Friday 23 July 2010

Email data migration – Migrationwiz.com

If you are familiar with the pain that can come when migrating mailbox data between servers you will appreciate https://www.migrationwiz.com.

It is a cloud service charged per mailbox that can hook in to Exchange, Gmail, Hotmail, IMAP and other mail servers and import directly to Exchange Server 2007/2010. It takes care of a lot of work for IMAP migrations such as securely gathering user credentials.

I really like the simple dashboard showing the state of the migration. I also like the option to take multiple passes at a mailbox and being able to on filter date ranges.

image

Configuration is simple.

1. Enter source server OWA/IMAP address
2. Enter destination Exchange OWA address
3. List mailboxes to migrate, then either it will handle credential gathering or you can specify a super user with access to all mailboxes.
4. Press GO and monitor.

Daniel

Test-ExchangeUMCallFlow - Unified Messaging Troubleshooting Tool

Microsoft have released the Unified Messaging Troubleshooting Tool which used some new cmdlets to help configure testing and diagnose configuration errors with call answering and voicemail.

Whether the solution is on-premise or cross-premise, use OCS R2 2007 or MCS “14” the cmdlet will emulate and run diagnostic tests in telephone, UM 2010 SP1 and cross-premise deployments. You end up with some useful information in the form of a cause and possible solutions.

Download it here, http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=10d2e48f-0846-40b6-b08f-d282309811a2

OCS 2007 R2 July 2010 Cumulative Update

Can you believe July is nearly over? Microsoft have released a wave of OCS 2007 R2 cumulative update packages for OCS Server, Communicator and Group Chat.

OCS 2007 R2 Server
KB: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/968802/

OCS 2007 R2 Database
KB: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2032834/

Communicator 2007 R2
KB: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2028888/

Communicator Phone
KB: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2267962/

Group Chat Server
KB: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2032881/

Group Chat Client
KB: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2032922/

Group chat Admin
KB: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2032949/

Wednesday 21 July 2010

Hosting Deployment Guide for Exchange Server 2010 SP1 Beta

Microsoft have released the Hosting Deployment Guide for Exchange Server 2010 SP1 which is the first of many services to break away from the HMC and MPS deployment and provisioning model. Multi-tenant capabilities are now built directly in to AD and Exchange, although there are some limitations such as the removal of public folders and no access to ECP for tenant organisations.

Despite some limitations this is the product many hosters and carriers have been waiting for, as until Exchange Server 2010 SP1 Microsoft have not provided guidance or support for multi-tenant Exchange Server 2010. The really good news for me is this opens up the doors to more complex cross-premise deployments where the customer has Exchange in-house and in the Cloud(s).

A couple of warnings about the /hosting install. 1. You must deploy in a new forest where Exchange Server has not been installed previously. 2. There is no GUI for /hosting you must install form command line using setup.com /hosting and manage the service through Powershell. This makes sense as the current Exchange GUI won’t display multi-tenant organisations in a hierarchy and it also prevents simple changes being made outside of automated provisioning 3. Resource forest type scenarios still has limitations.

If you are interested head to http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyID=a0965fc9-2723-4947-ae6b-74bc3808e72a&displaylang=en to download SP1, remember to use setup.com /hosting.

While that is installing start reading through the guidance provided here, http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?displaylang=en&FamilyID=bba88fb5-9d84-475c-85d7-3ffeb308636e.

I have been testing /hosting in the lab for a few months now and we still have a journey to complete before /hosting will make it in to the Cobweb production platform. I imagine we will start to see the hosting editions, lead by BPOS, gaining new and updated features through regular smaller releases.

Happy Hosting

Daniel

Tuesday 20 July 2010

Hotfix Rollup 1 for Microsoft Forefront Protection for Exchange

Hotfix Rollup 1 for Microsoft Forefront Protection for Exchange was release a few weeks ago over at http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2181692/.

I’ve been testing with the build of Exchange Server 2010 SP1 that we run in production and haven’t had any problems with it.

Get the update: http://support.microsoft.com/kb/2181692/

Daniel

Thursday 8 July 2010

Cobweb make it onto The Register

Our VCE offering has made it onto the front page, and can be found here.


Oliver Moazzezi

MVP - Exchange Server

Wednesday 7 July 2010

Follow me on Twitter

Well,

I upped a geek level and now post on Twitter. You won't find me talking about randoms - you will find me posting out links to cool new technology, tools or gadgets.

http://twitter.com/OliverMoazzezi

Enjoy,

Oliver Moazzezi

MVP - Exchange Server

Good news! Re-awarded as a 2010 MVP!

So this will be my 4th year as an Exchange MVP. In the last year I have probably made my biggest contributions to Technical Communities.

So I thought i'd take you back to where it all started, back in 2007 on the Exchange Newsgroups.

Over these last 36 months i've made nearly 5000 posts to the Microsoft Exchange Public Newsgroups, the picture below, taken from Google shows my posts and I guess somewhat crazy dedication to Exchange and helping others. You will find everything from talking about Clustering, SAN vs DAS, Exchange 2000, 2003, 2007 and 2010 to scripting and help with Active Directory.

After having a quick run through, I even noticed I posted on Christmas Day :-)























The posts slowly declined as I moved over to Microsofts replacement forums - the Exchange Technet Forums. I now post here.

You can see my threads here.

And you can follow my RSS feed here.

So with the decline or the newsgroups I also started Webinars for my employer, Cobweb. I have some far done 3 online webinars on Exchange 2010 since the start of the year. I have also presented Exchange 2010 including a live demo of OWA and it's new advanced features (Thankyou Demo Gods for a perfect demo!) at Microsoft Victoria, and I have also presented a Technet Webcast on Exchange Server 2010 Management (RBAC, Powershell), which I must say was very nerve racking but was deeply rewarding.

And with that i'l leave you with my first post I can find, when I was very much new with Exchange Server, way back in November 2005.

It's an honour and a prviledge to continue to be held in high esteem and awarded as an MVP each year, always wondering whether you will get it back again or not :-)

Take care, and Thankyou Microsoft, you guys rock..


Oliver Moazzezi

MVP - Exchange Server