Deploying Windows 7 – Part 17: Deploying Applications Based on Make and Model

If you would like to read previous articles in this series, please go to:

Tip:
You can find more information about automating LTI deployment in the Windows 7 Resource Kit from Microsoft Press. I am the lead author for this Resource Kit and I also maintain the Unofficial Support Site for the Windows 7 Resource Kit where you will find the latest updates and other useful information.

In the previous article of this series you learned how to use the MDT database to customize the deployment of Windows 7 based on computer properties such as the MAC address or UUID of the target computer. In this article we’ll learn how to use the MDT database to deploy Windows 7 Enterprise edition together with an application (Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise edition) based on the make and model of the target computer.

Adding Office 2007 as an Application

The powerful thing about Microsoft Deployment Toolkit is that you can use it to deploy Windows operating system images together with any applications, packages and drivers that may be needed by your users on their target computers. For this walkthrough, we’re going to deploy Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise edition together with Windows 7 Enterprise edition, which is a typical scenario for information workers (IWs). Begin by inserting your Office DVD into the DVD drive of your MDT technician computer. Then open Deployment Workbench, expand your deployment share, right-click on the Applications node and select New Application (Figure 1):


Figure 1: Step 1 of adding a new application to a deployment share

Doing this launches the New Application Wizard as shown in Figure 2 below. We will choose the first option here, which copies the Office installation files from the Office DVD into a folder in our deployment share.


Figure 2: Step 2 of adding a new application to a deployment share

On the next wizard page, we’ll type Microsoft as the publisher and Office 2007 Enterprise as the descriptive name for the application; we’ll leave the other two fields blank (Figure 3):


Figure 3: Step 3 of adding a new application to a deployment share

On the next page, we will browse to select our DVD drive as the source directory where the installation files currently reside. Note that the option to move the files to the deployment share instead of copying them is grayed out—this is because you can not move files from a DVD, you have to copy them (Figure 4):


Figure 4: Step 4 of adding a new application to a deployment share

On the next page, we will accept Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise as the name of the folder that will be created within our deployment share to host the application’s installation files (Figure 5):


Figure 5: Step 5 of adding a new application to a deployment share

On the next page, we will type setup.exe as the command that will be used to install the application on our target computers (Figure 6):


Figure 6: Step 6 of adding a new application to a deployment share

Once we have finished walking through the wizard, the new application is displayed in the Deployment Workbench within the Applications folder of our deployment share (Figure 7):


Figure 7: Office has been added to the deployment share as an application to be deployed

You are done adding Office as an application in MDT.

Customizing Office 2007 for Installation

Before you deploy an application using MDT, you may need to further configure the application by opening its properties from the Workbench. This is particularly true for Office 2007, which includes its own special Office Customization Tool (OCT) you can use to customize your installation Office prior to deploying it. The OCT lets you customize Office and save your customizations in a Windows Installer (MSI) Patch file having an .msp file extension. Once you create this .msp file, you then save it in the Updates folder of your deployment share. Then, when Office is being installed on the target computer, the Office installation program (setup.exe) looks for an .msp file in the Updates folder of your deployment share, and if it finds one it applies the customizations contained in the .msp file during the installation of Office. For more detailed information concerning customizing Office 2007 installations using the OCT, see this article on Microsoft TechNet.

To customize how Office will be deployed by MDT, right-click on the application in the Applications folder in the previous screenshot and select Properties. This opens the application’s properties sheet, which has several different tabs. We’ll learn more about what these tabs can be used for in a future article, but for now let’s select the Office Products tab as shown in Figure 8:


Figure 8: Step 1 of configuring Office for deployment using the OCT

Now, on the Office Products tab, click the Office Customization Tool button. An information dialog box will be displayed indicating where you need to save the .msp file you will create using the OCT (Figure 9):


Figure 9: Step 2 of configuring Office for deployment using the OCT

Clicking OK closes the dialog box and opens the OCT, which prompts you to create a new .msp file or open an existing one. We’ll select the first option to create a new .msp file (Figure 10):


Figure 10: Step 3 of configuring Office for deployment using the OCT

When you click OK, the Select Product box closes and you’re presented with the main screen of the OCT (see Figure 11). By clicking on various items on the left, you will be able to customize many different aspects of how Office will be customized during its deployment.


