Deploying Office 2013 via GPO

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Looking at potential ways to deploy Office 2013 via GPO.

First and most obvious way is to run a startup script which calls the Office 2013 setup.exe. Problem here is what happens after it is installed, will that startup script keep re-installing the product every time the machine boots?

Another potential way is to install each Office component separately using the multitude of .msi files which are present, would that work and provide the same thing as a full install of Office? There is actually twenty three separate .msi files. What about officemui.msi is that a wrapper which contains calls to all of the other office components.

Best Answer

Installing from the .msi files is not supported. It just plain doesn't work.

You have to install from a startup script (or logon script, but that's generally a bad idea). You'll want to write the startup script such that it checks for a previous installation.

Also, it's the exact same process for Office 2010. And you can do some fun stuff like dumping Office, Visio, Project, and Sharepoint Designer all into one installation folder (still have to call setup for each individually, but saves on space)

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