Microsoft Application Virtualization improves end user productivity and reduces the risks associated with application management. It transforms applications into virtualized, network-available services that are available on-demand and never installed, minimizing application confl icts and enabling users to work from virtually any location. By deploying and managing Microsoft Offi ce through Microsoft Application Virtualization, you can enable multiple versions of Offi ce to run side-by-side on the same device, accelerate the deployment of Offi ce, and enhance user mobility and business continuity.

Microsoft Application Virtualization is an integral component of the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack, a suite of fi ve dynamic desktop solutions that helps Software Assurance customers reduce application deployment costs, enable delivery of applications as services, and better manage and control enterprise desktop environments.

Challenges with Application Management

Managing corporate applications, including Microsoft Offi ce, can be very time-consuming. Inherent complications with application compat-ibility and integration, and challenges with updates and mobile user support, can disrupt IT services and delay critical deployments.

Because of compatibility issues, IT managers who migrate users to the latest Offi ce version may be unable to run some Offi ce plug-ins or other installed applications designed for earlier versions of Offi ce on the same computer. Since multiple versions of an application may not install or run correctly on the same desktop or server, IT may have problems running applications that are dependent on older versions of Access, Excel or Word on the same device as the new Offi ce release.

These complexities not only impact IT resources, they also can hamper end user productivity. Other challenges that may impact end user productivity include downtime when their computers are being updated, and, in the event of a complete hardware system failure, when their applications must be reinstalled on other devices—or their entire systems must be rebuilt.

Implementing Microsoft Offi ce through Microsoft Application Virtualization can mitigate these challenges and simplify application management for IT.

Microsoft® Offi ce through Microsoft Application Virtualization

Accelerate Office deployments and simplify management

Accelerate Offi ce DeploymentUsing Microsoft Application Virtualization makes enterprise-wide Offi ce deployments—including department-by-department rollouts—easier to manage. Because virtualized applications are never installed on the client computer, and therefore never confl ict with the device’s installed applications, you don’t need to perform application-to-application regression testing when you virtualize older versions of Offi ce to ensure other applications will work with it. Similarly, if you install the newest Offi ce release, any virtualized applications you have don’t need to run through application-to-application compatibility testing. This can save you signifi cant time and speed your time-to-production.

With Microsoft Application Virtualization 4.5, a release available in H2 CY2008, a new feature called Dynamic Suite Composition

provides the capability to help simplify deployment and manage-ment of Offi ce and its dependent applications. IT can sequence and manage packages for middleware applications separately from the main application. In essence, Offi ce is treated as the middleware for the virtualized dependent applications. IT only needs to virtualize the Offi ce application once to use it with multiple applications.

To make implementation as easy as possible, Software Assurance customers can use the Desktop Deployment Planning Service (DDPS) benefi t to plan the deployment of Microsoft Application Virtualization and Offi ce in a virtualized environment. You can also use training vouchers to learn how to deploy Offi ce with Microsoft Application Virtualization.

Microsoft Application Virtualization and Offi ce: Advantages

Run Multiple Versions of Offi ce on the Same DesktopBy enabling you to run multiple versions of the same application on the same machine, Microsoft Application Virtualization benefi ts both desktop and server implementations of Offi ce. It lets you consolidate Terminal Services farms while providing users a rich client experience. You can also run Offi ce 2007 simultaneously with applications that are dependent on older versions of Excel, Access, Word, or other components. If you virtualize those older versions they can work with the applications they need to and you can still move to Offi ce 2007 on the core platform. In addition, by virtual-izing Offi ce 2003 you can run both Offi ce 2003 and Offi ce 2007 on the same machine. This enables you to host both Offi ce 2003 and 2007 in your environment while migrating from one to the other.

Enhance User Mobility and Business ContinuityImplementing Microsoft Application Virtualization with Offi ce helps you enhance business continuity for your end users. In the event of a disaster, IT can easily get end users back up and running on Offi ce at a new site on new machines, without the delay caused by the

application installation process. Even updating won’t impact end user productivity. Offi ce updates can be streamed to the user on-demand without requiring reboot or downtime. Because you don’t need to do regression testing, you can get the latest fi xes into production faster.

Deploying virtualized applications, including Offi ce, also enables IT to lock down desktops while still giving users the applications and experience they require to perform their jobs. As a result of the application isolation provided by Microsoft Application Virtualization, the application does not interact with the operating system to the same degree as a locally installed application. This ensures that applications do not leave any footprint or alter the operating system in any way. This does impact some functionality in Offi ce 2007 that tightly integrates with the operating system, such as “search.” For more information please visit http://support.microsoft.com/kb/932137/

Microsoft Office through Microsoft Application Virtualization

Microsoft Application Virtualization and Offi ce: Advantages (continued)

Microsoft Application Virtualization combines with four other components to make the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack for Software Assurance, which delivers dynamic desktop solutions: Microsoft Asset Inventory Service, which translates software inventory into business intelligence; Microsoft Diagnostics and Recovery Toolset, powerful tools to accelerate desktop repair, recovery, and troubleshooting of unbootable Windows®-based computers; Microsoft Advanced Group Policy Management, which enhances Group Policy through change management tools; and Microsoft System Center Desktop Error Monitoring, which enables proactive problem management by analyzing and reporting on application and system crashes.

Customer Impact:

Improvements in IT management, user productivity and business continuity reduce total cost of ownership for applications, including Offi ce.

To learn how Microsoft Application Virtualization and the Microsoft Desktop Optimization Pack for Software Assurance can help you, please visit http://www.windowsvista.com/optimizeddesktop.

Microsoft Application Virtualization for Terminal Services is also available separately for Windows® Terminal Server environments. To learn more about this product, visit http://www.microsoft.com/terminalservices.

For more information about Microsoft Offi ce, please visit http://offi ce.microsoft.com

This document is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.098-109161 DATASHEET Desktop Optimization Pack for SA MS Offi ce through MS App Virtualization0108