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Deploy Office 2010 by using System Center Essentials 2010

 

Applies to: Office 2010

Topic Last Modified: 2011-09-10

Banner stating end of support date for Office 2010 with link to more info

You can use Microsoft System Center Essentials 2010 to deploy Microsoft Office 2010 in a medium-sized organization. This article contains detailed technical guidance on the necessary processes.

System Center Essentials 2010 is an IT management solution that is designed for system administrators in medium-sized organizations that have up to 50 servers and 500 client computers. By using a unified console, IT administrators can easily secure, update, monitor, and track their entire IT environment. This article provides detailed technical guidance for specifically deploying Office 2010.

Although this article illustrates the test network environment used for helping to describe the process of deploying Office 2010 by using System Center Essentials 2010, it does not provide information about how to set up the test network infrastructure, such as the Active Directory directory service, Microsoft SQL Server, and System Center Essentials 2010. For resources on how to set up the test infrastructure, see Resources for deploying the infrastructure later in this article.

In this article:

  • Deploying Office 2010 in a test environment

  • Resources for deploying the infrastructure

Deploying Office 2010 in a test environment

This section provides an illustration and description of the test network environment for the System Center Essentials 2010 infrastructure. It also includes procedural steps for deploying Microsoft Office Professional 2010 by using System Center Essentials 2010.

Network environment

The test network environment for this article is shown in the following illustration.

System Center Essentials network diagram

All of the servers (A and B) are running Windows Server 2008 R2 and are members of the same domain (CPANDL.COM), including the client computers (C), which are running Windows 7 Professional. The applications and roles that each server is running, and the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) for each client computer, are listed as follows:


  • A – Active Directory, DNS, DHCP <DC.CPANDL.COM>


  • B – System Center Essentials 2010, SQL Server 2008 Enterprise Edition (SP1) <SCE.CPANDL.COM>


  • C – Windows 7 Professional, System Center Essentials 2010 client <W7C01.CPANDL.COM, W7C02.CPANDL.COM, and W7C03.CPANDL.COM>

Procedural steps for deploying Office 2010 by using System Center Essentials 2010

In this example deployment scenario, detailed information is provided to deploy Office Professional 2010 in the previously defined System Center Essentials 2010 test environment. By following these steps, you can use System Center Essentials 2010 to deploy a silent installation of Office 2010, in which the users do not interact with the installation process. In this example, the first step is to create a customization file for the silent installation of Office 2010.

Create a Setup customization file for Office 2010

The program file to create a setup customization file for Office 2010 is run from the source directory that contains a copy of all the files from the Office CD. In this example, the source files were copied to \\SCE\Office2010\Professional.

In Office 2010, Setup controls the complete installation. This includes processes that Windows Installer handled in Office versions earlier than the 2007 Office system. Customizing the default behavior of Setup lets you control the process. In this example, you customize the installation for a silent installation of Office 2010.

The Office Customization Tool (OCT) is used to create a Setup customization file (.msp file). Setup applies this file when Office is installed on the computers.

Note

It is also possible to use the Config.xml file to configure a silent installation of Office 2010. For more information about how to use Config.xml, see Configure a silent installation of Office 2010.

To customize the installation

  1. To customize Office Setup, use the command line setup.exe /admin to start the Office Customization Tool. In this example (using System Center Essentials 2010 to deploy Office 2010), at a command prompt, run setup.exe /admin from the package source directory, \\SCE\Office2010\Professional.

  2. To ensure that Office 2010 is silently installed, modify and configure the settings as follows:

    1. In the Licensing and user interface dialog box, set the Display Level to None, which will then enable the Suppress modal check box.

    2. Verify that the Completion notice and No Cancel options are not selected.

    3. In this example, select the Enter another product key option located under Licensing and user interface, and then enter a valid Multiple Activation Key (MAK) key.

    4. Select the I accept the terms in the License Agreement check box.

  3. Save and name the newly created .msp file, and then put it in the \Updates folder for Office 2010 on the computer that contains the source files, which in this example is \\SCE\Office2010\Professional\Updates\CustomFileOffice2010SilentInstall.MSP.

Warning

During the initial installation of Office 2010 if there are multiple .msp files that are located in the Updates folder (the Setup customization file that was created by using the OCT), you need to ensure that the Setup customization file is the update applied at the beginning of the installation. This is performed by ensuring the desired .msp file is alphabetically first. In this example, if there was more than one .msp file, you would rename the file CustomFileOffice2010SilentInstall.MSP to 1_CustomFileOffice2010SilentInstall.MSP.

The next step is to use System Center Essentials 2010 to create a computer group that contains the computers on which Office 2010 will be installed.

Create a computer group

To create a new computer group that contains individually selected computers

  1. In the System Center Essentials 2010 console, click Computers.

  2. In the Computer Groups pane, click Create a Computer Group.

  3. in the Criteria drop-down box, select Select from a list, and then choose the computers on which Office 2010 will be installed. In this example, the following computers were selected: W7C01.CPANDL.COM, W7C02.CPANDL.COM, and W7C03.CPANDL.COM

  4. In the Computer group name dialog box, enter a name for the new computer group, and then press ENTER. In this example, the name is Office 2010.

The next step is to create a new software deployment package of Office 2010 and then select the previously created group, Office 2010, for the computers on which Office 2010 will be installed.

Create and distribute a package for Office 2010

To create a software package

  1. In the System Center Essentials 2010 console, click Software. In the Software Packages pane, in the Tasks area, click Create new package to start the New Software Package Wizard.

  2. On the Setup File screen, select Deploy a package from a setup file requiring additional folders. In the Folder location: dialog box, click Browse and then select the directory that contains the Office 2010 source files, which in this example is C:\Office2010\Professional.

  3. In the Package setup file dialog box, click Browse, and then select the setup.exe file for Office 2010, which in this example is located in the C:\Office2010\Professional folder. Click Next.

  4. On the Package details screen in the Package name dialog box, enter a name for the package, which in this example is Office2010Pro. Then, in the Package Description dialog box, enter a descriptive name for the software package, which in this example is Office-2010-Professional-SCE-Package. Click Next.

  5. On the Target System Types screen, verify the default of No, this package is applicable to all my managed computers. is selected, and then click Next.

  6. On the Return Codes screen, accept the default return code of 0 (zero) to equal success, and then click Next.

  7. On the Install/Uninstall Parameters screen, select No, and then click Next.

  8. On the Summary screen, review the configured settings, and then click Finish.

    The progress bar for the software package creation will then appear.

  9. Once the package is created successfully, click Finish. The Add and Remove Approvals dialog box will appear, which will show a list of the available computer groups. Click the computer group of the computers on which Office 2010 will be installed, which in this example is Office 2010. Click OK.

  10. The Approval Progress dialog box will appear with the message, “Approvals have been successfully applied.” Click Close.

Verify package deployment status

The approved package will then be deployed to the computers within the selected computer group based on the configured settings for the package and how Automatic Updates is configured on the managed computers. In this example, because there was not a specific deadline set for the software package, the package was not configured as optional, and Automatic Updates is enabled on the managed computers, the software package for Office 2010 installation to begin at the specified time for Automatic Updates to be installed, which uses a daily basis at 3:00 A.M. For more information, see About Software Deployment in System Center Essentials (https://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/p/?LinkId=169715).

In the Software Packages pane, select the software package, which in this example is Office2010Pro, to monitor the status. Upon completion of installing Office 2010, the status will be listed as Successful.

Resources for deploying the infrastructure

This section includes resources to help you understand and configure an infrastructure to test the deployment of Office 2010 by using System Center Essentials 2010.