Saturday, September 30

Something to share about Client Access Server

Hi,

Good day. After a discussion with one of the PSS people in India, we found out something is good to know about Exchange 2007 CAS server -

Do you know that

1) Client Access Server is not recommed to deploy in DMZ (E2007 beta 2)?
2) Exchange 2003 Front End cant be used to connec to Exchange 2007 database?
3) Exchange 2007 CAS server can connect to Exchange 2007 mailbox server as well as Exchange 2003 mailbox server...
4) When accessing Exchange 2003 mailbox from CAS server, the URL will remain as https://E2007CAS/exchange, which accessing Exchange 2007, will use URL https://E2007CAS/OWA
5) You cant access normal E2003 URL to E2007 mailbox resource, example, no longer be able to access https://E2003/exchange/user/calendar if you have the rights. In E2007 mailbox, you have to access https://E2007/owa/e2007@e2007.com/?cmd=contents&f=calendar

This will give a good help to developers.

Happy reading!

Sunday, September 17

Enable LCR - Local Continuous Replication in Exchange 2007

Good news for those using Exchange 2007. without implement third party application, you can now replicate your database to different drive (LCR) or server (CCR).

In this session, we would like to share how to enable LCR, in Exchange 2007 Beta 2.

1. Launch Exchange Management Console.

2. In the Exchange Management Console, in the Navigation Pane, expand Microsoft Exchange, expand Server Configuration, and then select Mailbox.

3. In the Settings Pane, right-click , and then click Enable Local Continuous Backup.

4. In the Enable Storage Group Local Continuous Backup Wizard, on the Introduction page, click Next.

5. On the Set Paths page, in the Local continuous backup log files locations dialog box, click Browse, and then select - the other drive for LCR.

6. On the Set Paths page, in the Local continuous backup system files locations dialog box, click Browse, and then select - the other drive for LCR.

7. Click Next to continue.

8. On the Mailbox Database 1 page, in the Local continuous backup Exchange database file path box, click Browse, and then select - the other drive for LCR.

Note: Make sure that there is no path in front of Mailbox Database 1.edb in the File Name box. If there is re-navigate to - the other drive for LCR

9. Click Save

10. Click Next to continue.

11. Review the information on the Enable page and verify that the correct paths have been configured.

12. Click Enable to enable Local Continuous Replication for the storage group. After the storage group and databases have been enabled for LCR, click Finish to close the wizard.

To check on whether it is working:

1. Switch to Windows Explorer and navigate to the other drive for LCR.

2. Examine the contents of the LCR folder and compare the contents with the contents of the path of the original storage group location.

3. Make a note of the highest log file number; for example, E0100000006.LOG.

Thats easy. We will share on how to enable CCR and how to perform test on LCR and CCR.

Thursday, September 14

RPC/HTTPS & OUTLOOK ANYWHERE

Dear all,

Good day. We are back to Blogs again. This time, we would like to share out on Outlook Anywhere, the new name for RPC/HTTPS in Exchange 2007. The concept is still the same, but now, you need to know more theory on what role to deploy and configure.

To summary on how to configure this cool feature, means you do not need a VPN to access your Exchange server using Outlook 2003/Outlook 2007.

The first thing you might want to think about is the certificate. It is recommended that you purchase the certificate rather than setup up one in your organization although it is FREE.

However, we will share on how to configure the certificate.

1) Setup a certificate authority in your organization; we will try to publish on how to do this in coming blogs.

2) Configure your IIS6 (Windows 2003) to use the Web Server certificate.

3) Export the certificate out to a .pfx file extension. You can then copy the certificate to a tumb drive/diskette drive for install this certificate to client side (You can use AD Group Policy to deploy to Windows 2000 workstations and above)

4) Install the certificate to the client workstation

NOTE: Please ensure the installation is successful. To check, simply launch Internet browser to the website that is hosting the RPC Proxy, most of the time, OWA; eg: https://companyname.com/exchange. You should not get any prompt for the untrust certificate. If you can any prompt, please check on the certificate installation.

On Outlook side,

1) For first time launching outlook users, email accounts window prompt. Select “Add a new e-mail account” selection.

2) Click Next.

3) Select Microsoft Exchange Server, click Next.
On the Exchange Server Settings, under Microsoft Exchange Server key-in mailboxexchangeserver.com, key in on the User Name. Click Next.

4) A warning is prompted that the Microsoft Exchange server is unavailable. Click OK to continue.

5) When the window prompt, click on Connection tab. Check “Connect to my Exchange Mailbox using HTTP”. Click Exchange Proxy Settings…

6) On Exchange Proxy Settings, under Proxy authentication settings, select “Basic Authentication”, under Connection settings, key in https://yourpublishproxyserver.com, select Mutually authenticate the session when connecting with SSL, on the Principal name for proxy server: msstd: yourpublishproxyserver.com. Select only “on slow network, connect using HTTP first, then connect using TCP/IP”. Click OK.

7) Launch Outlook 2003, please be patient to wait for the Outlook 2003 to connect to Exchange 2003. Key-in username and password when prompted

NOTE: You can check by clicking Start-> Run-> outlook /rpcdiag to test out whether the outlook is running fine using HTTPS

Till then, this is the good feature to test out.

Wednesday, September 6

Saving Disk Space using VPC - differencing virtual disk

Dear all, during this sharing session, we would like to share on how to make your Virtual Machine file small. This is important for most of our customers, especially keeping all those big VM files for the testlab...

To do this, what you can do is, create a base Operating System, eg: Setup a Windows 2003 Ent with all the Service Packs installed.

There is something call differencing virtual disk in VPC where you can build your machine via a base OS, ya, it is COOL.

Below are the steps we would like to share:
1) Create one OS based, which OS installed and patched.
2) Create a second VM where act as the second VM. once you reach creating disk side, in the Virtual Disk Wizard dialog box, click Next.
3) In the Disk Options dialog box, click Create a new virtual disk, and then click Next.
4) In the Virtual Disk Type dialog box, click A virtual hard disk, and then click Next. By default, the wizard creates the virtual hard disk in the My Documents folder. If you want to store the virtual hard disk in a different location, type the full path of this location when you specify the virtual hard disk name.
5) In the Virtual Hard Disk Location dialog box, type a name for the virtual hard disk, and then click Next.
6) In the Virtual Hard Disk Type dialog box, click Differencing, and then click Next. In the Differencing Virtual Hard Disk dialog box, type the name of the parent disk or click Browse to find it, this is the location where you put in your based OS .VHD file.
7) click Next, and then click Finish.

At the end of the day, the VPC will only save the changes to the differencing disk, not the based OS. You can then use this method with only one based OS.

Saving space? Of course!