Re: Previous versions of Office won't uninstall when deploying Off

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I don't think this is "by accident", but by "marketing strategy".

If you want to sell as many SMS-Licenses as possible, find a "killer app"
that will force everyone to use it.
Using Office 2007 to push SMS is just a nother way to screw the customer.
Have you tried to deploy SQL 2005 Express with GPO ?
MSDE 2000 is an msi that deploys without ant problems, but I still haven't
found a way to do it wth 2005.
Expect the exact same behavior with all new products. How can I use a new
product that everyone wants, to push a product that they don't need or want
?

Kenneth Hempkins

"Gerry Hickman" <gerry666uk@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote in message
news:um6KvPOhHHA.4552@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx
Hi,

It's been the case for a long time that Microsoft products are becoming
less friendly for the big corporate IT networks. There's thread over on
the MSI newsgroup (Vista and DCOM) that echoes the same problem but from a
different angle.

The main Microsoft focus appears to be the "home user who is a member of
the Administrators group", and who interacts with the computer by
"clicking" things.

If you look at all the Microsoft help files, ResKits and MSDN collections
since 1999, you'll note that all the advanced topics are being removed and
replaced by meaningless rubbish. Here's an example when you search for "An
attempt was made to reference a token that does not exist." on Vista you
get this from Windows 2000:

<http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/windows2000serv/reskit/w2000Msgs/3803.mspx?mfr=true>

"Contact the supplier of the running application."

Great, so I have to contact Microsoft:(

The Vista help file is another good example. Vista makes extensive use of
Reparse Points, but if you put those words into the help file, it starts
offering help about "Wireless access points"! Clueless and stupid, just
like the so-called "security model" and "virtualization" in Vista.

No doubt the AIP was seen as a "bit too advanced" for the average
Microsoft Certified Systems Engineer. Likewise they "deprecated" the MSI
provider inside WMI. Again probably seen as a "bit too difficult" for the
kind of people who choose Microsoft? Instead they offer "wizards", where
people are led by the hand like children, and end up with equally childish
results.

The other thing they did was create ".NET Framework" to try and make
programming more "child friendly". Note that for their own products they
stick to native code using C++ and COM, but try to brainwash customers
into thinking .NET is superior, and most of them fall for it.
Unbelievable!

eugenevr wrote:
I find the whole way the new deployment is being done very
interesting. Suddenly GPO deployment is not as an acceptable way of
deploying Office any more.... Some distasteful words come to mind.
Whilst the "preferred" procedure is sure to work OK (never mind that
you can "customize" far less of the deployment than would have been
the case with OCW alone), it is clear MS did not think this through
properly.

As for uninstalling Office 2003 first (upgrading is ALWAYS wrong????),
most of us lowly techies (esp those who consult to other companies who
most of the time do *not* have pristine setups), cannot always start
with a clean slate. In short, I've had no issues doing in-place
upgrades from Office 2000->XP->2003. It is not ideal I concur, but it
is the reality many of us work with. And what about user setttings
specific to Office; if I remove an old version and do a fresh there
are always some things missing, and we then are faced with touching
the desktop manually or having to find all kinds of scripting
solutions as workarounds. (Thanks for posting the js by the way!)

MS has given us a wonderful product in Office 2007, it's people ready
but not exactly IT ready. Once again: there are numerous of our client
base that cannot afford SMS/SCCM, where we have been using GPO
extensively to deploy software (esp Office 2003); to curb the use of
GPO in deploying Office 2007 seems almost unbelievable. There are
numerous posts and blogs about this issue and it is sure to stir up
even more emotion as sysadmins start to realize the deployment toolset
is not as refined as it should be.








On Apr 21, 5:25 pm, Gerry Hickman <gerry66...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Hi,

Ok, if the original installs were "manual", that explains a lot. Here's
something to try, run this script against some random remote boxes and
it should print the 3 key qualifiers for the product. Once we have them
we can test doing an uninstall (if you have a domain admin account?)

Copy and paste this script into a text file called o2k3check.js, then
run it like this

CScript o2k3check.js

Copy and paste the output back here

* look out for line wrap below *

// Get Microsoft Office Products
// You MUST run this under CScript, not WScript.
// one command line arg = computer to check
// no command line arg = local computer

var cArgs = WScript.Arguments;
var cArgsUnnamed = cArgs.Unnamed;
if (cArgsUnnamed.Count > 0) {
var strCmp = cArgsUnnamed(0);} else {
var strCmp = ".";
}

var oLoc = new ActiveXObject("WbemScripting.SWbemLocator");
var oSvc = oLoc.ConnectServer(strCmp, "root\\cimv2");
getProducts();
oSvc = null;
oLoc = null;

function getProducts() {
// Get key qualifiers for all Office products

var re = /^Microsoft Office/i;
var cProducts = oSvc.InstancesOf("Win32_Product");
trace("Total number of products " + cProducts.Count);
var e = new Enumerator(cProducts);
for(;!e.atEnd();e.moveNext()) {
var oThisProduct = e.item();
var strProductName = oThisProduct.Name;
if(strProductName.match(re)) {
var strProduct = oThisProduct.IdentifyingNumber
+ " : ";
strProduct += strProductName + " : ";
strProduct += oThisProduct.Version;
trace(strProduct);
}
}

}

function trace(strMsg) {
WScript.Echo(strMsg);

}
Will73 wrote:
That is exactly what I am trying to do. It will uninstall if I use the
setup.exe file. It will uninstall if I use a custom .MSP file.
Problem is
there is no way to uninstall through Group Policy. Since the software
was
originally installed manually there is no upgrade path to remove it
viaGPO.
I would love to run around my company and uninstall all the clients,
but
that would take quite some time. It would be better if there was a
automated
way of doing this. Your approach is the ideal method, but not always a
practical one.
--
Gerry Hickman (London UK)




--
Gerry Hickman (London UK)


.

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