Google Chrome Links - Alternative Suggestion

Content Authoring
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Hi everyone,

As of this date , there are issues with the Google Chrome link which is provided on the external content site - it is a static link which direct us to the latest version of Google Chrome.

I’ve looked upon Google Chrome Update - Create Log File section and managed to be able to retrieve:

  • Specific Version Google Chrome Installer (EXE) not MSI

  • Install Command which allow for system-wide (machine-level) installation

  • SHA1,SHA256,size,name

Is there any reason to use the MSI version and not the EXE version?
I was able to upgrade older MSI version with a newer EXE version.

https://github.com/orbiton21/BigFix/blob/main/GoogleChrome_GetVersions.ps1

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@JasonWalker do you have any input about using the EXE versus MSI options?

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Generally MSIs are preferred, but MSIs do not seem to be available with version specific URLs which is annoying… and if you try to update an MSI install with the EXE it seems to cause problems in my initial testing.

This means to really get this to work, you would have to uninstall the MSI version and then install the EXE version, which is messy in a regular day to day patch fixlet and has other problems. That said, we could provide EXE based patch fixlets that are only relevant on machines that have chrome installed by EXE and then you could do a transition from MSI to EXE if you wanted.

The other option I would recommend to help with chrome not providing version specific URLs is to have a WebUI Patch Policy that aggressively deploys Chrome and similar software without version specific URLs as an offer to test machines that way the BigFix server is likely to cache it and then it will still be available later to deploy as long as the root server cache is set sufficiently large.

This does seem to work for the EXE install:

wait __Download\chrome_installer.exe /silent /install --system-level

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@jgstew I was able to upgrade from MSI Installation with EXE without issues while using the following arguments: For Example, stable channel
–verbose-logging --do-not-launch-chrome --channel=stable --system-level {8A69D345-D564-463C-AFF1-A69D9E530F96}"

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Interesting. Where does this GUID come from?

When you did this, does google chrome seem to be able to update itself, or does it throw an error when you go to Help->About and look at the update check area? For me, the Help->About reported the type of chrome I installed over top of, not the one that is currently installed and it threw an error.

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@jgstew Google Chrome Updater is built upon Ohama - Google Chrome is being registered through a specific GUID - for example: https://omaha-consulting.com/google-omaha-tutorial-chrome-updater

I’ve also got this GUID through the Google Chrome Updater Log file

I’ve also tried it on a system which was not connected to the Internet - and the update was successful

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I did realize the Ohama connection, but I wasn’t sure where to find a list of GUIDs to know.

Are there different GUIDs for EXE vs MSI? are there different GUIDs for 32bit vs 64bit? are there different GUIDs for different channels?

That is interesting.