Example: Deploying Microsoft Office 2010

Introduction

This document describes the process of creating and deploying an install task that deploys "Microsoft Office 2010 Professional Plus" through OptiTune.

To deploy Microsoft Office 2010, we will need to create an "Install Task" for this program, and then deploy the install task to one or more computers or groups.

Step by Step

1. We will first create an "Install Task" for Microsoft Office 2010. Start by navigating to "Applications" > "Install Tasks" and click on "Add".

   

2. Download the package creator tool by clicking on "Package Creator Tool", and saving the zip file to your hard drive (e.g. "C:\data\PackageCreator.zip").

3. Unzip the downloaded "PackageCreator.zip" to a local directory, for example "C:\data\package creator".

4. Run the PackageCreator.exe application (e.g. "C:\data\package creator\PackageCreator.exe"), and click "Next" on the welcome screen.

   

5. Enter the name and description you want to use for the package, and click "Next".

   

6. Select the specific Operating Systems you would like to target, and click "Next".
   In this example, we have chosen Windows XP (SP3 or above) through Windows 8, and set it to deploy on either 32-bit or 64-bit systems.

   

7. Copy the installation directory for Microsoft Office 2010 to a local folder on your hard drive (e.g. "c:\data\apps\office2010\source").

   

8. Inside both the "source\x86" and "source\x64" directories, create a file called "config.xml" with the following content, replacing the "ABCDEABCDEABCDEABCDE" value with your product key for Microsoft Office (don't include the dashes, just the letters and numbers).

   <Configuration Product="ProPlusr">
   <Display Level="none" CompletionNotice="no" SuppressModal="yes" AcceptEula="Yes"/>
   <PIDKEY Value="ABCDEABCDEABCDEABCDEABCDE" />
   </Configuration>

   For more information on creating a silent installation for Microsoft Office, click here. Also, you can view more information on the config.xml file format.

   Keep in mind that if you are not deploying the "Profesional Plus" edition, the "Product" attribute in the "Configuration" element will be different from the one shown above. For example, if you are deploying the "Microsoft Office 2010 Standard", it would be "Standardr" instead of "ProPlusr".

9. Back in the package creator application, specify the following values for your package, and press "Next". You can use the browse icons at the right of each text box for faster entry.

   

   You can also use an alternative location or name for the output file, "office2010pp.bvx".

10. Select "Msi Product" for the detection method, and either enter the product code as shown, or browse to "C:\data\apps\office2010\source\x86\ProPlusr.WW" and select "ProPlusrWW.msi" to get the MSI product code for Office 2010 Professional Plus.

    Click "Next" to start compressing the package.

    Important: This MSI Product Code depends on the version of Office you are installing. The one shown below is for the "Professional Plus" edition. This is not your product key for Office, but the MSI product code that identifies the product being installed. For Office 2010 Standard, you would browse to "C:\data\apps\office2010\source\x86\Standardr.WW\StandardrWW.msi" to get the MSI Product Code.

    

11. Wait for the package creation to complete...

    

12. Once the package has been created, click on the link to view the output package file in windows explorer.

    

13. Copy the ".bvx" file to one or more locations that the client computers have access to. In this example we will copy it to the following locations.

    \\bravurastore\Shared\apps\office2010pp.bvx
    https://s3.amazonaws.com/acmewidgets/office2010pp.bvx

    Note that the clients will try to download the package in the order listed, so you typically want to list cheaper or faster locations first. For clients which may not have access to the corporate network, you can list URLs where the clients can obtain the package, as long as they start with "https://".

14. Go back to the OptiTune administration website, and proceed by uploading the manifest created by the package creator. It will be in the same directory as the ".bvx" file, but will have a ".bvxd" extension.

    Click on the "Browse..." button to select the ".bvxd" file, and then click "Upload Manifest".

    

15. Most of the details from the ".bvxd" manifest are entered into the form for you.

    However, you need to enter the locations that you copied the ".bvx" package file in the "Package Locations" text box, one per line:

    

16. Click "Save" to save the new Install Task.

17. This will bring you back to the "Install Tasks" page. Click on the checkbox of the task you just created, and click on "Deploy".

    

18. Select the computer or group you wish to deploy the application to, and create a schedule for the deployment. The schedule instructs the OptiTune client when it can try to install the application.

    

19. Click "Save".

20. You are finished. The program will now be deployed to the clients according to the schedule you've defined.