Step-by-Step: Access Office Apps in SharePoint 2016 Azure VM with Azure RemoteApp

In Continuation with my earlier posts on How to Set up SharePoint 2016 Farm with Azure VMs , In this post we will look at the options with which users can access Office 2016 applications in Azure VM or in any other SharePoint 2016 machine.

I Initially tried to Install Office 2016 (from my MSDN Subscription) but being a Click-to-run installer, it did not got installed with “Microsoft SharePoint Server 2016 Preview” being on the same Azure machine. Obviously there was no sense uninstalling SharePoint 2016 preview so I started looking at other viable options. 

There are two options to run Office Apps on SharePoint 2016 Azure Machine – Using Office 365 Subscription (via Azure RemoteApp) or by using Office Online Server.

Before I start discussing the options, In case you are curious to know – the error that you get when installing the Office 2016 setup is : “We’re sorry office click-to-run installer encountered a problem because you have these Windows Installer based Office programs Installed on your computer “Microsoft SharePoint Server 2016 Preview“.

Now, there are two Options to run Office Apps or Office 2016 on SharePoint 2016 Azure Machine:

1. Using Office 365 ProPlus (with Subscription) via Azure RemoteApp.

2. Using the Office Online Server as a part of the Azure farm.

In this blog post, we’ll look the first Option of using the Office 365 ProPlus Subscription with Azure RemoteApp.

Using Office 365 ProPlus Image – If you have an active Azure Subscription, you can use Azure gallery image from your Azure RemoteApp Subscription which should be available as a part of your Azure Portal. Using an Office 365 ProPlus Azure gallery image will allow you to open, create & save Office application like Word, Excel or PowerPoint Online in your SharePoint 2016 Azure VM (or any other machine).

Note : You need to have an existing Office 365 ProPlus Subscription with few accounts setup in it. For testing purposes, sign-up for a new Office 365 ProPlus trial subscription if you do not have one.

Lets look at the Steps :

1. Login to Azure account and the select New -> App Services -> RemoteApp -> Quick Create.

Select the Office 365 ProPlus (Subscription) and then Create the Remote App.

2. Once Created, verify the Status in RemoteApp category on the left.

3. Next you need to perform two tasks – Publish the Apps andConfigure User Access.

To do this, click on the RemoteApp and select the options in green.

First, Publish the Apps –

Select “publish remoteapp programs” and then check the boxes for apps that you want to Publish.

Next, select “configure user access” – Now before you go there, make sure that the users that you will be giving access to are listed in the default Azure Active Directory and they are able to Login into the Office 365 Subscription (which will be accessed through RemoteApps).

There are two things that you can do –

1. Either add a new user to the existing Azure AD and then give that user access to your Office 365 Subscription.
2. or, simply bring in all the users from your Office 365 Subscription as a separate directory in your Azure AD. Steps here

RemoteApps by default can only use the default directory. That means, the only Azure AD tenant that you can use is the one associated with the Azure subscription. So, If you bring in your Office 365 AD in Azure, that must be set as a default Active Directory for your Azure Subscription.

Now, after you have setup the Office 365 AD in Azure (steps) follow the steps below to make it your default AD in Azure.

Use these steps to change the Active Directory association with your subscription:

1. Add the Office 365 Active Directory as a part of Azure AD.

2. Change the Azure Active Directory tenant used by RemoteApp. To do this navigate to the Settings -> Subscription.

3. Next, Select the existing Office 365 Active Directory.

4. Verify if the directory is being set as default.

Thats it.

Now, lets go back to the RemoteApp and configure user access. Here you can give users from your Office 365 Subscription AD access to your RemoteApp Published Apps.

Don’t forget to save the users after adding them.

5. Next, Copy the Remote Desktop Client URL from your RemoteApp so we can use it in SharePoint 2016 VM or any other machine that you have hosted SharePoint on.

The URL in our case was : https://www.remoteapp.windowsazure.com/

6. Finally, login to the SharePoint 2016 VM or any other server and then open the above URL.

Next, Install the RemoteApp Windows Client on your Machine (Azure or otherwise).

Let the RemoteApp Install on your Machine.

Once done you can get started with Azure RemoteApp on Windows.

You will need to Sign in with your Office 365 credentials (that was given access via RemoteApp) so you can access the Office Apps.

Verify by opening the Word document from RemoteApp.

7. Now test the MS Word Application by Opening and Saving a Word document in your RemoteApp repository.

Let me explain – When you Open & Save the publish Apps from you RemoteApp Client, the options (folder structure) that you see under “Computer” in Save As..is the 50 GB persistence storage that every user gets with RemoteApps. This structure & storage will remain the same regardless of the device from where the user remotes in and uses the RemoteApp applications.

If that’s the case, then how do you save the documents in your local machine you ask? – For that, there must be another option in windows explorer on left that represents your local machine’s drive (i.e. the mapped drive). You also need to make your Local VM’s drive accessible for your RemoteApp by setting up drive redirection.
If you don’t see the Local Mapped drive in your RemoteApp, follow the Instructions @ How to make Azure Virtual Machine’s drive accessible by RemoteApp.