Can I directly assign .MSP files to workstations with group policy

[Guest]

Hi,

I am using Group Policy to install office 2003 to XP workstations. I would
like to install SP1 for Office 2003 afterwards via group policy too. I don't
want to use an Administrative Install point for office, as I wish to use the
local cached installation source instead. The problem is that the service
pack package has a .MSP extension, and I can't seem to get group policy to
deploy that kind of file.

Is there a way to take a .MSP file (the service pack) and use group policy
to install it (by assignment - to a machine) on top of an already deployed
application? In my tests, I'm not able to attach a .MSP package to a group
policy, and I can't seem to find a .MSI version of the service pack either.
Alternatively, is there a straight-forward way to convert a .MSP package into
a .MSI package, without having to produce images etc?

Ideally, it would be nice to let group policy push the updates to our
computers. Although I could chain SP1 to the office 2003 install now, and
install them together, I would like a way to perform the update separately,
since I'll have this problem again when SP2 comes out. Can group policy do
this? Any ideas?

Thanks in advance!

 

[Denis Wong @ Hong Kong]

Hi,

You'll probably want to apply the MSP (patch) to your admin install point
for distribution.

Strategies for Updating Office 2003 Installations
http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/assistance/HA011525741033.aspx

br,
Denis

 

[Guest]

Thanks Denis,

I'm aware of that approach, but I don't want to use an admin install point,
and then have to recache and re-install office on all the workstations every
time we update the SP level. I'm hoping there's a way to use group policy to
distribute/push .MSP patch packages directly to the workstations, and allow
it to "assign" the package to each computer, without user intervention. Does
anyone know if that can be done? Is this a limitation of GPO? Would a
product like SMS, or other 3rd party tool be able to do this?

Thanks

----