GPO Editor Using VB.NET - Can it be done?

[Superfreak3]

I'll start off with a long story made short. Without going into much detail, our application has an automated update mechanism that is really becoming obsolete. Not so much obsolete, I guess, but it is hindered by progressing security on newer OSs.

My thought was to maybe offer an alternative via Group Policy. We could instruct users on how to deploy our software, but I'm also exploring the possibility of maybe coding a wrapper around Group Policy so that it only really deals with the deployment of our software and any prerequisites.

I would basically want something that I could write to deploy our .msi and have the ability to patch it as well. This would be per machine deployments initially. I don't know that I fully understand how patching works through GPO, but I believe it involves an administrative install of the deployment package (.msi), which is then patched.

Anyway, I don't even know how much of an UI I would need for this little GPO widget. I guess I could limit it to only launching our .msi, but need to expose which groups can receive the installation, etc.

I'm by no means an expert programmer, but know a bit about VB.NET (what I prefer, I guess).

Any points to information, resources, etc that help in getting something coded would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks much in advance!!

[jeremym]

I think you really need MSI training.

In short, you'll want to learn how to package your application as an MSI.. then deploy patches with MSP files.

The best training on this is here: http://desktopengineer.com/msi

When it comes to deploying those MSIs... that's what we're here for. :-)