Multi-Tenant Microsoft Intune Packaging Tool: Automatically Package and Deploy Applications Across Microsoft 365 Tenants

Multi-Tenant Microsoft Intune Packaging Tool: Automatically Package and Deploy Applications Across Microsoft 365 Tenants

By
July 21, 2022

When combined with Azure AD, Microsoft Intune offers the ultimate endpoint management solution for organizations ranging from small businesses to enterprises. It enables organizations to seamlessly manage company devices and applications from a single pane of glass, with advanced control over security policies and regulatory compliance.

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The best part? Apart from remotely managing company-owned devices assigned to employees, Intune also allows businesses to regulate access to apps and data crucial to your business. That means you can control what kind of information your employees have access to, even when they’re on their personal devices.

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But there’s a catch. If you want to manage a business application, you must first upload it to Intune. Simply dragging and dropping the .exe file to your Intune dashboard won’t work, because you have to first convert your application into a format that can be read and understood by Intune.

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Normally, that means jumping through hoops inside Command Prompt and something called Microsoft Win32 Content Prep Tool. But with our Intune packaging tool, you can convert your business apps for Intune and deploy them across multiple tenants in Microsoft 365 with just a few clicks. Want to know how it all works? Then just keep reading!

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How to Package and Deploy Intune Applications the Old-Fashioned Way

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Before you upload an application to Intune, you must convert the installation folder and package it into a .intunewim file. This is done using a special command line tool called the Win32 Content Prep Tool. Here’s what you need to:

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  • Download the Microsoft Win32 Content Prep Tool from Github.
  • Place all your app’s installation files into a dedicated folder in your computer.
  • Launch IntuneWinAppUtil.exe using Command Prompt.
  • Specify the source folder, setup file, and output folder in Command Prompt. A catalog folder is only required if packaging the app for Windows 10 S.
  • Wait for the confirmation message saying that the packaging is complete.

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Once the application has been packaged, it’s time to upload it to Intune so that you can deploy it to your Microsoft 365 tenants. This is done with Microsoft Endpoint Manager (MEM).

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  • Navigate to Apps > WIndows > +Add and choose Windows app (Win32) from the dropdown menu.
  • Upload the .intunewim source file using the installation wizard that appears next.
  • Fill in your app’s metadata with information such as name, description, and publisher.
  • Manually configure the installation and uninstallation commands for your new app.
  • Set up any pre-requisites that need to be met in order for the app installation to succeed, such as Bit Architecture and Operating System. You may also want to specify certain files and directories that need to be present before the app installs. A script will run and make sure that these requirements are met before installation takes place.
  • Specify detection rules so that Intune knows when the app is successfully installed.
  • Add any dependencies, such as other software, that need to be installed first for the app in question to install successfully.
  • Use supersedence to configure app updates.
  • Finally, configure app assignments to determine whether the app is installed automatically or manually using Azure AD.

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That’s a lot of steps, possible errors, and time spent packaging Intune apps. What if you wanted to deploy the same Intune application package to multiple tenants or copy it from one tenant to another? Unfortunately, there is no way to deploy the same app package to another tenant in Intune, so you are stuck having to repeat those steps for every deployment.

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How to Package and Deploy Intune Applications with Simeon Cloud

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The process for packaging and deploying business applications with Intune is quite convoluted, maybe even unnecessarily so. Simeon Cloud is a configuration management solution that comes with an easier way to package and deploy Intune apps with a few clicks.

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  • Create an application package and sync it to Simeon Cloud
  • When it is time to update your installation file, there is no need to package the appliation over again from scratch. Instead, simply click on the button that says Add File to upload your installation folder.
  • Simeon automatically edits and updates the app packages and deploys your application inside Intune.

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And that’s not all! If you’d like to deploy the same Intune application package to multiple tenants in bulk, you can do so from Simeon Cloud’s Reconcile tab.

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Want to have a replica test tenant for Microsoft 365? Simeon Cloud keeps your test tenant in sync with production across Intune, Azure AD, and O365 configurations so that you can have a replica test environment for testing Intune application packages. Only possible with Simeon, you can create your application package in your test tenant first to make sure it works properly and then simply point and click and move it to production. This saves you all the time, hassle and possible errors made having to re-package the entire app again from scratch.

Simeon helps you automate configuration management and application packaging for Microsoft Intune. It saves countless hours of engineering time by making it easier to manage Intune application packages from a single source of truth. Interested in giving us a try? Book a free demo to learn more!