2
I'd like to repackage MSIs with custom modifications
Let's do an example: I use an Windows Server and GPOs to deploy software to clients. When I put there a MSI of e.g. firefox it's installs as a normal software, but I require for example custom add-ons and a different start page (of course there might be GPOs which do that, but not every software supports this).
So I use the application "AppDeploy Repackager" which builds a custom MSI from the changes that where made during the installation. I installed some add-ons for firefox and changed some settings. After the MSI has finished building I copied the MSI to another machine and installed it. Everything works fine with my presets.
Now I've read that this process can cause an "disaster". Have you use this process already in your environment and what is your opinion about this?
And does this MSI installs on other hardware machines from different vendors without any issues (In fact every machine is 64bit)? I was only able to test it on VirtualBox machines.
That sounds that it would be the easiest way to go. Of course there is everytime something you can mess up. But we plan to create the MSI package on a snapshottet Win10 VM that can be reset to the installation state. In addition every unnecessary process and service is stopped (like explorer.exe). Have you already some experiences if the repackaged MSI works also on machines from different vendors? – ForJ9 – 2017-11-23T21:57:47.520
Another addition: Which software have you used? And which would you recommend? – ForJ9 – 2017-11-23T22:45:55.333
Yes we do use various brands of laptop & desktop, it would primarily be windows itself/ the application that would have problems. And yes snapshotting machine is a good idea, we did the same. I cant remember what was used before, it ran on windows XP. We moved onto using PDQ Deploy instead of repackaging. – Lister – 2017-11-30T16:55:18.563