Citrix : Profiling Microsoft Office 2010

Application Virtualisation is not a new technology, yet many companies are not using it. By placing an applictaion in a ‘bubble’ you can run, for example, different version of Microsoft Office on the same PC wihtout any problems – effectively because the application isn’t actually installed.

For the purposes of this article I wanted to see how easy it would be to ‘profile’ (or package) Microsoft Office 2010 for streaming using XenApp 6.5, including configuring offline access.

The solution I have used below is purley KMS licensing centric, you can get a MAK license to work (witha little more effort) but that is outside the scope of this article.

Note that you can only profile Microsoft Office 2010 x86, the 64-bit version does not/will not work.

1. Preparing the Profiling Computer

2. Preparing Client Computers

3. Customise Microsoft Office 2010 Setup

4. Profling Microsoft Office 2010

1. Preparing the Profiling Computer

I would always profile on a ‘clean’ Virtual Machine that represents the platfom your users will be running the streamed application from; so in my case I built a fresh Windows 7 x64 VM.

You can always use snapshots to revert back to the clean state when you have finished profiling an application.

2. Preparing Client Computers

In order to make activation easy both Microsoft and Citrix reccomend that you install the Microsoft Office 2010 Deployment Kit for App-V (yes I know it says App-V, but trust me, it will work with Citrix too!)

You have a few options for deployment, Group Policy, System Center 2012 Configuration Manager (or an equivalant) or good old fashioned manual installation.I used a manual install for my single test machine, I suggest you look at one of the more intuitive solution for an en-mass roll-out.

The command I used to deploy the deployment kit was:

{code lang:ini showtitle:false lines:false hidden:false}msiexec /i OffVirt.msi PROPLUS=1 KMSSERVICENAME=”kmssrv.domlocal.net” KMSSERVICEPORT=1688 TRANSFORM=OffVirt64Custom.mst{/code}

You can obtin the transform files from the following locatoin: http://support.citrix.com/article/CTX130331

You then need to confirm that the ‘Office Software Protection Platform’ is started and that the startup type is set to Automatic.

{code lang:ini showtitle:false lines:false hidden:false}sc config osppsvc start=auto
sc start osppsvc
{/code}

3. Customise Microsoft Office 2010 Setup

On the profiling machine open a command prompt and change directoryto the Microsoft Office 2010 setup files. Remember these should be the 32-bit version as the 64-bit version will not work!

Execute the command setup /admin to launch the setup customisation wizard:

Select the product you wish to customise and click OK:

Unless you want to change the default file types select the keep current settings:

Now, under “Install Loation and Organization Name” enter your company name:

Under Licensing and User Interface select ‘I agree the terms of the License Agreement’

Under ‘Set feature Installation States’ configure every application you will provide users access to as ‘Run all form My Computer’ – ruin on first use will not work when using application streaming!

Finally, to make the user experience that much nicer, under Modify user Settings > Microsoft Office 2010 > Privacy > Trust Center set ‘Disable Opt-In Wizard on First Run’ to ENABLED (the screensot below is wrong – but illustrates the loctaion!)

Now File > Save and save the MSP file under the Updates folder in the location contining the Microsoft Office 2010 installation files.

4. Profling Microsoft Office 2010

Download, install and launch the Citrix Streaming Profiler tool, in this example I used version 6.6.0.16.

Select the ‘New Profile’ option:

Click Next to begin the profiling Wizard:

Name the Profil Office 2010:

Do not enable User Updates and select Next to continue:

Do not enable support for 6.0 Offline Plugins unless you have these versions deployed.

There are no linked profile requirements for this deployment, but your environment may differ:

Select your Target Operating Systems, I selected WIndows 7, Windows 7 64-bit and Windows Server 2008 R2 64-bit edition (not all shown below). The server edition of the OS was selected to that the applictaion could be streamed to the XenApp Server to support clients such as Apple iPads.

You should also select the languaged you wish to support.

Select Advanced Install and click Next:

Select ‘Run install program or command line script’ and click next:

Browse tot he folder containing your Microsoft Office 2010 installation files and select the setup.exe file, then click Next:

Click Launch Installer to begin Microsoft Office 2010 setup:

Run through setup as you normally would, the Streaming Profiler will monitor the installation and capture it into a package:

Click Close, the Streaming Profiler will then perform a ‘virtual restart’ (takes ~1 second):

We’re nearly ther,e we just need to add some additional files to the installation. Select the ‘Perform additional installations’ option:

Choose the ‘Select files and folders’ option:

So it’s now better to group the files you need up manually first.

Create a folder on the root of C: named ‘RequiredFiles’
Copy the following files to this folder:

Msvcr80.dll	C:Windowswinsxsx86_Microsoft.VC80.CRT (random chars after, you’ll have to search)
cmd.exe	C:Windowssystem32
control.exe	C:Windowssystem32
MLCFG32.CPL	C:CTXPackager<Target>deviceCProgram FilesMicrosoft OfficeOffice14

Now, using the wizard, in the left hand folder view select your C:RequiredFiles folder, then copy the files as follows:

Msvcr80.dll	C:Program FilesMicrosoft OfficeOffice14 and C:Program Files (x86)Microsoft OfficeOffice14
cmd.exe	C:Windowssystem32 and C:WindowsSysWOW64
control.exe	C:Windowssystem32 and C:WindowsSysWOW64
MLCFG32.CPL	C:Windowssystem32 and C:WindowsSysWOW64