Hi, just after help from anyone who has successfully pushed out the R6 client using Group Policies in windows 2000. Progress so far:
Used Installshield Tuner to create custom Transform file, created an OU with a GPO that assigns the MSI with the MST to the users within.
Upon the user logging in they will receive the policy and Add/Remove Programs will show Lotus Notes 6.0.1 as being installed. However there is no sign of the client anywhere on the computer. If within add/remove programs you go to “Add New Programs” the user can manually kick off the install from there, which works fine.
I dont believe theres a problem with my MST as using the command
msiexec /i “\\Lotus Notes 6.msi” /qb!+ /T “\\R601Client.mst”
works fine as expected. Also the setup.exe created by InstallShield Tuner runs fine… but I would like to use a GPO to push this out… any clues as to where I am going wrong?
Subject: Using GPO’s to install client
The first thing I would recommend is double checking your transform file (MST). You said you were using the command: msiexec /i “\\Lotus Notes 6.msi” /qb!+ /T “\\R601Client.mst”
to execute the installer while testing, and that it seemed to work. What was likely happening is that it was just running the setup with the default values; even though /T is the Microsoft published command switch to specify a transform file, I have never been able to get it to work. No matter what the format of the command, the transform is not applied.
However, if you use the following command instead, it should apply the transform correctly:
msiexec /i "\\<server>\Lotus Notes 6.msi" /qb!+ TRANSFORMS="\\<server>\R601Client.mst"
You should be able to tell from this whether or not your transform is working.
If you want the installer to create a more detailed log when it runs, add:
/l*v %TEMP%\notes6.log
You can change the path of the log to whatever you want.
One last thing: try to do any testing on a machine that has never has Notes installed before. Windows caches the Installer MSI files and the transform MST’s applied to them, along with creating a lot of registry entries from the Installer package. If your MST doesn’t work right, it can make the application impossible to remove, and impossible to reinstall even after manual removal.
You may want to look into a “virtual computer” program so that you can do any testing you need on that. This would allow you to set up a machine with a clean install of Windows, save it in the state, and revert it back to that point after each test you do. (Much easier than constantly reformatting and installing Windows on a workstation.) I’ve had good luck with VMWare’s programs. Another possibility is Connectix, which Microsoft acquired a few months back.
Subject: RE: Using GPO’s to install client
Thanks for the extensive information and for the tip about the transform switch. I couldn’t figure out why the Single Client Logon Service was not installing even though it was specified in my transform file…
Unfornately this still doesnt solve my GPO issues as there are no command lines involved, just selecting the MSI and MST when creating the GPO. I have decided to use the upgrade by mail option, so the above will be useful for my batch file. Thanks again