This post is part of SCCM Current Branch Installation Guide series.

In this post we are going to show you how to deploy application through SCCM. 7-Zip is a freeware and is available in msi format. Hence, we will use this application (7-zip 19.00) to deploy using SCCM.

7-Zip can be downloaded from here. We will be using 32-bit version for demonstration purpose. Exact link for 7-Zip 32-bit x86 version is available here.

Download the source, and copy if under a specific directory on SCCM, I have used : \\sccm01\d$\Source\Application\7-Zip 19.00 x86

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Create Application and Deployment Types

Launch SCCM Console, navigate to Software Library\Application Management, right click applications and select “Create Application

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This will open “Create Application Wizard”. As we have download msi file, hence we will be using msi file type only under “Automatically detect information about this application from installation files:”.
Under location provide the exact path for msi file which we previously downloaded.

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This will show following popup “The publisher of 7zip1900.msi file could not be verified. Are you sure that you want to import this file?”. As this is the not verified resource by Microsoft hence getting the warning, we can safely click on Yes to continue.

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Click next under “View imported information”.

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Under page “Specify information about this application”, you will see several fields such as name, comments, software version. We are moving ahead with default settings. Under “Installation program” you will see automatically generated command line for msi file “msiexec /i “7z1900.msi” /q”. Under “Install Behavior” select the option “Install for system” as system account is the most powerful account which will be used by SCCM. This account is also called “System Context”.

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Under next page, confirm the settings for this application and click next.

Finally you will see “The Create Application Wizard completed successfully” page. Click on Close.

Application is ready, and you can see 1 Deployment Types already created while running application creation wizard.

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Right click the application “7-Zip 19.00” and select “Properties”.

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Click on tab “Software Center”. Under “Localized application name” you will see “7-Zip 19.00”. You can rename it to whatever you want to get displayed it for users under their “Software Center”.
You will see generic Icon under this page, you can change it by clicking on “Browse” and pointing it to 7-zip exe installed locally or remotely.

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Change icon window will appear, select the icon and click on OK. You will notice icon has changed from generic icon to 7-Zip icon.

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Click on tab “Deployment Types”, select the only 1 deployment types listed and click on Edit to launch another window related to deployment type.

Click on tab “Content”, under “Uninstall content settings”,  select “No Uninstall content” as best practice.

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Click on tab “Programs”, you will see installation program and uninstallation program. As Installation program is the one calling msi (msiexec /i “7z1900.msi” /q) while uninstallation program just using product code to uninstall (msiexec /x {23170F69-40C1-2701-1900-000001000000} /q). Hence, we don’t need any content to uninstall the application.

Click on “Requirement” and you may click on Add to specify any condition such as  minimum disk space, Operating System etc. Application will only run if condition is met. We are not making changes here.

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Click on “Dependencies” and you may add other applications as dependencies which will make sure to install these applications before running the actual installation.

Click on OK to exit the Application and Deployment types properties.

Distribute the content

Select the application and click on “Distribute Content” from the ribbon.

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Under page “Specify the content destination”, click on Add and select “distribution point”.

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This will open another page “Add Distribution Points” , select the available distribution points and click ok.

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Click Next twice and click “Close” to complete the Distribute Content wizard.

Wait for some time and verify the successful distribution of content by selecting the application and click on tab “Summary” which is available in bottom window and verify success on 1 DP.

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Deploy Application

Select application and click on “Deploy” from top ribbon to launch “Deploy Software Wizard” window. Under Collection, click on “Browse” to open “Select Collection” window.

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Select “Device Collections” as we are targeting the application on systems rather than user. Select the collection under right pane. In real world, we will never select “All Systems”, but for the sake of demonstration we are doing here.

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Click next  to see “Specify the content destination”, as we have already distributed the content, we can ignore this page and click on next.

Under “Deployment Settings” page, select the action such as Install or Uninstall. As we are installing the app, we will go with Install.
under Purpose, there are 2 options: Available & Required.
Available: This is an optional way of deploying the application. This will make the application available under users “Software Center” window, ready to be installed manually by user.

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Required: This is an mandatory way of deploying the application. If we select this option, we have to select a deadline time so that application can be installed forcefully at that specific time.
Select “Available” for this demo and continue.

Under page “Scheduling”, specify the schedule for this deployment. Check the box “Schedule the application to be available at” and specify specific time when do you want to make the application available for user to see under “Software Center”. It also important to see what option you are selecting under “Time based on”, whether Client local time or UTC.  Click Next to continue.

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Under “User Experience” page, select following “User notifications” from drop down menu:
Display in Software Center, and only show notifications for computer restarts.

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Click next under Alerts page, and next to complete “Confirm the settings for this new deployment” page.

Test the deployment

Take RDP session to any client system, SCCM server may take upto 1 hour to update the policy on client. If you want to get the policy ASAP, launch Control Panel and select “Configuration Manager”.

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Under “Configuration Manager Properties”, click on “Actions” tab, select “Machine Policy Retrieval & Evaluation Cycle” and click on “Run Now”. This will instantly contact SCCM MP and download the policies which are targeted for this system, hence within no time we will receive 7-Zip policy.

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Click on Windows Start menu and type “Software Center” and click on it once found.

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Once “Software Center” is launched, you will be able to see new application under applications menu.

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Click on the application ”7-Zip19.00” and click on “Install

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Within no time status will change from Install to Installing and finally showing “Uninstall”, which is an indication of product got installed and ready to uninstall if we want.

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Installation of 7-Zip can be found under sccm logs which are located under c:\windows\ccm\logs.
Few important log files related to Application installation is appenforce.log, appenforce,appdiscovery,cas.log,contenttransfermanager.log,datatransferservices.log.

Advance troubleshooting steps through log files can be found here.