Figure 11: Step 4 of configuring Office for deployment using the OCT

To deploy Office unattended using MDT, we only need to configure the Licensing And User Interface page of the OCT. To do this, make the following customizations as shown in Figure 12 below:

  • Type your Office 2007 product key into the textbox.
  • Select the checkbox for accepting the EULA.
  • Change the Display Level to None, which enables Office Setup to run silently without displaying any user interface.
  • Make sure the Completion Notice checkbox is cleared—doing this will prevent Office Setup from displaying a message to the user when the installation is finished.
  • Make sure the Suppress Modal checkbox is selected—doing this will prevent Setup from displaying error messages or other dialog boxes that could interrupt the installation.
  • The No Cancel checkbox can be used to prevent the user from being able to cancel the installation by clicking the close gadget on the installation UI, but since the Display Level is set to None in this example, there is no installation UI so it doesn’t really matter whether you select or clear this checkbox (we’ll clear it anyways).


Figure 12: Step 5 of configuring Office for deployment using the OCT

Now let’s save our customizations as an .msp file. To do this, select File, Save As from the OCT menu. Then, in the Save As dialog, browse to the following folder:

<drive>\DeploymentShare$\Applications\Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise\Updates

Now type custom as the name for the .msp file you will create (Figure 13):


Figure 13: Step 6 of configuring Office for deployment using the OCT

You are done customizing Office for deployment.

Determining the Make/Model of a Target Computer

Now remember that our goal is to deploy Windows 7 together with Office 2007 to computers that have a certain make and model. How can you determine the make and model of a specific computer? If this information has not been provided to you by the vendor or displayed on a sticker on the outside or inside of the case, and if a Windows operating system is already installed on the computer you can customize the DisplayClassProperties.vbs script used in the previous article of this series to do this. Simply take the script in that article and replace the following line:

strWMIQuery = “:Win32_ComputerSystemProduct.IdentifyingNumber=’MXG5380254 NA540′,Name=’PY196AV-ABA a1130e’,Version=’0n31211CT101AMBEM00′”

with this instead:

strWMIQuery = “:Win32_ComputerSystem.Name=’INSERT'”

Next, substitute INSERT with the actual computer name of the computer, which can be found using the System utility in Control Panel and for this example is SEA-DESK-115.

Now use cscript to run the script to display the values of all the properties of the Win32_ComputerSystem WMI class:

c:\scripts>cscript DisplayClassProperties.vbs

Microsoft (R) Windows Script Host Version 5.8

Copyright (C) Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

 

Number of properties of :Win32_ComputerSystem.Name=’SEA-DESK-115′ class is 58

Property: AdminPasswordStatus   Value: 3

Property: AutomaticManagedPagefile      Value: True

Property: AutomaticResetBootOption      Value: True

Property: AutomaticResetCapability      Value: True

Property: BootOptionOnLimit     Value:

Property: BootOptionOnWatchDog  Value:

Property: BootROMSupported      Value: True

Property: BootupState   Value: Normal boot

Property: Caption       Value: SEA-UUID-TEST

Property: ChassisBootupState    Value: 3

Property: CreationClassName     Value: Win32_ComputerSystem

Property: CurrentTimeZone       Value: -360

Property: DaylightInEffect      Value: False

Property: Description   Value: AT/AT COMPATIBLE

Property: DNSHostName   Value: SEA-UUID-TEST

Property: Domain        Value: contoso.com

Property: DomainRole    Value: 1

Property: EnableDaylightSavingsTime     Value: True

Property: FrontPanelResetStatus Value: 3

Property: InfraredSupported     Value: False

Property: InitialLoadInfo       Value:

Property: InstallDate   Value:

Property: KeyboardPasswordStatus        Value: 3

Property: LastLoadInfo  Value:

Property: Manufacturer  Value: HP Pavilion 061

Property: Model Value: PY196AV-ABA a1130e

Property: Name  Value: SEA-UUID-TEST

Property: NameFormat    Value:

