Manual outlook configuration with Exchange 2013
Introduction
When I first heard that Exchange 2013 has killed MAPI and that now even internal clients connect to exchange using RPC over HTTP (or outlook anywhere), the first question that popped to my mind was "What should we enter in the server name then?"
Well it wasn't too long before I got the answer to that question, as you can see in the image below the servername is no longer the server FQDN, instead outlook uses a new connection point MailboxGUID @ UPNsuffix e.g.: 271d1d80-72c1-440f-b34c-f748dba61332@zerohoursleep.com this change has for goal to remove the infamous “Your administrator has made a change to your mailbox. Please restart.”
Yes you've read it right, it is the MailboxGUID so it will change for every user! You wouldn't care a lot about this if you are using outlook auto-configuration, however if you want to configure Outlook manually keep on reading.
Getting the Server Name
The only way I found to retrieve this GUID is through the Exchange Management Shell by running Get-mailbox username | ft name,ExchangeGUID, the GUID in question is that big funny string.
Bulk Mailbox creating mailboxes in Exchange 2010 multi-tenant
I recently received this email in my inbox so I thought it would be a good idea to dedicate a post answering this question.
Hi Antoine,
First of all, I'd like to thank you for you blog, I used your guide to set up an Exchange 2010 multi tenant set up and it worked like a dream! Very clear instructions, just what I needed to guide us through the potential minefield!
Do you have any blog posts or examples on how to bulk create mailbox in a multi tenant environment, I'd like to a take a spreadsheet with users name, e-mail address etc. and create multiple mailboxes using a powershell script. I'm a GUI man at heart and I find powershell tricky at the best of times. I saw your blog on how to import PST files which I also think will be very useful.
Any help you can offer would be greatly appreciated.
Before getting started, and if you are new to Exchange 2010 multi-tenant mode I suggest you check the list of tutorials I wrote : Exchange 2010 hosting for hosters.
Lab Setup
For this tutorial I am using a single exchange server in hosting mode running all the roles, but the number of exchange servers you have in your setup will not change anything.
I have also created 2 test organizations for this tutorial TestOrg1 and TestOrg2.
A look to the CSV file
Enable end users to manage group membership of distribution groups in Exchange 2010
I am often asked how to allow end users, or regular users with no administrative privileges, to change group membership of specific distribution groups in Exchange 2010. This is what I will cover today in this short tutorial.
In this post I will show you how to allow to userA to manage group membership of DistGroup
First open Exchange Management Shell -> Recipient Configuration -> Distribution Group
Find the distribution group DistGroup and right click properties on it
Go to the Group information and add UserA as manager to this group and click OK
Creating a DAG in Exchange 2010 SP1 multi-tenant mode
After my posts about Exchange multi-tenant or hosting mode I got a lot of questions about how to create Database Availability Group, or DAG, when running Exchange hosted. So I decided to dedicate a post on how to configure/create DAG using powershell.
Technically the below applies to any exchange setup but, since when running in hosting mode there is no more Exchange Management Console, it might be specially useful if you are trying to configure a DAG while running exchange in multi-tenant mode.
The setup
For this article I am using 2 Exchange 2010 SP1 servers running the mailbox role in multi-tenant mode configured as below
| Name | LAN IP | Replication network IP |
| VSMBX1 | 10.2.1.71 | 192.168.99.71 |
| VSMBX2 | 10.2.1.72 | 192.168.99.72 |
Export and Import mailboxes in Exchange 2010 SP1
Ever since Exchange 5.5 I have been longing for an easy way to import/export mailboxes to and from PST. I have to admit that Exmerge was a pretty decent tool back then, however, although it did work, I was very disappointed by the requirements of import-mailbox export-mailbox on Exchange 2007, and I prefer to forget the frustration of using these commands with Exchange 2010 RTM.
I can happily say that all my problems are now quickly forgotten after the release of Exchange 2010 SP1 and the new commands New-MailboxImportRequest and New-MailboxExportRequest.
Prerequisites and permissions considerations
I am happy to say that installing Outlook on the server is no longer a requirement to export/import mailboxes and this, for me, was great news!
If you rush things and directly try to run New-MailboxImportRequest cmdlet it will fail with the following error, this is because, by default, no one is assigned the permission to Import and Export mailboxes.
“The term 'New-MailboxImportRequest' is not recognized as the name of a cmdlet”
Register Snom m9 with lync server 2010
Although snom m9 is not a certified Lync device (yet?) I thought it would be a good opportunity to try it and share the registration steps.
Snom m9 Firmware upgrade
When I got the snom phones they required a firmware upgrade before they could be used with OCS/Lync so make sure to download the latest snom m9 firmware and load it to your phone, details are here