Tonos for schools

How it works.

Shared and device-assigned iPads have no personal Apple Account, so the in-app purchase that unlocks Tonos Pro cannot run on them. A school license replaces it. Your school buys the license from us directly, and we send you the license: one line of text that starts with TONOS-SL1.

Your MDM delivers the license to Tonos as managed app configuration. Tonos checks it on the device, without a network connection, and unlocks every Tonos Pro feature (auto-correct, Typeahead and the style preferences) for whoever uses that device. The license is signed, so it cannot be edited to name another school or a later date.

Students who use their own devices and their own Apple Accounts keep buying Tonos Pro in the App Store as before. The school license covers the devices your school manages.

Before you start.

Tonos has to be a managed app on the device, which is the case when your MDM installs it from your Apple School Manager apps and books licenses. Managed app configuration only reaches apps the MDM manages. School licenses need Tonos 2.6.3 or later, on iOS or iPadOS 18 or later.

To get a license, email support@motomatic.com with the school's name as it should appear on the devices, the number of devices, and the school year the license should cover.

The configuration.

Add one key to the app configuration for Tonos (bundle ID com.motomatic.tonos):

As XML, with your own license in place of the shortened one, the configuration is this dictionary. It is also what we send with the license:

<dict>
    <key>TonosSchoolLicense</key>
    <string>TONOS-SL1.eyJ2IjoxLCJraWQiOiJrMSIs…</string>
</dict>

• Jamf Pro: paste the dictionary, from <dict> to </dict>, into the Preferences field of the app's App Configuration.
• Jamf School: paste the same dictionary wrapped in <plist> and </plist>, with no XML header.
• Microsoft Intune: under Apps, Configuration, create a policy for managed devices. In the configuration designer, add the key TonosSchoolLicense with the value type String, or choose Enter XML data and paste the dictionary.
• Other consoles that take app configuration as XML, Kandji and Mosyle among them, take the dictionary as well.

A console that asks for a property list file to upload takes the full document instead:

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="UTF-8"?>
<!DOCTYPE plist PUBLIC "-//Apple//DTD PLIST 1.0//EN" "http://www.apple.com/DTDs/PropertyList-1.0.dtd">
<plist version="1.0">
<dict>
    <key>TonosSchoolLicense</key>
    <string>TONOS-SL1.eyJ2IjoxLCJraWQiOiJrMSIs…</string>
</dict>
</plist>

Spaces or line breaks that end up inside the value when it is pasted are ignored.

Treat the license like a password. It unlocks Tonos Pro on any device it reaches until it expires, so keep it in your MDM, and do not post it where students or the public can read it.

On each device.

1. Add the keyboard: in Settings, go to General, Keyboard, Keyboards, tap Add New Keyboard and choose Tonos. Device management cannot add a keyboard, so each user does this once.
2. Open Tonos once after the configuration has arrived. The app reads the configuration and passes the license to the keyboard; from then on the keyboard checks it by itself. Until Tonos has been opened, the keyboard works without Tonos Pro.

On a device-assigned iPad or an iPhone, that is once per device. On Shared iPad, iOS keeps each student's data apart, the license Tonos passes to the keyboard included. Each student opens Tonos once after their first sign-in, and in a temporary session, which iOS erases at sign-out, at the start of every session.

Tonos also reads the configuration every time it is opened or brought back to the foreground.

Checking the status.

On the device, the Tonos home screen shows a School license card with the school's name and the last day the license is valid.

Tonos also reports the license status to your MDM as managed app feedback, under TonosSchoolLicenseStatus, with the license ID under TonosSchoolLicenseID while the license is valid. The status reads, for example:

• valid through 2027-07-31 (UTC) for Gymnasium Musterstadt
• invalid: expired at the end of 2027-07-31 (UTC)
• invalid: the signature does not match; the license was altered or not issued for Tonos
• invalid: malformed license: the signature is not base64url
• invalid: not a Tonos school license (expected TONOS-SL1.<payload>.<signature>)
• none, when the configuration has no license

A signature that does not match, a malformed license or "not a Tonos school license" almost always means the value was copied incompletely. Copy it again from what we sent, in full.

The feedback updates when Tonos is opened. Whether and where your MDM shows managed app feedback depends on the MDM. On Shared iPad, the MDM requests managed app feedback for the device, not for each student, so the status may not reflect every student's session.

Expiry and renewal.

A license is valid through the end of its last day, in UTC. After that the keyboard switches the Tonos Pro features off by itself, whether or not the app is opened, and the home screen offers the in-app purchase again. To renew, we send a new license and you replace the value in your MDM.

The check uses the device's clock. On supervised devices, turn on the restriction Set date and time automatically (forceAutomaticDateAndTime in the Restrictions payload), so the clock cannot be set back.

Removing a license.

Remove the configuration, or the key in it, and the license is gone from the device the next time Tonos is opened. Removing the app removes everything with it. Taking a license away never touches an in-app purchase made with an Apple Account on that device.

Privacy.

A license holds the school's name, the issue and expiry dates, a license ID, the ID of the key that signed it and the app's bundle ID, and, if your school's order included them, the number of seats and a short note. It is signed, not encrypted, so anyone who has the license can read these fields. It holds nothing about students or devices.

Tonos checks the license on the device and sends nothing anywhere. The only thing it writes back is the status line and the license ID above, which only your MDM reads. The privacy page describes this under School-managed devices.

Get in touch.

Licenses, renewals, questions about a deployment: support@motomatic.com.