AndersonPatricio.ca

Exchange Server 2007 SP1 - Rollup Update 8

Hello folks,

RU 8 for Exchange Server 2007 SP1 was released and these are the issues fixed in this new update:

• 948856 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/948856/ ) Event ID 9667 occurs when you create a new named property on an Exchange Server 2007 server
• 952935 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/952935/ ) A software update is available that provides the log tracing feature for the LogTruncator tag in Exchange Server 2007
• 954639 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/954639/ ) Exchange Information Store service stops responding intermittently on an Exchange 2007 server
• 955480 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/955480/ ) Meeting requests from external senders are displayed as Busy instead of Tentative in an Exchange 2007 environment
• 956633 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/956633/ ) User calendar permissions are removed after you run the Set-MailboxCalendarSettings cmdlet in an Exchange Server 2007 environment
• 957640 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/957640/ ) The "test-*" command fails when you run it on a site that contains only CAS roles in an Exchange 2007 environment
• 958239 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/958239/ ) Exchange Server 2007 does not generate an event log message for public folder replication messages even though a property validation exception is thrown and the replications do not occur
• 958881 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/958881/ ) All HTML content in attachment files of messages is run through an HTML filter when you open or save the attachment by using Outlook Web Access (OWA)
• 958938 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/958938/ ) The importance attribute of a message is lost when an Exchange 2007 user accesses a high-importance message or a low-importance message from Exchange Server 2007 by using a non-Outlook POP3 client or IMAP4 client
• 959510 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/959510/ ) A meeting request that is sent from OWA causes a "553 5.0.0 Message-Id header line format error" NDR message in an Exchange Server 2007 environment
• 959748 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/959748/ ) An account with the "Exchange View-Only Administrator" permission can review user mailbox contents by using an administrative application in Exchange Server 2007
• 959861 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/959861/ ) Some clients cannot connect to back-end Exchange Server 2003 IMAP servers after Exchange 2007 Service Pack 1 RU2 is applied
• 959990 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/959990/ ) An error occurs when you try to update a recurring appointment by using an Outlook client that is connected to an Exchange 2007 server
• 960178 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960178/ ) You receive an NDR when you send an e-mail using OWA Premium and the ANR cache if the Exchange organization name has more than one space
• 960354 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960354/ ) Edge Attachment Filtering does not honor the ExceptionConnectors value in Exchange Server 2007
• 960367 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960367/ ) Error message when you run the Export-Mailbox command on a folder that has more than 5000 items in Exchange 2007: "-1056749164"
• 960495 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960495/ ) The Information Store service crashes continuously on an Exchange Server 2007 server
• 960633 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960633/ ) The Microsoft Exchange Information Store service crashes on an Exchange Server 2007 that has the mailbox server role installed
• 960703 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960703/ ) Extended characters are replaced by question marks when you send an e-mail message that contains extended ASCII characters by using an IMAP4 client in Exchange 2007
• 960775 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960775/ ) You receive a "Message too large for this recipient" NDR that has the original message attached after you restrict the Maximum Message Send Size value in Exchange Server 2007
• 960869 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/960869/ ) A queue that has multiple connections cannot enter a Retry state in Exchange Server 2007
• 961152 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961152/ ) The Exchange information store service (Store.exe process) crashes intermittently when you migrate user data from Lotus Notes to Exchange Server 2007
• 961347 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961347/ ) Error message when you export an Exchange 2007 mailbox to a .pst file and a filter is defined: "Export-Mailbox : Error was found for <username> (<SMTP address>)"
• 961443 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961443/ ) Users cannot use Outlook Web Access for Exchange Server 2007 to open an address book
• 961524 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961524/ ) Some journal messages are stuck in the Submission queue in Exchange Server 2007
• 961606 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961606/ ) After you apply Rollup Update 5 for Exchange Server 2007 S961606, Outlook Web Access users find the font size of plain text messages is extremely small when they use some third-party Web browsers
• 961693 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/961693/ ) Japanese (1 byte Kana) characters in the subject and display name are corrupted when you try to reply or forward task requests or calendar items in Outlook client
• 962235 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/962235/ ) The date and time information for a "Follow Up" flag is missing if an Exchange 2007 user sends a message to an external recipient
• 966535 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/966535/ ) Duplicate messages are sent to an external recipient if the recipient is included in multiple distribution lists in an Exchange Server 2007 environment
• 967038 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/967038/ ) Many log entries are generated in Exchange Server 2007 if you turn on the Exchange log to audit the logons that do not use the primary account for shared resource mailboxes
• 967097 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/967097/ ) Users may receive duplicate calendar items for the updated instance on mobile devices
• 967109 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/967109/ ) A delegate cannot accept a meeting request for an online meeting in an Exchange Server 2007 environment
• 967255 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/967255/ ) Only the tracing information of the last user is logged when you configure Exchange Server 2007 to trace multiple users at the same time
• 968310 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968310/ ) Many log entries are generated on an Exchange Server 2007 computer when you enable the Exchange log to audit user logons that do not use the primary account for their mailbox
• 968352 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968352/ ) The W3wp.exe process crashes when you use the Italian version of the spelling checker on a message in Outlook Web Access in Exchange 2007
• 968589 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968589/ ) The managed policy does not work if the ptagProvisionedFid attribute is missing in Exchange Server 2007
• 968673 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968673/ ) The EdgeTransport.exe file of Exchange 2007 servers crashes continuously and Event ID 10003 and Event ID 5000 occur
• 968745 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968745/ ) Incomplete tasks show in the Complete tasks view in OWA 2007 in an Exchange 2007 environment
• 968966 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968966/ ) Many log entries are generated in Exchange Server 2007 if you turn on the Exchange log to audit administrator logons that do not use the primary account for mailboxes
• 969690 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/969690/ ) Unresolved sender for delivery status notifications after applying update rollup 7 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1
• 970687 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/970687/ ) A search operation in Outlook does not return a correct result if there is a corrupted HTML message in the target folder in an Exchange Server 2007 environment

