Chapter 18: Deploying Outlook 2003


Microsoft Outlook 2003 is the latest version of Outlook. Because it is a component of Microsoft Office 2003, Outlook 2003 will become widely used as organizations upgrade to this newest version of the popular Office suite. It is included in all Office 2003 editions and is also shipped with Microsoft Exchange Server 2003. This chapter looks at some of the issues an administrator faces when deploying Outlook 2003, including installation, using Outlook 2003 offline, and enabling multiple users.

Installing Outlook 2003

Installing client software is among the more repetitive tasks you face as an administrator. However, it’s one that you’ve got to perform because a client/ server system such as Exchange Server 2003 will not work unless both sides of the equation are in place.

Because this book focuses on Exchange Server, we will not provide detailed instructions for installing Outlook 2003. We’ll simply give an overview of the installation methods available, explaining some of the options you or your users have when performing a standard Outlook installation on an individual machine. We’ll then introduce the Office Custom Installation Wizard, which allows you to create customized installations for your users.

More Info

This chapter provides an overview of the concerns regarding Outlook 2003 from an administrator’s view, but Outlook is a pretty complex program. If you want to learn more about using Outlook 2003, read Microsoft Outlook 2003 Inside Out by Jim Boyce (Microsoft Press, 2003). To learn more about Office 2003 deployment, check out the Microsoft Office 2003 Resource Kit (Microsoft Press, 2003).

Standard Outlook Installation

Like most Microsoft programs, Outlook 2003 installs with a setup wizard regardless of whether you are installing Outlook as part of Office 2003 or as a standalone installation. You can customize just about every aspect of an installation, including adding and removing components during or after an installation. Figure 18-1 shows the component selection process for Outlook 2003 during a custom installation of Office 2003. (The list of Outlook components is the same when installing only Outlook.) For each component of Outlook 2003, you can elect to perform one of the following actions:

click to expand
Figure 18-1: Specifying which Outlook 2003 components to install.

  • Install the component to run from the local hard disk. If disk space is abundant, many administrators choose to install every available component to run in this way.

  • Install all subcomponents of the component to run from the local hard disk. This essentially chooses the previous option for an entire group of components.

  • Set the component to install the first time the user attempts to use it. If a user never uses a certain component of Outlook, the component is never installed and doesn’t waste space. On the other hand, constantly used components are installed locally. This option also saves time during the initial install.

  • Make the component unavailable. This simply means that the user will have to run the installer again to install the component. You can also use this option to prevent the user from installing certain components, as long as you don’t make the installation files available.

After you’ve selected the components to install, Windows Installer takes care of the rest of the installation with little or no intervention on your part.

The first time a user runs Outlook 2003 following a standard installation, Outlook starts up and prompts the user to configure the user’s e-mail account. In an Exchange organization, this configuration involves providing the name of the Exchange server and the user name.

Customizing Outlook Installation

As an administrator, you can customize the setup of Outlook 2003 in three ways. You can run the setup program with command-line switches, use a setup information file to answer various setup questions and then specify the setup information file using command-line switches, and customize an installation of Outlook with the Office Custom Installation Wizard. The following sections briefly discuss these options.

Using Command-Line Switches

You can customize the setup of Outlook somewhat by using various switches. Most of the switches involve the use of a Microsoft Installer (.MSI) package file. Table 18-1 lists the available command-line switches.

Table 18-1: Command-line switches for installing Outlook 2003

Switch

Use

/a <msifile>

Creates an administrative install point using the .MSI file for client installations.

/f [options] <msifile>

Repairs the Outlook installation using various repair modes.

/i <msifile>

Specifies the name of the .MSI file to be used during installation. This switch cannot be used with the /a switch.

/j [options] <msifile>

Creates an icon that can be used later to install a feature not configured during setup.

/l [options] <logfile>

Specifies the log file used during installation and also switches to be passed to the Windows Installer.

/noreboot

Specifies that the computer not reboot or display a dialog box asking the user to reboot when the installation is finished.

/x <msifile>

Uninstalls Outlook.

/q [options]

Specifies the amount of information to be presented on screen during the installation.

/wait

Indicates that the installer should wait for the installation to complete before exiting.

/settings

Specifies the path and settings file to be used for the automated installation.

More Info

For more information about using switches to modify your Outlook installations, see the setup.htm file on the Outlook 2003 or Office 2003 installation CD-ROM.

Using a Setup Information File

If a file named Setup.ini exists in the same directory as Setup.exe, or if the /settings <inifile> switch specifies an .INI file with a different name, that file will be used to modify the default behavior of the setup. Because this file can specify all the parameters you would normally provide at the command line, it is useful for a number of reasons:

  • You can avoid typographical errors at the command line.

  • You are not subject to limitations on the length of the command.

  • You can enforce specific settings, even with an interactive installation.

The file is merely a text document and can be opened with Microsoft Notepad or any other text editor. Like other .INI files, each line represents one aspect of the installation. To include a comment, type a semicolon at the beginning of each comment line.

