Deploy Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 Beta using Desktop Central

Endpoint Central | February 5, 2010 | 2 min read

 Microsoft recently have released the beta version of Office Professional Plus 2010 with some new exiting features like OneNote, Publisher, PowerPivot Add-in, etc. 

You can register and download the Beta version from here: http://technet.microsoft.com/hi-in/evalcenter/ee390818.aspx

The beta version do not require a license key to activate the product; can be installed and tried for free. The installation is pretty similar to Office 2007. You can also install Office 2010 silently to multiple computers by creating an MSP file.

Want to install Office 2010 beta to multiple computers? You don’t have to run around to install manually; use Desktop Central instead.  Ideally, the following will be the steps to install Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 Beta to multiple computers at once:

Step 1: Create a common network share to store the required installable. The network share should have read permissions to the Everyone group and should be accessible from all the computers to which you are trying to install.

Step 2: Download the beta version and extract the contents

  1. Download the Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010 Beta from: http://technet.microsoft.com/hi-in/evalcenter/ee390818.aspx
  2. Select Start –> Run and type %temp% and clear all the unused files/folders.
  3. Run the ProfessionalPlus-32.exe. This will first extract the required files in the Temp directory before installing it. Once the extraction is complete, you will see the installation wizard. 
  4. Select Start –> Run and type %temp%. You will now find a new folder with the extracted contents of Office 2010.
  5. Copy all the extracted contents with the same directory structure to the share.
  6. Exit the installation wizard.

Step 3: Customize the Installation

  1. Open a command prompt and change directory to the network share where you have copied the installable.
  2. Type setup.exe /admin . This opens the office customization tool from where you can specify the license/company information, change the outlook profiles etc. Since this is a beta version, you do not require the license key.
  3. You need to select the Display Level as None and select the Suppress Modal check box.
  4. After making the necessary customization, save the customized file as, say, custom.MSP
  5. The MSP file should also be saved in the same network share.

Step 4: Adding the Package in Desktop Central

  1. From the Desktop Central client, select Software Deployment tab –> Add Package button
  2. Select Package Type as “MSIEXEC/EXE/ISS/Command”
  3. Specify a name for the application.
  4. Specify the “Installation Command with Switches/Arguments” as <share_name>setup.exe /adminfile <share_name><msp file name>
  5. Click Add Package

Step 5: Deploy to Target Computers

  1. Select the Package added in step 4 and cilck Install/Uninstall Software
  2. This creates an Install Software configuration with the package selected.
  3. Select the target computers.
  4. Specify the schedule options, if required and click Deploy.

Sounds easy ! Try for yourself.

Cheers!

Update: Now that the GA version of Office 2010 is available, you can deploy the GA version by following the steps provided in this article: http://www.manageengine.com/products/desktop-central/deploy-ms-office-professional-plus-2010-how-to.html
Tags : deploy office 2010 beta / microsoft office professional plus 2010 / software deployment / software distribution
ananthv@zohocorp.com

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