Separating the Office package

[matthewk]

Is there a way to separate the office package into like an install file for word; an install file for excel; and so forth? Maybe should be done with multiple mst files? I don't know; need experienced user's views. Thanks

[<SparTacuS>]

There is - but it's a complete pain.

1. Create an admin point and slipstream the SP.

2. Using the admin kit create an MST file for the different installs - one for word, one for outlook etc.

3. Install a CLEAN Windows XP system in VMWare or VirtualPC.

4. Transfer Your Admin Point + MSTs + OfficeShrink Program (From Buckeye - see UA Applications forum) to your Virtual Machine.

5. Now run the Office Shrink using your first MST to create your first mini-package.

6. Transfer the package to your main machine - it's ready to use - unless you want to compress it with RAR or 7Zip.

7. (This is where it gets painful). You've got to start over again at step 3 (fresh XP install to do the same again for each MST. This is important, OfficeShrink will only work on a CLEAN install.

You could alleiviate the process a little by taking a Ghost image of the Virtual system after step 3 but before step 4 - this is how I did it, but it still took a full days work.

The biggest drawback to doing this is that, due to the way that OfficeShrink works, your installs will only work properly on machines with exactly the same Windows installation as your Virtual setup (it works by checking your system and only including files that you don't already have).

[Zxian]

If you don't want to use OfficeShrink, then you can also use 7-zip to compress the administrative install for each of the installers to help save space (it does help a lot...). That way you avoid problems with changing the configuration of your computer/install process.

[gentoobox]

3. Install a CLEAN Windows XP system in VMWare or VirtualPC.

only work on a CLEAN install.

use VirtualPC - you can setup virtualpc to NOT save changes. or use deepfreeze to restore the OS back to it's defaults.

[Historic]

A different method will be to,

1. Create a separate transform for each word, excel etc. Completely disable all the features for the applications you want removed. (save the transforms for each)

2. Create a backup of office .msi installation file.

3. Now open the office .msi file in orca,

from the tools menu, select apply transform, open the selected transform. Now save the .msi file.

4. For each application, use a separate folder and repeat step 3,

OR

save the transformed .msi using a different filename, then close orca, restore the backed-up .msi and repeat step 3

5. Now if you have saved .msi's using different filenames, all you need to do is double click on word.msi or excel.msi and users will be able to install separate applications depending on msi launched.

6. {warning unchartered territory} if you want to do it the hard way, figure out which files to delete for each installs, e.g. delete all excel related files from word install folder and so on.

This should give you an head-start in creating your own customised installs, although only a partial solution.

Edited September 28, 2005 by Historic