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You are here: Home / Citrix Apps and Desktops / How to solve This copy of Microsoft Office cannot be used

How to solve This copy of Microsoft Office cannot be used

August 18, 2019 by Ulrik Christensen 6 Comments

If you are using Office 365 on your Citrix Apps and Desktop workloads, you have probably run into this error. It says, “This copy of Microsoft Office cannot be used on a computer running terminal services.” I have seen this error even though I have used Office Deployment Tool and created a configuration.xml file for the roll-out.

this copy of microsoft office cannot be used on a computer running terminal services

The Solution to This copy of Microsoft Office cannot be used on a computer running terminal services

The reason why you get this error is that you are missing a key in registry.

Go to this path in registry:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\ClickToRun
\Configuration

And add the following key:

SharedComputerLicensing: value 1

You need to do this on each VDA or in your image.

Once that is done, you need to set policy as well. For that, you need the latest Administrative Template Files for Microsoft Office. If you do not already have them, you can download here: https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=49030.

When the Administrative Template Files are implemented, create a new policy. Navigate to this path in the policy editor.

Computer Configuration\Policies\Administrative Templates\Microsoft Office 2016 (Machine)\Licensing Settings.

Enable the policy named “Use named computer activation”.

Link the policy to an OU so it will apply to the VDAs. After that, you need to reboot your VDA’s so the policy will apply.

 

 

 

 

Filed Under: Citrix Apps and Desktops

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Me says

    February 11, 2020 at 7:15 pm

    There’s no such thing as“Use named computer activation”.

    Reply
    • Ulrik Christensen says

      February 12, 2020 at 8:08 am

      You need to install the Administrative Template files for Office. You can get them here:

      https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=49030

      Reply
      • examen says

        June 3, 2020 at 10:02 am

        Just downloaded and installed the admx templates, the user above was right, the option you where probably refering to, which according to gpsearch does exactly the registry modification that you showd us is ,,Use shared computer activation”:
        https://gpsearch.azurewebsites.net/#13827

        Anyway , outstanding post, saved my ass 🙂

        Reply
  2. Nick Poccia says

    April 3, 2020 at 9:27 pm

    Not using Citrix using a Microsoft RDP Server so will this work on that as well? Thanks

    Reply
    • Ulrik Christensen says

      April 4, 2020 at 6:14 am

      Yes. This works for RDP as well.

      Reply
      • Nicholas Poccia says

        April 5, 2020 at 3:38 pm

        THANKS!!!

        Reply

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EUC Specialist. Work is not a place…..and some other nerdy stuff.

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