Download it here: http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=e1f5c8b2-c4f2-4eba-849b-e464d4f2869c

More information about the RU 8: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968012

Cheers,
Anderson Patricio

Using Exchange Server 2010 e-discovery (Multi-mailbox search)

Hello folks,

Exchange Server 2010 has tons of new features and using the new permission model RBAC (Role Based Access Control) we can assing a regular user to do legal search on the users' mailboxes. In this post I'm going over this process in the Exchange Server 2010 Beta, our scenario is that we want to use a Mail Enabled Security Group called Legal Group and all users that belong to this group will have the ability to do a search in our Exchange Organization.

Okay, our user responsible to do the legal search is called Auditor, and we need to add him into our Legal Group that we have just created. As soon as we have these steps done, we can assign the DiscoveryManagement role to that group using the following cmdlet:

Now, the Auditor user can run /ECP">https://<cas-server>/ECP, and in the dropdown list (Select what to manage) make sure that My Organization is selected and you you will see on the left site the item Reporting, as demonstrated in the figure below.

Permissions done! Time to create a query to demonstrate the feature. Our legal team is searching for the word gremio (which is the best soccer team in the world! :) If you want to know what I'm talking about, you can check http://www.gremio.net/home/Default.aspx?language=1) and we are going to configure some options in our search.

During the search creation process we have 6 main sections (Keywords, Messages to and From Specific E-mail Addresses, Date Range, Mailboxes to Search and Search Name and Storage Location) and we can play with them to get better results based in all those criterias.

The Keywords, Messages To and From Specific E-mail Addresses, and Date Range sections can be seen in the figure below. Basically, the keywork will be the best soccer team of the world (gremio) and we are not going to speciy who send or receive the message, and we are not going to customize date range for our search.

In Mailbox to Search section we can select all mailboxes or a specific set of mailboxes. Finally, in the Search Name and Storage Location section, we are going to define the rule name and which mailbox will receive the results, we can also configure the search to send a message as soon as it finishes the process. To conclude the process click on Save.

We can see that the status still in progress. Let's wait for the results..

Okay, done! We can see that we have some issues, it happened because the mailbox store wasn't available during the search process.

Let's check the results. Let's log on as Audit user, and we can see that our search name has a folder in the root of our mailbox, and its subfolders represents each mailbox where that string was found. Using some of the new features of OWA, we can see the conversation thread. Isn't cool?

ECP is a really nice interface but sometimes the admin wants to do the process using the well-known PowerShell and we can accomplish the same tasks using Get-MailboxSearch, New-MailboxSearch, Start-MailboxSearch, Stop-MailboxSearch and Remove-MailboxSearch cmdlets. Using those cmdlets we can create the same query that we have just created using ECP interface, also we can some extra options, such as: use the archive, search the dumpster.

Cheers,
Anderson Patricio

Exchange Serve 2007 SP2 brings in-box backup to the Windows Server 2008

Hello folks,

A new feature that we will be found on Service Pack 2 of Exchange Server 2007 is the ability to protect Exchange data using the Windows Server 2008 backup utility.

