Please change detection for Adobe Acrobat Reader app to include Adobe Acrobat

[rejohnson]

Adobe Acrobat Reader is not needed if Adobe Acrobat is installed.  The application detection script for the Reader application should consider itself already installed if Acrobat is also there.

[Ben Whitmore (Patch My PC)]

Hi Russell, thanks for reaching out.

Just to help us understand the perspective here - what situation prompted you to make this request? Are you pushing the update for Adobe Acrobat Reader to All Devices, for example, and it is attempting to install on devices that have Adobe Acrobat installed?

If you are deploying Adobe Acrobat Reader as an Intune app, we do have a requirement script in our Community Scripts repo that you can use. This means the Adobe Acrobat Reader Intune app will not install if it detects Adobe Acrobat is already installed.

The script can be found at https://github.com/PatchMyPCTeam/Community-Scripts/blob/main/Install/Requirement/ReaderDCx64Requirement

[rejohnson]

We try to ensure that Acrobat Reader is installed on all PCs by advertising via ConfigMgr.  Prior to PMPC, our detection logic checked for either Reader or Acrobat.  PMPC only checks for Reader.  I understand I can create, modify or copy a different script but I believe that the default script should check for either version since Reader is already a component of Acrobat DC.  Or perhaps the default installer detection script should look elsewhere, such as the Intune app script you referenced.  We shouldn't need to work around what is an obvious omission.

[Adam Cook (Patch My PC)]

Thanks for the feedback. I see the value in your idea. Normally we would suggest to customers to scope their deployments to only deploy a product to devices they want it installed on, however your scenario is, in my personal opinion, perfectly valid for Adobe Acrobat.

This is not a function or feature today, kindly raise it on https://ideas.patchmypc.com.

[rejohnson]

Thanks, I've added the idea.

[rtruss]

what is your request number?  Has there been any traction on this?  The way reader installs now does make it difficult to keep the environment patched/clean.

A year ago I posted this (https://ideas.patchmypc.com/ideas/PATCHMYPC-I-3180) due to a reader cleanup process it started pulling the full version from users systems as well.  I put blame squarely on Adobe for being lazy, so I hope there is a solution to keeping adobe reader patched without messing with the full versions.

[Johnson]

Yes, Adobe Acrobat Reader is not needed if Adobe Acrobat is already installed. The application detection script for Adobe Reader should recognize that Acrobat is present and therefore consider the Reader application as already installed. This topic has become a top search for users trying to streamline their software installations and avoid redundancy.