App Attach is the Future? 🤔

I had a partner come-up to me at NerdioCon 2025 and ask how they can easily deploy WhatsApp for all users in an AVD Environment.
My quick answer was, “Oh, just use App Attach for that” because I had been recently re-watching Azure Academy's and Jim M.'s great videos on the topic. However, when I tried it, it wouldn't work for me as an app attach package no matter how much I twisted and tweaked my process

Side Note: You “can” deploy it for all users if you download the app package (from https://store.rg-adguard.net ) and install it on the VM with a scripted action.

 Add-AppxProvisionedPackage -Online -PackagePath "C:\Installs\5319275A.WhatsAppDesktop_2.2531.4.0_neutral_~_cv1g1gvanyjgm.Msixbundle" -SkipLicense 

Well, all of this, and the various community posts (Snipping Tool Disappearing - Win11 23H2 – Nerdio Help Center, Snipping tool missing after deploy golden image to HostPool – Nerdio Help Center, etc.), sent me down a rabbit hole and I found myself asking, what if I package all of the built-in Windows apps (that are actually Microsoft Store Apps) and use app attach instead?

Many months later, I created a bunch of scripts that streamlines the process of getting apps from the Microsoft Store, Downloads them, using Winget, Converts them to AppAttach packages, and then easily allows you to upload the packages to a storage account and deploy the app dependencies to your Desktop Image VM. 

Once complete with the 5 steps, you can Create an App Attach Applicaiton or Update an Existing App Attach Application to have the assigned Host Pool/Users have the application at the next logon.

It's definitely not perfect, and involves a little manual effort, but I think it is a huge step forward in streamlining the process.

Here is a list of the applications that I tested that work and don't work:

Working

• ClipChamp
• Notepad
• Paint
• Photos
• Snipping Tool
• Terminal Preview* 

* = Currently requires manually downloading the package from https://store.rg-adguard.net/ because it's not allowed to be downloaded from the Microsoft Store using WinGet

Not Working (currently)

• Calculator
• Clock
• Camera
• Sticky Notes
• Terminal
• ToDo
  
   

Check out the guide, and the corresponding scripts on the Nerdio Manager for MSP Sales Engineering GitHub Repo.
App Attach Script Toolkit for Azure Virtual Desktop (AVD)

Once you get a chance to try it out, I'd be curious of a few things:

• With this kind of semi-automated solution, do you think you'd feel comfortable using App Attach in Production?
• What other Apps would you want as part of the “Download Apps” script?
• If you were doing a similar project, what would you change/add to the solution?

Please comment and let the rest of the community know how you're using (or wanting to use) App Attach in your AVD Environments!