alienvenom

For the 10th time, Office needs access to the MSI file when it pull updates/addons for say.. MS Query, or whatever. A "shortcut" will not work.

Since Office 2003 Standard does support the /a flag, I'll probably just install each one separately then point them to the network share for updates/addons/etc...

Every user is already on the domain, and I feel it's a waste of time to manually go in and adjust permissions on each "install" based on what license they have. There should be a more "secure" way of distributing office. I'd like to somehow strip out the serial number of the MSI file, having it separate and giving only admins access to the serial number file. That way, when users need to install updates/addons, they will have access to the MSI file and even if they copy it to another comptuer, they can't just right click and click Install.

I may have to roll out Office 2003 to 100+ computers, except not all of them have a licence for Pro. I will need a slipstreamed Office 2003 Standard and a slipstreamed Office 2003 Pro version available. Is this possible? I am under the impression that only the Pro version supports the /a (administrative install flag). Also, when I use the /a (administrative) flag, the installer will build a PRO11.MSI file. Inside this contains the serial number. While I don't want to have to put it in 100+ times, I don't want the users to be able to simply right click on the MSI and click "install" and then have access to Office 2003 Pro. I thought about making the slipstreamed version separate from the version that will be available to the users (the files will still need to be on the network in case they need a component from Word, it wont ask for a CD), but at the same time, I don't want them to have access to the full product by copying the MSI file, bypassing whatever MST or SETUP.INI files are in place. Is there any way to edit or modify the setup.ini file before its placed in the PRO11.MSI file after using the /a flag? Also, is there any way to slipstream Office 2003 SP2 without having the serial number in the MSI file (so it prompts for it before it installs or removes components)?