Access IT Automation Blog

A few days ago, we talked about how mature MSIX really is (18 months away) and how it make sense for some enterprises to do a double hop over App-V to ease the transition. Today, I want to take you on a little journey that will take us three years into the future. 

While Access CAPTURE does already fully support MSIX as a packaging standard, I want to also show you the most effective roadmap to adopting it enterprise-wide over the next years. The ultimate goal is to have you up and running on a smooth Evergreen IT/Windows-as-a-Service Management path by the end of the first year and all your applications in MSIX by the end of year three.

You might have noticed a lot of vendors in the application packaging space shouting from the rooftops that they are supporting MSIX, Microsoft's new packaging format. Anyone who can run an automated PowerShell command to create and convert an app could technically claim MSIX support.

However, it is easy to get carried away with the impression that MSIX is actually READY for adoption. This is a big misconception as we are at least 18 months away from that point! While it is important to start testing and playing around with the new packaging standard, it is far more important to worry about how you will manage until it reaches maturity and how to set yourself up for success once it happens.

Microsoft recently announced that Office 2019, the company's next perpetual Office suite (including Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Outlook, and Skype for Business applications as well as  Exchange, SharePoint, and Skype for Business servers) will be released some time this fall, with previews beginning to ship in the second quarter of 2018.

If you read the announcement carefully, you will find some interesting facts:

1. Office 2019 will only be supported on any current Semi-Annual Channel release of Windows 10 as well as the next Long-Term Service Channel release of the Windows 10 Enterprise 2018 and the Windows Server.

2. Customers will only receive five years of mainstream support with an option to pay for an additional two years of extended support — effectively cutting the support timeline by 30%!

3. Office 2019 client applications cannot be deployed using MSI packages (Windows Installer technology), but will only be released with a Click-to-Run installation method. However, server products will still be provided as MSI.

A few weeks ago, we walked you through the 15 most frequently asked questions during an Access Agent demo. Today, I would like to do the same for Access Capture, our IT automation solution for application packaging and testing solution.

A recent Gartner survey shows that 80% of all enterprises will have started to migrate to Windows 10 by the end of 2018. By then, Windows 10 will be 3.5 years old and will have seen seven versions (namely 1507, 1511, 1609, 1703, 1709, 1803, 1809)!

One of the biggest roadblocks to a smooth and efficient rollout (and subsequent service updates) is application packaging and testing. Despite Microsoft's claims that it did not test 99% of its apps before migration and its encouragement for enterprises to do the same, meaning test applications in-flight and only if things break, I have yet to encounter any large organization who is willing to take this kind of risk.

With Millennials making up more than half of today's workforce, companies can no longer play by the old rules of the Baby Boomer or early Gen X generations. Today's employees aren't coming into the same office, same desk, and same computer every day as they used to only a decade ago. Whether it is for business or personal reasons, working from your home office, on the road, in a coffee shop, at co-working spaces, or even in a remote location is not only acceptable, but even desired by some companies.