as the guest account on 10.5 (or intentionally left open, but this would be to help dissuade them from poking around during class or downloading files to lab machines which we may not wish to have them do). Additionally, some of our Bonjour printers are showing up in the list which is kind of pointless.

  If there was a toggle (or property we could edit in the plist file if you wanted to mask it) for this that would be great.

  Thanks,

  Jim

  Posted 16 years ago #

• Scott McGuire Administrator

  Hi Jim,

  Thanks for feedback, I will pass it along and put it in our feature request database.

  If there are Bonjour printers showing up, it must be because those printers are running FTP or SFTP servers! (I guess you could upload a file to them to be printed...)

  It sounds like you'd like to just be able to turn off a Mac's ability to detect things via Bonjour in general, not just in Fetch; you might want to file a feature request with Apple for that as well. (Obviously, if Bonjour was disabled on the whole Mac, Fetch would not show the Bonjour servers.) There is no way to do that now that we know of.

  Thanks again,

  Scott McGuire
  Fetch Softworks

  Posted 16 years ago #

• jimkirk Member

  Thanks, Scott.

  "If there are Bonjour printers showing up, it must be because those printers are running FTP or SFTP servers!"

  Sadly, it would not surprise me, if they were. But suffice it to say, those are not located within my area.

  Jim

  Posted 16 years ago #

• Scott McGuire Administrator

  Hi Jim,

  Sorry, just to clarify, I didn't intend that sentence as "you ought to know that!" I intended it to express surprise, because I'm kind of surprised to hear there are printers that advertise Bonjour FTP servers.

  And also, I'm back with good news - I was discussing your feedback with my colleagues, and it turns out we do actually have a hidden preference to disable the Bonjour shortcuts in Fetch 5.3. Here's what to do:

  * Quit Fetch.
  * Open Terminal.
  * At the Terminal prompt, type:

  defaults write com.fetchsoftworks.Fetch RendezvousEnabled -bool false

  And that should do it. This change is stored in the com.fetchsoftworks.Fetch.plist file, where the other Fetch preferences (except for shortcuts) are stored.

  To re-enable them, enter the same command, except replace "false" with "true".

  (As you can see, this preference predates Apple's renaming of Rendezvous to Bonjour.)

  However, my colleagues - and I - want to emphasize again that this is not a complete solution; as I'm sure you know, even after you turn it off in Fetch, there are plenty of other ways for users to browse for shares via Bonjour in other standard Mac programs (such as Safari and the Finder). So you should definitely send feedback to Apple requesting a way to turn off Bonjour system-wide.

  But I hope this helps do what you want.

  Thanks,

  Scott McGuire
  Fetch Softworks

  Posted 16 years ago #

• jimkirk Member

  Thanks again, Scott.

  This will work great. I recognize there are many other ways to get at the Bonjour shares; however, I think masking the obvious will at least help to cut down on this sort of thing. I do agree that there needs to be a system-wide way to turn off Bonjour. Oddly enough, and as you're likely aware, there is a checkbox for it in 10.4 's Directory Access application; however, it is not able to be manipulated. Sort of pointless, but I guess they simply did to bring attention to the fact that Bonjour service is running. No such service is listed in the Directory Utility in 10.5 though.

  No need to apologize for your previous statement either. It is surprising; I agree. I can only imagine that they were left on by someone who set them up out of the box and didn't know any better to disable the service. I know several printers from various manufacturers we have on campus (Xerox, Dell, HP, etc.) support printing and firmware upgrades over FTP, but why anyway would need to print over FTP is whole other question entirely . . .

  Cheers,

  Jim

  Posted 16 years ago #

• Scott McGuire Administrator

  Hi Jim,

  You're welcome.

  While of course we'd like people to use FTP as much as possible, it does seem an odd way to print. But there must be some people who use it...

  Best,

  Scott McGuire
  Fetch Softworks

  Posted 16 years ago #

• iangoos Member

  Originally posted by ScottMcGuire:

  Hi Jim,

  Thanks for feedback, I will pass it along and put it in our feature request database.

  I too would like to see the feature to turn off Bonjour shortcuts. My main reason is to just cleanup the interface and the number of available shortcuts in the list. Right now there are about 50 additional entries in my shortcut menu. I am in a managed environment where the bonjour server is visible but none of us non admin users have passwords to make use of them.

  I did try the terminal entry as a regular user in 10.4.11 and it works as advertised. Even if it isn't a feature built into the program, perhaps an AppleScript included with the program to let the user choose it from within Fetch?
  Anyway, thanks for the help with the terminal line.

  Ian

  Posted 15 years ago #

• timcrawf Member

  We'd like to hear why you'd like to disable this feature, though - we're always interested in feedback.

  I would like this feature as well. Why? Very simple. I enable ssh access to all clients that I administer. Fetch sees this as SFTP, it then adds every Mac to the list of shortcuts. This makes for a long list of computers that none of my users will ever access. They have 3 shortcuts that they use.

  So let me ask why NOT allow us to disable it?

  Posted 15 years ago #

• Scott McGuire Administrator

  Hi timcrawf,

  Thanks for the feedback.

  We do have a way for you to disable them; it is mentioned several posts above. I will repeat it again here.

  * Quit Fetch.
  * Open Terminal (inside the Utilities folder inside your Applications folder)
  * At the Terminal prompt, type:

  defaults write com.fetchsoftworks.Fetch RendezvousEnabled -bool false

  And that should do it. This change is stored in the com.fetchsoftworks.Fetch.plist file, where the other Fetch preferences (except for shortcuts) are stored; so you can distribute an updated com.fetchsoftworks.Fetch.plist file to each of your users. (Or you could write an AppleScript for them to run.)

  I realize this is not as easy as telling your users to uncheck a checkbox, but I hope it will help.

  Thanks,

  Scott McGuire
  Fetch Softworks

  [This message has been edited by ScottMcGuire (edited 04-07-2009).]

  Posted 15 years ago #