ACSP Network Configuration 5 — Questions and Answers
Question 1: A technician needs to remove a stubborn network location profile from a Mac managed by MDM. Where should they look first?
- Network preferences > Locations menu
- System Settings > VPN
- Profiles section in System Settings (Correct answer)
- Keychain Access > System keychain
Correct answer: Profiles section in System Settings
MDM-deployed network profiles appear in System Settings > Privacy & Security > Profiles (or General > Device Management), where they can be reviewed and removed if authorized.
Question 2: Which protocol does macOS use by default to automatically discover printers, file shares, and other services on a local network without requiring manual configuration?
- SNMP
- Bonjour (mDNS) (Correct answer)
- NetBIOS
- LDAP
Correct answer: Bonjour (mDNS)
Bonjour uses multicast DNS (mDNS) and DNS-SD to advertise and discover services on a local network without a central server.
Question 3: A user reports that their Mac connects to the corporate VPN successfully but cannot reach internal servers by hostname, only by IP. What is the most likely cause?
- The VPN tunnel is using split tunneling
- The VPN is not pushing internal DNS server settings to the Mac (Correct answer)
- The Mac's firewall is blocking DNS queries
- IPv6 is conflicting with the VPN's IPv4 tunnel
Correct answer: The VPN is not pushing internal DNS server settings to the Mac
When the VPN does not push internal DNS server addresses, the Mac continues using its default DNS servers which cannot resolve internal hostnames.
Question 4: What is the function of the 'networksetup -setdnsservers' command in macOS Terminal?
- Flushes the DNS cache for a specific interface
- Assigns custom DNS server addresses to a specified network service (Correct answer)
- Tests DNS resolution speed for a list of servers
- Exports DNS settings to a configuration file
Correct answer: Assigns custom DNS server addresses to a specified network service
The `networksetup -setdnsservers <NetworkService> <dns1> <dns2>` command sets the DNS servers for the specified network interface from the command line.
Question 5: A Mac on a school network receives an IP but the user cannot browse to any website. Pinging 8.8.8.8 succeeds but pinging google.com fails. What is the problem?
- The default gateway is misconfigured
- DNS resolution is failing (Correct answer)
- The DHCP lease has expired
- The network firewall is blocking ICMP
Correct answer: DNS resolution is failing
Successfully pinging an IP address but failing to ping a hostname confirms DNS resolution is not working, as IP routing is functional.
Question 6: In macOS Network settings, what is the purpose of configuring a 'Search Domain'?
- It restricts browsing to only that domain for parental controls
- It appends the domain to short hostnames so they resolve correctly on a local network (Correct answer)
- It forces all DNS queries through the specified domain's nameservers
- It sets the default homepage in Safari to that domain
Correct answer: It appends the domain to short hostnames so they resolve correctly on a local network
A search domain causes macOS to append the domain suffix to unqualified hostnames (e.g., 'server' becomes 'server.company.local') enabling local name resolution.
Question 7: Which macOS feature creates an encrypted tunnel between a Mac and a private network, and is configurable directly within System Settings without third-party software for IKEv2 connections?
- iCloud Private Relay
- VPN (built-in IKEv2/IPSec client) (Correct answer)
- Network Extension framework
- Personal Hotspot
Correct answer: VPN (built-in IKEv2/IPSec client)
macOS includes a built-in VPN client supporting IKEv2, IPSec, and L2TP protocols, configurable in System Settings > VPN without additional software.
ACSP Network Configuration 5
A technician needs to remove a stubborn network location profile from a Mac managed by MDM.
Where should they look first?