Man, this thread is a freakin' mess.
WHY HAVEN'T THE SIMPLE INSTRUCTIONS, INCLUDING BASIC ASSUMPTIONS, BEEN POSTED ON THE FIRST PAGE????
Then guys like Astalavista wouldn't have to get snooty about reading and using the search function so often.
You guys, coming into this stuff is REALLY HARD for non-programmers. Yes, we know answering the same questions a million times is really obnoxious for you good programmer-types, but you wouldn't have to if you realized what the holes in your information were, what people obviously weren't getting about the operation of the program, and posted it at the beginning of a ridiculously long thread! For God's Sake!
Here's how this program works:
To begin with, you don't need a clean install of Windows, you just need an installation of Windows that DOESN'T HAVE OFFICE ON IT. If you've got that, fine. If not, reinstall Windows, install a Virtual machine, whatever. Make sure your OS has no previous versions of Office on it. Now:
1) Download the shrinker from the first post and forget about it for a while.
2) Get your office cd and put it into your computer.
3) Go here:
Office XP for the Office XP version and here:
Office 2003 for the Office 2003 version of the instructions you need to slipstream all the latest updates into your computer and SET AN ADMINISTRATIVE INSTALL POINT.
4) Apparently, you've got to do that. Set an Administrative Install Point, okay?
5) Keep following the instructions over there on the guide. Eventually, you'll download the Office Resource Kit, which will take you through everything you'll need to do to install ONLY THE OFFICE TOOLS YOU WANT. This step creates the .MST file that you need to run the shrinker.
6) NOW you can run the shrinker, okay? What it does is ask for the Source files of Office, which I think means the CD you're installing from, and then asks for the destination you'll be installing to. Then, it wants the Setup.exe file, and then the .MST file you made with the ORK.
7) The shrinker watches the install of Office that you're now doing, and copies all those files, and ONLY those files, into the destination directory. Those are the files you specified in the ORK, and are only the applications and inclusions that you want. So you're only getting the Office that you want.
8) At the end, the destination directory has ALL the files you need to run ONLY the Office tools and programs that you specified in the ORK, and should be zipped up using WinRAR or some similar program.
9) Then, finally, it should be referenced in the start.cmd file on your Unattended CD for installation at the end of the Windows install process. The lines for the start.cmd file are as follows:
ECHO.
ECHO Installing Office XP [Home or Pro] with [name your applications here]
ECHO Please wait...
start /wait %systemdrive%\install\Applications\OfficeXP\setup.exe TRANSFORMS=Unattended.MST /qb-
And? The final file should be placed here: C:\XPCD\$OEM$\$1\install\Applications\OfficeXP\
There. And I haven't even used the program!
This, or the awesome .pdf on page 34: Kickass Guide or any of the other good guides in the last THIRTY-SEVEN pages ought to be posted in that first freakin' post... It's just ridiculous that something like that hasn't been done.
Good night. I hope this helps. PLEASE correct any mistakes, so I can update them, and then follow this in the morning when I've utterly forgotten how to do all this...
Thanks! Great site, and great guide!