Use Windows Intune to Install Office 365 Client Software

If you have a Windows Intune environment and are moving to Office 365, Intune will make this move a lot easier on getting the client machines ready.
You can use Windows Intune to run reports, to gather information on machines in your current environment, and to verify software requirements that are needed before deployment. Then you can deploy to the machines that are not compliant with the necessary Office 365 client software or requirements.

Below I will show a few steps and tips to make this a bit easier.
Here are some sample steps needed to deploy Office 365 Client Software with Windows Intune.

• Run reports to verify machine requirements.
• Gather all the needed client software and any updates.
• Package and upload software into Windows Intune.
• Deploy the packages to the client machines that will receive Office 365 or that are not compliant.
• Run reports during the deployment to make sure all machines receive the needed software.

Tips on packaging Office 365 software for Intune deployment.
1. Office 2010 Professional Plus – This software can be downloaded from your Office 365 tenant.

• Save at the root of c:\ MicrosoftOffice.exe.
• Open CMD Prompt as administrator.
• Run from CMD MicrosoftOffice.exe /extract:<path>.
• Inside the folder with the extracted files, create a txt document and paste these settings.

Revolutionize Your Business With Generative AI

From product design and software development to virtual agents, content creation, and reporting, GenAI is transforming business. Our AI experts help you unlock GenAI’s full potential and drive growth.

Let’s Get Started

<Configuration Product=”ProPlusSub”>
<Display Level=”none” CompletionNotice=”no” SuppressModal=”yes” AcceptEula=”yes” />
</Configuration>

• Save the txt document as XML and rename it to config.XML.
• During upload into Intune use the command line argument /config config.xml
• You can use these Detection Rules in Windows Intune.

File exists:
%ProgramFiles%\Common Files\microsoft shared\OFFICE14\osaui.exe
(This is the Office Subscription Agent. Note that on 64 bit machines Intune will check both C:\Program Files and C:\Program Files (x86))
MSI product code exists:
<Extracted Folder>\ProPlusSub.WW\ProPlusSubWW.msi
Registry key exists:
HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\OfficeSoftwareProtectionPlatform
2. There are two patches that might need to be deployed depending on the need, Microsoft Outlook 2010 Update kb2597011 and Microsoft One Note 2010 Update kb2523130.

• These can be incorporated into the Office 2010 Professional Plus package, by extracting them into the updates subdirectory of the extracted Office 2010 Professional Plus package setup. Or upload the .msp files as Non-Microsoft Updates into Windows Intune and deploy them as needed.

3. Microsoft Lync Install

• You do not need to extract Lync, just upload the exe into Windows Intune.
• Use the command line argument /Install /Silent.
• Use for Detection Rules %ProgramFiles%\Microsoft Lync\communicator.exe.

4. Microsoft Online Services Sign-In Assistant

• You do not need to extract the Sign-In Assistant just upload into to Windows Intune.
• Since this is a MSI it will run silent and Windows Intune can verify whether this has been installed already.

As you can see Windows Intune is a great way to deploy the necessary Office 365 client software to make the journey to Office 365 a smoother trip.