I’m starting to use BigFix to update Office 365. The provided fixlets force the end user to shutdown all running Office applications. This is disruptive to the end user. I’m looking to create custom copies of the provided fixlets and adding the forceappshutdown=false switch. Does anyone have experience with this? I would like to hear how others are patching O365 in their environments.
Thank you!
BigFix content already utilizes Forceappshutdown=false.
False is the default setting if forceappshutdown is not specified.
I’m not sure that O365 can be patched while it’s running. I think that option only controls whether users are prompted to shut down O365 (Forceappshutdown=false), or whether the apps are killed by the updater itself without warning the user (Forceappshutdown=true)
So (in my experience), when patching O365 the user is prompted to close their running apps and a lot of times they will decline and the action stays in a “running” state. The baseline can’t continue and doesn’t complete. Not being able to patch the apps while open is causing me some grief. Is the only option to force shutdown of the apps or only patch systems where the use decides it’s ok to proceed?
I realize this is an old post but hopefully it helps others. To answer LouC’s earlier question “Yes” those are the only options. Both choices allowing the user (to kill office) or allowing the updater (to kill office) have their negatives. We decided to allow the updater to kill office patches (Forceappshutdown=true). We do this with action #6 that has been in the fixlet for a while. We made sure to send out pre-patch communications about the “forceclose” impact to the end users. We are also using a message in the Preset to warn end users. I hope that helps.