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larsonm
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

Has anyone successfully installed the OneDrive for Business Client in a non-persistent VDI environment?

Has anyone successfully installed the OneDrive for Business Client in a non-persistent VDI environment?  I'm looking for a procedure to get this working.

I see statements from Microsoft about it being not supported, but I also see blogs and products that appear redirect the OneDrive Offline Sync capability to symbolic link or VHD container.

Any assistance would be appreciated.

27 Replies
Ray_handels
Virtuoso
Virtuoso

Just out of curiosity (not really an answer but still Smiley Happy). How do you wanna sync the data if the machine is non persistent. That would mean that you would sync the entire OneDrive for business after logon, that sounds a bit odd.

My guess is that you would need to have an Appvolumes writable volume for that, this way the synced data will be on the writable disk and there after logon.

Could be i'm just misjudging your question here.

Other option would be to create a WebDav attachment to OneDrive and just capture those settings with UEM (no idea what those settings would be though) or use software that can create a mapping to a drive letter using a webdav call to Onedrive. This way you could deliver it non persistent. You could use a tool like WebDrive but there are tons of applications that can do this.

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larsonm
VMware Employee
VMware Employee

We would use the OneDrive Files on Demand capability keeping files available online only for desktops, and/or a 3rd party tool like FSLogix for the RDS deployment since Files on Demand required 1709 or later. 

Page 10 of the below document states:  VMware has tested the sync client’s File On-Demand feature along with Horizon 7 Instant Clone Technology using Windows 10 Fall Creators update. 

https://techzone.vmware.com/sites/default/files/resource/best_practices_for_delivering_microsoft_off...

Based on the above, it seems that this has been done before.  Looking for a procedure that has bee used to get the OneDrive for Business client software itself to function properly in a non-persistent environment.

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JohnTwilley
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

I took a stab at it a few months ago...but never could get it straight. 

    OneDrive - Windows 10 1709 Files On-Demand abilities of the new OneDrive sync client. 

I'm hoping that once people start actively rolling out Windows 10 build 1709+, that some of you smart folks will figure it out! 

The UEM Office 2016 still references Groove.exe...which was the OLD retired client.  Office 365 (click-to-run) uses OneDrive.exe

  ref:  Changes to OneDrive sync client deployment in Office Click-to-Run | Microsoft Docs 

I really wish that someone at VMware would step-up and take on this configuration!

It seems that it has already been done...just not well documented from a UEM perspective.

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tbro
Enthusiast
Enthusiast

I attempted to get this working using a 2016 LTSB template. Went down the path of using the OneDrive GPOs to force the sync location to a writable volume. It seemed to work well initially, but would occasionally run in to permissions issues on the sync folder.

In the end we pretty much shelved the option of using the OneDrive client until it is actually supported in a non-persistent environment. Currently using the OneDriveMapper powershell script to load OneDrive as a network drive letter. OneDriveMapper | Liebensraum

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OmegaFlood
Contributor
Contributor

Yes I've done this on our VDI environment and it works...ok. The main pain point for us is the fact that for each login OneDriveSetup.exe runs for about a minute or two, hogging 100% of the CPU and then eventually auto-signs in. Files on Demand is enforced through group policy. The other annoyance is that when OneDrive eventually signs in Explorer restarts. So any keen user who is using Explorer when this happens will have to re-open Explorer again. I assume the setup does this to integrate the OneDrive icons into Explorer.

Both of these issues would be solvable if Microsoft allowed you to install OneDrive to the system and not the user profile. If that was the case I would simply install it on the base image. It's bizarre that such an option does not exist! Last I checked quite a few enterprises run Windows! /Rant

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lansti
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

How did you mange to do this?

Whe i create a mandatory profile, the "cookbook" says that i have to delete %localappdata%\local and locallow, and then the onedivesetup.exe also is deleted and then onedrive will not work.

So i might have to create a new mandatory profile.

I have tried to copy the onedrive catalog over to local folder on my mandatory, and it works, but as you says it takes like 2-3 minutes with a explorer refresh to install onedrive, but it do not sign in automaticly. Where do you set that policy?

I have enabled these policies:

pastedImage_0.png

We are using UEM, and i assume that i can import/export %localappdata%\microsot\onedrive with the profile, and maybe exclude some files(need to play a bit with this to find the best solution).

But i do agree with you, it is strange that Microsoft allows this to install on userprofile and not to the system..

Best regards
Lansti
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OmegaFlood
Contributor
Contributor

So just a little more information on our setup. We're using instant clones with UEM and no mandatory profile (it broke some UEM configs for us relating to Win 10). When a user logs in a local profile is created and UEM then imports the user's settings on demand using DirectFlex. We don't have a UEM application profile for OneDrive as it's installed for each new login and auto-signs in once done. I did try to 'speed up' things by roaming OneDrive's AppData and content folders but this never worked well so stepped away from this approach.

We're running Windows 10 1803 which by default would run OneDriveSetup.exe for every new user so we left this behaviour in place. It seems to launch the installer from C:\Windows\SysWOW64\OneDriveSetup.exe. If I want to deploy the latest OneDrive client I'll simply replace this file with the latest copy from Microsoft. I had to take ownership of the original installer first before I could replace it. I'm not sure if OneDriveSetup.exe will auto-run for you in the same way with a mandatory profile so you'll likely need to set it to run on startup in the context of the logged on user with the /SILENT switch. This should be doable in UEM by placing a shortcut to the installer in the user's Start Menu 'Startup' folder.