Using the Office Custom Installation Wizard

The Office Custom Installation Wizard, shown in Figure 18-2, works with Windows Installer to let you tweak almost every detail of the installation process. Using the Custom Installation Wizard, you can perform the following actions:

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Figure 18-2: Customizing an Outlook installation with the Office Custom Installation Wizard.

  • Define the path where Outlook 2003 is installed on client computers.

  • Set the installation options (Run From Hard Disk, Install On First Use, Don’t Install) for individual components of Outlook 2003.

  • Define a list of network servers for Windows Installer to use when the primary installation server is unavailable.

  • Specify other products to install or other programs to run on the user’s computer when the Outlook installation is done.

  • Hide selected options from users during setup.

  • Add custom files and Windows registry settings to the installation.

  • Customize desktop shortcuts for Outlook 2003.

  • Set user default options.

  • Use Office profile settings created with the Profile Wizard for Office 2003 to preset user options.

To accomplish all this, the Windows Installer uses two types of files: an installer package (an .MSI file) and an installer transform file (an .MST file). The installer package contains a database that describes the configuration information. The installer transform file contains modifications that are to be made as Windows Installer installs Outlook. The package file never changes; it is essentially a database that helps Windows Installer relate various features to actual installation files. The transform file is what the Office Custom Installation Wizard helps you create. It allows you to create unique setup scenarios that use the same installation files. In other words, you could create different installation routines for different departments but use only one network installation point.

More Info

The Office Custom Installation Wizard is included on the CD- ROM that accompanies the Microsoft Office 2000 Resource Kit (Microsoft Press). It is also available online at http://www.microsoft.com/office/ork/xp/default.htm. The resource kit provides detailed information about using the wizard.

Systems Management Server

Systems Management Server (SMS) is a Microsoft application specifically designed to help administrators address the needs of larger user communities. The Microsoft Office 2003 Resource Kit (Microsoft Press), which is available in both book form and online, contains instructions for creating installation packages and configuration files that can be used by SMS. The resource kit also contains a sample package definition file (PDF) that can be used with SMS to distribute the customized version of the executable client setup file to the users on your network. The PDF is a text file (with an .SMS extension) that includes the setup parameters necessary to install Outlook 2003 using SMS. The sample PDF is as follows:

 [PDF] Version=2.0 [Package Definition] Publisher=Microsoft Name=Office 2003 Applications Version=11.0 Language=English Programs=Typical, Manual, Custom, Uninstall MIFName=off11 [Typical] Name=Typical (quiet) CommandLine=setup.exe /qb- /m off11 AdminRightsRequired=True UserInputRequired=False DriveLetterConnection=False CanRunWhen=AnyUserStatus RemoveProgram=False SupportedClients=Win NT (I386) Win NT (I386) MinVersion1=5.00.0000.0 Win NT (I386) MaxVersion1=9.99.9999.9999  [Manual] Name=Manual CommandLine=setup.exe /m off11 UserInputRequired=True AdminRightsRequired=True DriveLetterConnection=False RemoveProgram=False SupportedClients=Win NT (I386) Win NT (I386) MinVersion1=5.00.0000.0 Win NT (I386) MaxVersion1=9.99.9999.9999  [Custom] Name=Custom (quiet) CommandLine=setup.exe /qb- TRANSFORMS="New Custom Setup File.MST" /m off11 AdminRightsRequired=True UserInputRequired=False DriveLetterConnection=False CanRunWhen=AnyUserStatus RemoveProgram=False SupportedClients=Win NT (I386) Win NT (I386) MinVersion1=5.00.0000.0 Win NT (I386) MaxVersion1=9.99.9999.9999  [Uninstall] Name=Uninstall CommandLine=setup.exe /qb- REBOOT=ReallySuppress /m off11 /x AdminRightsRequired=False UserInputRequired=False DriveLetterConnection=False CanRunWhen=AnyUserStatus SupportedClients=Win NT (I386) Win NT (I386) MinVersion1=5.00.0000.0 Win NT (I386) MaxVersion1=9.99.9999.9999 

You must accomplish two steps before distributing Outlook 2003 to your client systems. First, you must create a package. The package consists of the PDF just discussed and a package source folder containing all the files necessary for the installation. After you’ve created the package, the second step is to create an advertisement to distribute the package. An advertisement consists of the package as well as a list of all client systems on which you want the package installed (called a collection). SMS provides flexibility and granularity so that you can install the package only where you want it. For example, you might decide to install the package only on client systems that meet minimum memory and hard disk parameters and ignore all other systems. The job can also be set to run only after a certain time period and, if not voluntarily accepted by the user within that time frame, the job can be configured to become a mandatory installation that the user cannot stop or defer to a later time period.




Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Administrator's Companion
Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Administrators Companion (Pro-Administrators Companion)
ISBN: 0735619794
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2005
Pages: 254

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