Installing individual MS Office 2007 Pro products via Novell Application Launcher

Novell Cool Solutions: Feature
By Leon Hewitt

Digg This - Slashdot This Posted: 3 May 2007

Want to deploy individual MS Office 2007 products via NAL? Here's how you do it.

Benefits:

• Avoid linking multiple NAL objects together
• Ability to install MS Office application independently of each other
• Faster distribution as you only install what you need

Process:

1. Create MS Office 2007 Network Installation Point
2. Create required Config.xml files
3. Create NAL Object

Create MS Office 2007 Network Installation Point

Copy the entire contents of your MS Office 2007 CD to your desired network location. This is where NAL will pull the installation files from so it should be accessible to users (at least "read" rights).

For this document I will use:

\\server\vol\Office2007

Create Config.xml files

The "config.xml" file contains all the information the "setup.exe" needs to install silently. Here is an example of the layout of the config.xml file.

<Configuration Product="ProPlus">

<Display Level="basic" CompletionNotice="no" SuppressModal="yes" NoCancel="yes" AcceptEula="yes" />

<PIDKEY Value="1234512345123451234512345" />
<USERNAME Value="username" />
<COMPANYNAME Value="Company Name" />

<OptionState Id="ACCESSFiles" State="absent" Children="force" /> //access
<OptionState Id="OUTLOOKFiles" State="Local" Children="force" /> //outlook
<OptionState Id="WORDFiles" State="Local" Children="force" /> //word

</Configuration>

Note: You can call the *.xml file anything you like and it is able to be stored anywhere on the network.

For detailed information on all the variables please see this article.

• Configuration Product - This ID can be found within the "config.xml" file stored in your Network Installation Point.
• Display Level="basic" ? This will control what is seen during installation
• CompletionNotice="no" ? This will prevent the completion notice from appearing after the installation is complete
• SuppressModal="yes" ? This will prevent error messages from appearing during the installation
• NoCancel="yes" ? This will prevent the user from being able to cancel the installation
• AcceptEula="yes" ? This will prevent the EULA from appearing during installation
• PIDKEY Value ? Enter your Office 2007 Product Key here without any "hyphens".
• USERNAME Value ? Enter your desired username here
• COMPANYNAME Value - Enter your desired Company name here

Depending on your company needs, you can create as many or as few config.xml files as you like. The above Config.xml file will tell the setup procedure to remove Access 2007 and install both Outlook and Word 2007.

For this document I only want to install Word 2007 and leave all other Office 2007 products alone, so I would remove the ACCESSFiles and OUTLOOKFiles lines.

I can now save the below configuration as "\\server\vol\Office2007\Config Files\Word2007.xml"

<Configuration Product="ProPlus">

<Display Level="basic" CompletionNotice="no" SuppressModal="yes" NoCancel="yes" AcceptEula="yes" />

<PIDKEY Value="1234512345123451234512345" />
<USERNAME Value="%USERNAME%" />
<COMPANYNAME Value="Curtin University of Technology" />

<OptionState Id="WORDFiles" State="Local" Children="force" /> //word

</Configuration>

Create the NAL object

Open ConsoleOne and create a new "Simple" Application Object where you like.

Enter the following in the "Run before distribution" script:

Also enter the following to the "Run after Termination" script:

Enter the appropriate path to the "winword.exe" like below:

You can now assign your NAL Application to the appropriate users to use.

If you have any questions you may contact Leon at L.HewittTAKETHISOUT@TAKETHISOUT.curtin.edu.au

Reader Comments

• Amendments - Leon Hewitt:
  
  All MS Office 2007 products install on first run:
  
  Due to the predefined configuration files packaged with MS Office 2007, I have found that the first time you install Office 2007 using the above XML files; all products load even though they were not specified.
  
  To avoid this problem you need to create an *.MSP file and save it in the “\\server\vol\Office2007\Updates” directory. *NOTE: The *.MSP files found in the above directory will only be used when you run the “setup.exe” for the first time on a machine.
  
  Creating Office 2007 MSP File:
  
  - Load the “Office Customization Tool” by running the following command: “\\server\vol\Office2007\setup.exe /admin”
  - Fill in the relevant details for your company where required
  - Under “Licensing and user interface”: Enter your Product Key
  - Tick the Agree to licence agreement
  - Select the Display type as “Basic”
  - Un-tick the Completion notice box
  - Tick the Suppress modal box
  - Tick the No cancel box
  
  - Under Set feature install state: - Unselect all the software that you don’t want automatically installed on the first installation process. (I have unselected everything except the “Office Tools” and “Shared Features”
  
  Once you have completed the “Office Customization Tool” save the file under the “\\server\vol\Office2007\Updates” directory.

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