I'm at VMworld at the moment so can't check our config easily for Group Policy and UEM to make auto-sign in work but I'll get back to you on this. There was a few more settings to it than just the ones you have.

Like I say, It's a messy solution but works for us and would be so much cleaner if Microsoft let us install OneDrive to the system instead of the user. Maybe I'll create a feature request.

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OmegaFlood
Contributor
Contributor

Forgot to mention that before I could do anything I had to wait for our engineering department to enable and configure Azure Active Directory Connect. Without this auto-sign in will not work.

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lansti
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Hi, just want to add up with some issues here, and hope someone else has a fix og 5... Smiley Happy

I have managed to get Onedrive to run durig logon(running onedrive.exe from startup, deployed with Vmware UEM), we are running mandatory profile, and i have included the onedrive files in the "localappdata% folder in the mandatory.v6 profile:

pastedImage_2.png

But when a user starts our business windows 10 for their first time, the OneDrive Ikon is grey. Users have to click on it and they get this box:

pastedImage_1.png

When they click "Logg på"(Log on) it is logging in without any user credentials.

How can we manage this to log on automatichly first time?

But what i see in the %localappdata%\microsoft\onedrive is following:

pastedImage_3.png

Why does onedrive kind of reinstalles?

When i restart our VDI(non-presistent desktop) and logs on, our users logs automaticly in to onedrive, but after a minute or 2:

Image

If they click "Tyr again" its fine, and this message its not necessary and just annoying.

Best regards
Lansti
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OmegaFlood
Contributor
Contributor

I had the same issue until I added the following GPO settings:

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lansti
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

Ok, thanks, i'll give it a try, but do you have all users and your AD in azure?

Ref:

pastedImage_0.png

We are using windows federated accounts...

Best regards
Lansti
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lansti
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

My users still logs on automaticly, but his message pops up every time they log on:

onefuckindrivetryagain.png

When they click "Try again" it syncronize files on demand, and all files are in the sky, but pretty annoying that they have to clikc "Try again" every morning!!!!!

Best regards
Lansti
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OmegaFlood
Contributor
Contributor

All of our users are enabled in Azure. I'm afraid I don't know much about this process as another department set it up.

I used to get that same error when I was trying to roam OneDrive settings via UEM. You shouldn't need to roam any OneDrive settings if its set to login automatically and use Files on Demand. Perhaps there is something in your Mandatory Profile/UEM configuration causing this?

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Fabrice_Blanche
Contributor
Contributor

We do use Onedrive in a non-persistant Windows 10 1709 instant clone desktop.

You need to make sure to remove an attribute on the Writable volume VMDK

as follow:

  1. start a VM without AV agent installed or service disabled (helper VM)
  2. edit settings on the VM, add VMDK for the UIA_plus_profile template to the helper VM
  3. change disk type to independent-persistent (from dependent)
  4. Clear the NODEFAULTDRIVELETTER attribute on the template volume with diskpart
  5. run 'diskpart'
  6. list volumes
  7. select volume
  8. attributes volume clear NODEFAULTDRIVELETTER
  9. shut down helper VM
  10. disconnect disk (no need to set the persistence mode back)
  11. delete all entitlements to WVol existing, including AD groups (group is bound to old template)

if u want the drive not to show in explorer make a gpo to hide it with the following:

12. set regedit on svdriver\parameters key DriveLetterSettings REG_DWORD 6 per https://kb.vmware.com/selfservice/microsites/search.do?language=en_US&cmd=displayKC&externalId=21282...

then onedrive will not throw any error messages

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SummaCollege
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

I have noticed that MS has introduced the option to install Onedrive per machine rather than per user:

Install the sync client per machine | Microsoft Docs

You need sync client build 19.043.0304.0003 or later for this to work. Download is available from:

OneDrive release notes - Office Support https://support.office.com/nl-nl/article/releaseopmerkingen-voor-onedrive-845dcf18-f921-435e-bf28-4e...

We have tried this and it works nice. You might check this out...

Note: Feature is still in preview!

JohnTwilley
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

SummaCollege

Would you mind sharing your UEM configs with us for your OneDrive setup that is working? 

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SummaCollege
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

At this moment we don't have a lot of configuration setup regarding Onedrive.

It's purely installing Onedrive in the golden image using the correct Onedrivesetup.exe and the new command, and using group policy to force the use of files on demand and SSO. The user is still able to download files to it's desktop but these files are discarded once they logoff due to the fact we are using non-persistend desktops.

There is actually no UEM configuration needed for this to work.

You might need to make a few tweaks if you are also using Writable Volumes.

JohnTwilley
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

You are correct!  ---    "There is actually no UEM configuration needed for this to work."

I setup the new Machine-Based OneDrive (Build 19.043.0304), applied a couple computer Group Policies to force Files-on-demand & Auto Sign-in.

Logged in, and it sets up my Files-on-demand OneDrive after a minute or so.  

It does force kill the explorer.exe process during the setup...which is kinda annoying.  But other than that, this is completely usable in a non-persistent environment.

If anyone knows of a reason to use UEM to capture anything from the profile related to OneDrive, please let us know.

SummaCollege
Hot Shot
Hot Shot

That explorer restart is indeed annoying but sadly is by design as mentioned by MS: Why does OneDrive restart Windows Explorer? - OneDrive

"Is OneDrive crashing Windows Explorer?

No, the restarting of Windows Explorer is to ensure that sync can work correctly."

Glad this info might help others 😉

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