Property: NetworkServerModeEnabled      Value: True

Property: NumberOfLogicalProcessors     Value: 1

Property: NumberOfProcessors    Value: 1

Property: OEMLogoBitmap Value:

Property: PartOfDomain  Value: True

Property: PauseAfterReset       Value: -1

Property: PCSystemType  Value: 1

Property: PowerManagementCapabilities   Value:

Property: PowerManagementSupported      Value:

Property: PowerOnPasswordStatus Value: 3

Property: PowerState    Value: 0

Property: PowerSupplyState      Value: 3

Property: PrimaryOwnerContact   Value:

Property: PrimaryOwnerName      Value: Windows User

Property: ResetCapability       Value: 1

Property: ResetCount    Value: -1

Property: ResetLimit    Value: -1

Property: Status        Value: OK

Property: SupportContactDescription     Value:

Property: SystemStartupDelay    Value:

Property: SystemStartupOptions  Value:

Property: SystemStartupSetting  Value:

Property: SystemType    Value: x64-based PC

Property: ThermalState  Value: 3

Property: TotalPhysicalMemory   Value: 2078859264

Property: UserName      Value: SEA-UUID-TEST\Administrator

Property: WakeUpType    Value: 6

Property: Workgroup     Value:

Now, from the above script output of property/value pairs, examine these two lines:

Property: Manufacturer  Value: HP Pavilion 061

Property: Model Value: PY196AV-ABA a1130e

The Win32_ComputerSystem.Manufacturer WMI property corresponds to the Make property in MDT, and the Win32_ComputerSystem.Model WMI property corresponds to the Model property in MDT. In other words, the Make of this particular computer is HP Pavilion 061 and its Model is PY196AV-ABA a1130e as far as MDT is concerned.

Customizing Deployment Based on Make/Model

To make use of such Make/Model information and deploy Windows 7 together with Office 2007 to computers having this particular Make and Model, we now need to create a new Make And Model record in the MDT database that specifies this particular Make and Model and is configured to deploy Office 2007 to these computers. To do this, expand the Database node for your deployment share in the Workbench, right-click on Make And Model, and select New (Figure 14):


Figure 14: Step 1 of creating a MDT DB record for Make/Model deployment of Office

In the Properties sheet for the new record, type the Make and Model of the target computers (Figure 15):


Figure 15: Step 2 of creating a MDT DB record for Make/Model deployment of Office

Next, click the Applications tab (Figure 16):


Figure 16: Step 3 of creating a MDT DB record for Make/Model deployment of Office

Click Add and select Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise from the list of applications you can deploy to computers that match the Make/Model specified in this record (Figure 17):


Figure 17: Step 4 of creating a MDT DB record for Make/Model deployment of Office

Click OK to return to the Applications tab which will now show Microsoft Office 2007 Enterprise (Figure 18):


Figure 18: Step 5 of creating a MDT DB record for Make/Model deployment of Office

Click OK to apply the changes and create the new record in the MDT DB. The new record will now be displayed under Make And Model in the Workbench (Figure 19):


Figure 19: A new MDT DB record for Make/Model deployment of Office has been created

At this point we are ready to begin our deployment. Insert your LiteTouch_x64 CD into a computer having the specified Make/Model and turn the computer on. The Windows Deployment Wizard will run completely unattended and Windows 7 will be installed on the computer in the usual way. Once Windows 7 has been installed, the desktop will be displayed and a progress dialog will indicate that Office is being installed (Figure 20):


Figure 20: Office is installed after Windows has been installed

When Office Setup is finished, you should be able to launch Office programs from your Start menu (Figure 21):


Figure 21: Office 2007 has been deployed together with Windows 7 using MDT

Final note

Using Make and Model to deploy Windows using MDT is not as simple as using Computer and specifying the UUIDs or MAC addresses as described in the previous article of this series. To understand some of the complexities involved in using Make/Model for MDT deployment and to learn about some workarounds, see this article on The Deployment Guys blog.

If you would like to read previous articles in this series, please go to:

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