Read more at source: http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2009/05/13/451311.aspx

Exchange Server 2007 Sp2 announced

Hello Folks,

MSexchangeTeam announced here in TechED 2009 and also in their blog about the Service Pack 2 release of the product, as follows:

Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 is the industry's leading server for e-mail, calendaring and unified messaging. Exchange Server 2007 is the foundation for a dynamic and holistic unified communications experience, and has been designed to meet the challenges and address the messaging needs of today's businesses. Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 2 (SP2) enables customers to increase their operational efficiency and it sets the foundation for the transition to Exchange Server 2010, which is expected to be available in the second half of 2009. A public beta of Exchange Server 2010 is available for download at http://www.microsoft.com/exchange/2010.

Customer Benefits
Key new features of Exchange Server 2007 SP2 unveiled today include:

• Enhanced Auditing - New Exchange auditing events and audit log repository enable Exchange administrators to more easily audit the activities occurring on their Exchange servers. It allows the right balance of granularity, performance, and easy access to audited events via a dedicated audit log repository. This simplifies the auditing process and makes review of audited events easier by segregating audited events in a dedicated location.
• Exchange Volume Snapshot Backup Functionality - A new backup plug-in has been added to the product that will enable customers to create Exchange backups when a backup is invoked through the Windows Server 2008 Backup tool. Exchange Server 2007 didn't have this capability on Windows Server 2008 and additional solutions were required to perform this task.
• Dynamic Active Directory Schema Update and Validation - The dynamic AD schema update and validation feature allows for future schema updates to be dynamic deployed as well as proactively preventing conflicts whenever a new property is added to the AD schema. Once this capability is deployed it will enable easier management of future schema updates and will prevent support issues when adding properties that don't exist in the AD schema.
• Public Folder Quota Management - SP2 enables a consistent way to manage quotas by improving the current PowerShell cmdlets to perform quota management tasks.
• Centralized Organizational Settings - SP2 introduces new PowerShell option that enable centralized management of many of the Exchange organization settings.
• Named Properties cmdlets - SP2 enables Exchange administrators to monitor their named property usage per database.
• New User Interface for Managing Diagnostic Logging- SP2 enables Exchange administrators to easily configure and manage diagnostic logging from within the Exchange Management Console.

Read more at source: http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2009/05/11/451281.aspx

Managing multiple users through Exchange Managent Console of Exchange Server 2010

Hello folks,

Today we are going over a new administrative feature found in the Exchange Management Console of Exchange Server 2010. In the new version we are able to change more than one user' attributes in a single step like we already have in the Active Directory users and computers tool.

Let's disable the IMAP protocol of a couple of users using Exchange Management Console, let's select the designated users and click on Properties.

Click on Mailbox Features, and when we have <current status> value means that the values will not be changed on the selected mailboxes even though if they are different.

Let's Disable IMAP4 procotol as can be seen on the picture below.

When you click on OK or Apply you will be prompted with a Bulk Edit Summary window containing all settings that will be applied and also the number of recipients that will be affected by that change.

Note:

• Select always the same type of objects (resource mailboxes, user mailbox, groups)
• You can also use the Window PowerShell Command Log before applying the settings to see what's going to be applied. More info: http://msmvps.com/blogs/andersonpatricio/archive/2009/04/20/using-exchange-2010-windows-powershell-command-log.aspx

Cheers,
Anderson Patricio

List of available updates for Communications Server 2007 R2: April 2, 2009

Hello folks,

I read about this kb on the Office Communications Server Team Blog (http://communicationsserverteam.com) and the following kb http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968802 has a descriptive list of all updates for OCS 2007 R2 and its use for each server role.

Cheers,
Anderson Patricio

Personalizing Disclaimer in Exchange Server 2010

Hello folks,

Exchange Server 2010 brings a lot of new features, today we will go over some of the new capabilities that we can have in a Disclaimer Transpor Rule rule.

Using Exchange Server 2010 we can add HTML and Active Directory information in a Transport Rule, isn't cool?

To use an Active Directory attribute we have to use double dollar sign before and after the attribute name, for example: %%Company%%, it will bring the Company attribute of the user to the disclaimer. We can also combine HTML and AD attributes, in this post we are using some basic HTML in our disclaimer rule.

Okay, time for a test, let's create a new Transport Rule that adds disclaimer to the messages, and in the disclaimer text, we are going to add the text of the figure below.

Okay, we are using the following attributes: DisplayName, StreetAddress, Company and Phone. My user which is going to send a message has all those attributes filled out as show in the following pictures:

Company's attribute of my user

Street Address and Phone atributes

Now, my user is going to send a message, the user who receives my test message will see a personalized disclaimer based on user's AD attributes.

By the way, if you want to learn how to create a disclaimer transport rule in Exchange Server 2010, you can follow this Exchange Server 2007 article that I wrote last year http://www.msexchange.org/tutorials/Using-Transport-Rules-Creating-Disclaimers-Exchange-Server-2007.html.

Cheers,
Anderson Patricio