Creating an answer file for office 2007

[Bambino1506]

Hi guys

I wonder if I might pick your brains please. We are going to be rolling out office 2007 for a large number of users and the boss has asked me if its possible for us to create some kind of answer file or slipstream so that all the options will be filled out e.g. what to install, license etc etc.

Any advice ? If possible would like to intergrate into an .msi so we can run it in logon scripts.


Thanks

[zebulebu]

How many users are you talking about?

For fifty or so, you could look at Software Installation through GPOs - I use this regularly with the ORK (Office Resource Kit) to apply a transform and deploy within an SME that has only a single office. It works remarkably well, with no steep learning curve.

For more seats than that, or for organisations where you're looking at more thyan one location, you should probably be looking at SMS or something similar. Trying to sod around with GPOs for that sort of deployment is asking for trouble - you'd need multiple copies of the same deployed package (you might be able to get away withy this by being clever with DFS), fast and reliable bandwidth if hosting from a single location instead, applying updates to the installation would be counter-intuitive as you'd need to do it in multiple locations (or it would take ages to apply to each OU if there was a single source for files) you can't report or inventory any of the installations etc etc

Here's a couple of links:

Deploy using Software Installation via GPO

Deploy using SMS

The links are for Office 2003, but should apply equally to much of Office 2007 and I'm sure you can find similar resources where the procedures differ for O2K7

[Bambino1506]

Thanks Zeb, will check that out.

We're talking potentially 2000+ users

[zebulebu]

Originally Posted by Bambino1506

Thanks Zeb, will check that out.

We're talking potentially 2000+ users

LOL - then you DEFINITELY want SMS or something similar! No way GPOs can handle that sort of deployment. Unfortunately, SMS aint free... but the amount of time and money it will save you over having 2000 seats deployed via sneakernet probably makes it attractive enough to go for.

[Bambino1506]

Got no SMS , will only be deploying to one branch at a time gradually so think will go for deploying via Group Policy zeb. Be 20 users at a time approx.