Deployment Solution

More and more people are now using Office 2007. For the IT department installing Office 2007 is a great task that causes days of headaches, long workdays and can be hard to do. So I will try to help you to make the right decisions.

First off all we have to determine our approach.

1. Uninstall Office 2003 and install Office 2007
2. Update Office 2003 to Office 2007
3. Leave 2003 where it is and install Office 2007 Virtual

Uninstall Office 2003 and install Office 2007

To fully uninstall Office 2003 we can start inserting the CD and uninstall it by using Start Run and type appwiz.cpl.

Select Office 2003 and uninstall it.

Now it is asking for the original CD. Insert it, and the uninstall will take place. Do this for all your pc's.

You will notice that this is a lot of work. There are better methods.

First, we copy the original CD to a server and share the software to everyone. Then we go to the pc and we use the following commands.

Start Run, and type in cmd.exe.

Then: net use d: \\servername\sharename Enter

D:\setup.exe /x pro11n.msi /qb Enter

The uninstall will now be done silently. No interruption. Please remember the /x. It is very important in this step because it actually tells the installer to remove the software completely.

If you are that lucky guy who has Deployment Server in place, you can do this remotely. No walking to all machines. Just push the command and it will work.

Now we have to install Office 2007. Again we can do this by taking the cd to all clients, but the better and easiest way is to do this by a script.

So let's see what the script should look like.

First we copy the CD to our share and we share it.

Then we go to start run, and type in cmd.exe

The command is as follows:

net use D: \\servername\sharename Enter

D:\apps\office\2007\setup.exe TRANSFORMS=D:\apps\office\2007\MST\pro.MST /Qb

(The line above is one line)

Again you can use this script easily in your Deployment Server.

Update Office 2003 to Office 2007

We also can leave Office 2003 where it is. Don't uninstall it, just upgrade it to Office 2007. Again the fastest method is to use a script for this one.

And we can use the same script as before:

net use d: \\servername\sharename
Start /wait D:\apps\office\2007\setup.exe TRANSFORMS=D:\apps\office\2007\MST\pro.MST /Qb 

This script will upgrade the existing Office 2003 version into the new version.

For all installation scripts you first have to build an Office.mst that contains all the settings.

You can build this with Office resource kit, also known as ORK.

Be aware that in an upgrade several files of Office 2003 will stay on your machine and that you always have to make sure they are patched also.

Leave 2003 where it is and install Office 2007 Virtual

This is my favorite way.

Just build a clean and lean package of Office. Use Wise Virtual packager editor if available. Office 2007 is one of these packages that is best build by Wise and not with SVSadmin.

Export the package.

Now you have to deploy the package to all your machines.

You can do this again by placing it on a share and create a net use mapping to it, to import it.

Or you deploy it with Deployment Solution.

Make sure you delete the shortcuts to the Office 2003, because it will stay on the system, and can be available to your users. On the other hand, users will love being able to use Office 2003 when they wish because Office 2007 is slightly different.

Now you are ready to go for it and to make everybody happy in using Office 2007.

Have fun with it!

Regards
Erik Westhovens