Use GPO in conjunction with an .xml config for deploying Office 365 ProPlus?

[Robert_Spokane]

Hopefully I can even word this correctly.

I have 180 machines with Office 365 ProPlus Click-to-Run. Currently they have all default settings with regards to updates. I want to change some of those machines to the Targeted channel and I want to remove Skype from about 160 of them. I also want to control updates via Group Policy.

I have the .xml file to configure this but I don't see a way for Group Policy to integrate the .xml file into the update process. I don't specify a source path because I want the updates to come from the CDN and not a network share.

What would really solve everything is if I could remove Skype for Business via a GPO.

[#2 · Accepted solution]

There is no way to apply a config.xml through GPO onto a device. The config.XMLs always require the ODT (setup.exe) to apply them. On you questions:

• Change update channel: Either use the GPO "Microsoft Office 2016 (Machine)\Updates > Update Channel" OR re-run ODT with a config similar to this <configuration><Updates Channel="Targeted" /></configuration>.
• Remove Skype for Business: The only way to remove Skype for Business is through re-running ODT. the required config.xml would like the following: <configuration><Add><Product ID="O365ProPlus"><ExcludeApp ID="Lync" /></Product></Add></configuration>

Hope this helps.

[#3]

Thank you, it does help. I suspected this was the case, I was hoping I was overlooking another way to do this.