Teams Desktop Version on School PC's

[Katy]

Just to confirm, all those things you mention are locked down in the VDI install (if you're using alluser install flag). It's not that the installers are different, just the install method restricts them.

 

Even with the computer based installer you can get all the items, if you don't enable VDI:

http://www.edugeek.net/forums/cloud-services/219574-microsoft-teams-new-meeting-experience.html#post1880600

 

Steve

 

We don't use VDI - we just recommend the app (cause it has more features) leaving the web one as a "I just need to quickly do this on a different PC" or "the app is broke" backup.

[Steve21]

We don't use VDI - we just recommend the app (cause it has more features) leaving the web one as a "I just need to quickly do this on a different PC" or "the app is broke" backup.

 

We don't either, but that's the regkey needed for the whole system install via ALLUSER etc if you deployed the systemwide installer that way , which is generally what restricts the access to those items you mentioned. Else the new features should show up in the settings under the new meeting experience tick box

 

*Edit - Or did I misunderstand your question, that you're saying your webapp has less features showing currently? (Compared to webapp having more than the local one?)

 

Steve

Edited January 28, 2021 by Steve21

[Katy]

We don't either, but that's the regkey needed for the whole system install via ALLUSER etc if you deployed the systemwide installer that way , which is generally what restricts the access to those items you mentioned. Else the new features should show up in the settings under the new meeting experience tick box

 

*Edit - Or did I misunderstand your question, that you're saying your webapp has less features showing currently? (Compared to webapp having more than the local one?)

 

Steve

 

No, I'm saying the teams.exe has more features than teams.microsoft.com in a web browser

[smarties11]

We've let the machine installer go on with Office 365 and it just installs into AppData (gave up trying to fight it to get it to do anything sensible). I removed the RunOnce entry off the default profiles to stop it auto installing for every user, instead we have a shortcut that links to a batch script which installs it if it isn't already there, otherwise it just launches it, so that it's only installing for people who want to use the desktop app.

 

There's too many differences between the desktop app and the web version now to believe the app is just a wrapper round the website any more (UI elements in different places, unsupported features in web vs app e.g. breakout rooms)

 

We do similar here; a tip with regard to the installer that comes with O365 - it's never bang up to date (unless you are on current channel and deploy O365 updates every month perhaps), so new users will get a Teams install that's a few revisions old and then have to wait for an in-app update. What I do is download the latest installer from MS every couple of weeks then use a GPP to copy this to C:\Program Files (x86)\Teams Installer\Teams.exe

[free780]

The argument from MS is they don't want IT departments managing (stopping) updates. They want the app to update automatically. As it is a cloud service this makes sense the same with MS Edge and the Onedrive Sync Client. You release some control and trust Microsoft (then Work Folders breaks - Sorry other issue).

 

When MS finally work it out and have a per machine service/scheduled task, you shouldn't have an issue with the latest update. They did have a Teams beta in the MS Store at one point but it violated their own store guidelines due to its use of Chromium. This was before Chromium Edge. If they just put it in the store you can integrate the store with SCCM and deploy per machine. The other alternative is to make the Web App a Progressive Web App like Outlook, as long as there is a way of provisioning the latest version for the user before they login.

 

The issues have been highlighted as the Breakout rooms feature requires the latest version of the Teams client but as Microsoft want a gradual release sometimes the client will not update to the latest version.

 

Again shared devices are an afterthought as there is the trend towards 1:1 devices (increasing so with COVID-19).

 

I think Electron is not designed to separate the user data the the executable (yes silly I know).

 

Anyway vote away here.

 

Improve Install options - Install for all users and install location – Microsoft Teams UserVoice

 

Pre Per Machine installer I ended up having a script to download the latest version to a share which got GPP'd into C:\program files (x86)\Microsoft Teams\teams.exe.

If the user started form the start menu (User GPP file for the shortcut) it would point to C:\program files (x86)\Microsoft Teams\teams.exe but install Teams into the profile.

I did a user GPP to remove the shortcut to C:\program files (x86)\Microsoft Teams\teams.exe if the teams exe was present in the profile.

 

I think this is what the per-machine installer does today but without GPP.

Edited January 28, 2021 by free780

[3s-gtech]

Would you be able to share the Robocopy command you used to get this to work? Currently looking at this now and would like to avoid using Appdata if possible

 

I really don’t check my post history enough!

 

Robocopy \\server\share\Teams %localprofile\Microsoft\Teams /MIR

 

or something very similar to that. If tou have a copy of Teams working from the share directory, it will automatically update then that update will copy down to all clients using this script. Not the quickest solution but quite neat.

[e-class]

Hi, for those of you who have used the MSI machine installer, how are you updating it.

I've just realised it doesn't auto-update!

I've read about having to uninstall the deployed version and then redeploy the latest MSI machine installer? Is that the best way? Really don't want to be doing that each time.

And if I did, do I need to clear up Teams in the user profiles for all the users too?

 

Thanks

[mavhc]

The installer doesn't update, but the installed copies still update themselves