Deploy Office using Group Policy

[Jørn Jørgensen]

Hi,

We are considering roll out Office 2003 using Group Policies, but we have
had some feedback that Office is to large to be efficiently deployed in this
fashion.

We have a couple of dozen sites with 5-20 users at each, and have a need for
many different Office configurations (eg. one user may only need Word and
Excel while another requires Outlook and Project).

We are planning the following configuration:
* All users located in one OU
* Users are made members of application groups for each of the Office
applications, eg. App_Word2003
* Applications are assigned to users using Group Policies
* GPO's correspond to groups and are applied to all users in the Users OU
based on membership

Is this a viable solution for Office 2003? Are there any particular pitfalls
we need to consider with this design?

Is it perhaps recommended to assign Office to the computers instead of the
users? What are some pros and cons of these different approaches?

Any input appreciated!

Regards,
Jørn

 

[Patrick Rouse [MVP]]

I've used GPO's to install Office 2000, XP and 2003 and I
prefer assigning office installations to computers,
instead of publishing to users.

All worktstations are in one OU. I have security groups
setup that contain different computer objects, i.e.
Office11Pro, Office11Std... then I filter the application
of the GPO's by these security groups.

A pitfall I see with application publishing or assignment
to users (instead of workstations), is a user logging onto
someone elses workstation brings their office install
settings with them, invoking an install refresh each time
they logon to a new machine.

I find it harder to track licenses used if users can
install (by logging on) different versions of Office 2003.

I have two distinct groups of users so maybe my situation
is simpler than yours, but I'd still recommend that you
consider assigning applications to computers, instead of
users.

Patrick Rouse
Microsoft MVP - Terminal Server
http://www.workthin.com