Executive Summary:
Previous Microsoft Office versions could be deployed using Group Policy Software Installation (GPSI). However, it's not recommended that you deploy Microsoft Office 2007 using GPSI. Instead, you must use Systems Management Server (SMS) or System Center Configuration Manager to do so, or find an alternative, more cost-effective deployment method.
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A few months ago, in “Customizing and
Deploying Office 2007,” May 2007,
InstantDoc 95433, I walked through
how to deploy Microsoft Office 2007 by creating
a network installation point with a series of
customizations, including setup customization
(.msp) files and configuration (config.xml) files,
to drive the behavior of Office Setup. Now that
you’ve had time to prepare an installation of
Office 2007, you can turn to the task of deploying
Office 2007 to your clients. Let’s take a quick
look at some familiar deployment methods
that, unfortunately, aren’t necessarily ideal
for Office 2007, then explore workarounds for
deploying Office 2007 that won’t stretch your
budget. You can also use these workaround
methods to deploy other software and configurations—
sort of a do-it-yourself Systems Center
Configuration Manager.
Preferred Deployment Methods and
Dead Ends
For software deployment, several methods
come to mind. The first method is to use Group
Policy Software Installation (GPSI) to deploy
Office .msi files. Three previous Office versions
could be deployed using GPSI, however,
deploying Office 2007 using GPSI isn’t really a
feasible option. Nevertheless, Microsoft documents
how to deploy Office 2007 using GPSI
(see “Use Group Policy Software Installation
to deploy the 2007 Office system” at technet2.microsoft.com/Office/en-us/library/efd0ee45-9605-42d3-9798-3b698fff3e081033.mspx), and Darren Mar-Elia discusses the
Group Policy deployment of Office 2007 in
“The Group Policy Route to Office Deployment
and Management,” April 2007, InstantDoc ID
95210.
Despite what these information sources say,
I can tell you from my experience doing lots of
testing that deploying Office 2007 using GPSI
isn’t practical, even if it’s technically doable.
GPSI uses .msi files with transforms (.mst files),
whereas Microsoft architected Office Setup to
use the Setup command (setup.exe) with .msp
files to drive installation, so you’ll find that
GPSI doesn’t support the kind of functionality
and customization that you need. With GPSI,
you must perform all customizations in the
config.xml file, and even then you can customize
only a few settings, such as the product
key, language, and applications to install. And
trying to configure which applications to install
by using the OptionState element of the config
.xml file is painful to say the least. The aforementioned
Microsoft article provides information
about how to use OptionState if you’re so
inclined to self-torture. You can try deploying
Office 2007 by using GPSI, but I expect you’ll
find, like most organizations, that it’s just not
full-featured enough to be useful.
A second deployment option is to use
GPSI to deploy Office 2007 by using a .zap file.
A .zap file is a simple script that can call any
command—in this case, it would call Office’s
setup.exe command with all its switches. GPSI
can deploy a software package with a .zap file;
you just have to select the .zap file instead
of an .msi file when creating the package.
However, .zap files can only be published,
not installed, so that Office can appear in the
Add/Remove Programs list under Programs
and Features in Windows Vista and can even be associated with document extensions for install
on demand. However, publishing Office 2007
means that it isn’t deployed until a user needs
or requests it, and the user must be an administrator
to launch Office Setup, so .zap files also
fall short of the deployment requirements for
most organizations.
The third option, and the option that Microsoft
prefers you use, is to purchase Microsoft
Systems Management Server (SMS) or the
new rebranded release, Microsoft System Center
Configuration Manager 2007. Although
SMS and System Center Configuration Manager
2007 provide full-featured support for the
deployment and subsequent management of
Office 2007 as well as other applications and
configuration, they also aren’t cheap.
Office Deployment Challenges
As you know, Office 2007 is a large application,
typically consuming more than 1GB of disk
space, which includes the applications and the
local installation source (MSOCache). Installing
Office 2007 takes quite a while, so when
you’re choosing your deployment method it’s
important to keep in mind how it will impact
end users. You don’t want your CEO to log on to
his or her computer just prior to a presentation
to the board of directors, only to find that’s the
moment when Office 2007 is deployed to his or
her system.
Another challenge is that Office Setup
requires administrative credentials to execute,
so we’ll have to develop alternative deployment
methods that ensure setup.exe runs with the
appropriate credentials. I find it to be rather
obnoxious that, in this day of least privilege
and non-administrative users, Microsoft didn’t
provide an easy and full-featured way to deploy
Office 2007 using GPSI or logon scripts. Make
some noise to Microsoft about this topic by
sending an email message to your Microsoft
sales representative—the company is developing
Office 14 right now.
Most organizations deploy Office to computers,
not users. You don’t need Microsoft Visio
“following” users from computer to computer.
It’s best to have Office applications installed
per machine, available to any user who logs on
to that machine. That approach also facilitates
license management, since Office is licensed
per machine.
With these challenges in mind, let’s explore
our Office 2007 deployment options. The solutions
below will work with both Vista and
Windows XP clients in a Windows Server 2003
domain.
The Script
You can install Office 2007 by launching setup
.exe. Setup.exe takes optional parameters, as
discussed in “Customizing and Deploying Office
2007.” If you’re launching setup.exe on remote
systems to deploy Office 2007, you’ll want to
ensure that setup finished successfully. Therefore,
we’ll build a script that not only deploys
Office 2007 by running setup.exe but logs its
success as well. This script will also ensure
that each target system does, in fact, run setup
.exe only once. Listing 1 shows a portion of the
script, Office2007_Deploy.vbs. You can download
the entire script at www.windowsitpro.com, InstantDoc ID 97016. (Click the Download
the Code Here button near the top of the
article.)
Here are the script’s core elements:
- The Configuration Block: Office2007_
Deploy.vbs is written in VBScript, and you'll
find it easy to configure, even if you’re not a
scripting guru. All required parameters are
in the Configuration Block, which is heavily
commented to help you understand how to
customize the script for your environment.
I’ll discuss the purpose of each set of parameters
a bit later.
- Callout A: The script calls a subroutine, ExecuteCommand,
which launches the Office
Setup command as defined in the Configuration
Block by the variable sCommand (e.g.,
"\\windomain.com\software\office\sdp\setup.exe"). The ExecuteCommand routine
waits for the command to finish, then transfers
the exit code and contents of the StdOut
and StdErr streams to variables for logging.
The code at callout A then interprets the exit
code to determine whether the command
was successful and calls Log_WriteCommandResults
to write a new record to the log.
- Callout B: The script adds the computer
to one of two groups (i.e., APP_Office 2007
Deploy or ALERT_Office 2007 Deploy) indicating
the success or failure of the command
and removes the computer from the staging
group (i.e., CMM_Office 2007 Deploy). I’ll
explain these groups in more detail shortly.
To use the script, save it to your Office 2007
network installation point. I suggest creating
a folder at the same level as setup.exe and the
Updates folder called CompanyName_Setup.
Put the script in that folder and secure the folder
so that Authenticated Users have Read permission,
and only administrators have Modify
permission. Because the script will be run on
systems using administrative credentials, you
don’t want untrusted users to be able to modify
the script.
Don’t forget to put your Office Setup customization
file in the Updates folder and to
use the /adminfile switch on setup.exe to point
to the Setup customization file. Your Setup
customization file should ensure a silent installation
of Office 2007. (For more information
about how to point to your Setup customization
file, see “Customizing and Deploying Office
2007.”)
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