Test Layout

During a recent migration from Exchange 2007 to Exchange 2013, we ran into an issue that I was unaware of. Outlook 2013 was popping up multiple times per day with the following message: The Microsoft Exchange administrator has mad a change that requires you to quit and restart Outlook. After doing some research this appears when the default public folder database for a Mailbox database is set to a non-existent public folder database. In our scenario, we removed Exchange 2007 public folders after introducing Exchange 2013. Consequently, the Exchange 2013 databases were configured to use the Exchange 2007 public folder database as default. After removing the Exchange 2007 public folder database, the Exchange 2013 database were still configured to use the deleted public folder database that was now in deleted objects. This issue seems to be specific to Outlook 2013 and Exchange 2013 CU5. I have not applied CU6 because there are known compatibility issues with Exchange 2007 coexistence for...

We had a client get infected with a virus today that used Outlook for sending messages out. This was unusual. Most viruses attempt to deliver email themselves and can be blocked by the firewall. Because this virus used Outlook, the messages were sent through the Exchange server which is allowed to deliver email to the Internet. Three specific users got infected and I wanted to be able to inform those that were sent messages not to open them. I could get this information from the message tracking log based on the subject of the message. I used three commands to dump the information to a text file. First, get the list of messages sent by a specific user: $UserMessages=Get-MessageTrackingLog -Start "MM/DD/YYY 00:00:00AM" -Resultsize Unlimited | Where-Object {$_.MessageSubject -like "SubjectOfVirusMessage" -and $_.EventID -like "Send" -and $_.Sender -like "SenderEmailAddress" Second, build a list of message recpients: ForEach ($m in $UserMessages) {$...

This morning a client got a virus infected email message that got sent to all users. Only 3 users opened the infected attachment initially, but I didn't want to count on users to delete the message manually. The risk of one forgetting and opening the attachment was too high. In this case the virus was in an attachment named document2174_pdf.zip. This filename was unique enough that I was comfortable searching for all instances of that attachment and deleting the messages. If the filename was more generic, I would have included the message subject in the query. Before you can perform this type of search, your user account must be a member of the Discovery Management group. This is required to do multi-mailbox search. Group membership does not take effect immediately, you may need to close and reopen your Exchange Management Shell prompt. The syntax I used to delete all messages with the specific attachment from all mailboxes was: Get-Mailbox -Resultsize Unlimited | Search-Mailbox -S...

A few weeks ago, a client reported that when sending to a list of email addresses, one of the recipients was not getting the attachment. The recipient got the email message, but not the attachment. So, then you start to work it through logically: Others get the attachment, so, it must not be on our end. Send a test message from a non-client account and the attachment goes through, so, it must be on our end. Apparently it's nobody's fault. Of course it's always someone's fault, and it this case, I'm blaming Outlook. This turned out to be a new problem I've never seen with rich text formatting (RTF). I'm sure that everyone that supports Outlook has at one time or another run into the winmail.dat attachment problem when Outlook sends RTF formatted email to a client that doesn't understand it. In this case, the client receiving the email partially understood RTF. It understood it enough to get the text message out, but not the attachment. The whole message w...

Check it out: https://vouchers.cloudapp.net/mcp/default.aspx

During a recent Exchange 2007 to Exchange 2013 migration, we ran into an issue with Managed Availability in Exchange 2013. Managed Availability provides health monitoring services. This particular client is performing journaling by enabling journaling on each database and configuring all messages to be sent to a journaling mailbox in a separate database. They then have archiving software that removes the messages from the journaling mailbox. This allows them to retain a copy of all messages sent or received in the organization. As we implemented Exchange 2013, the journaling mailbox was filled with messages generated by Managed Availability. The messages were from inboundproxy@contoso.com with a subject of Inbound proxy probe to a health mailbox. Managed Availability was sending messages through the transport system to health mailboxes to verify that the system was functioning normally. However, this was resulting in a lot of messages that were not required being journaled. To avoid...

We recently had an emergency issue with a client system and had issues with the iDRAC7 remote control features. We put iDRAC cards in all of our servers for exactly this scenario where there is an unknown issue and we might need to power cycle the system. We were able to log into the iDRAC7 web console with no issues. However, on the summary screen it was not showing status for the power supplies. Also, if I tried to browse the disk status, it was indicating the no disks or controllers could be seen. Fortunately, the fix was pretty easy. Just restart the iDRAC card. To do this, on the Summary screen, in the Quick Launch Tasks, click Reset iDRAC as shown below. This does not reset the configuration of the iDRAC, it just restarts the card.

You might not realize it, but your Exchange server is probably already encrypting messages sent and received from the Internet. By default, Exchange uses opportunistic TLS. This means that it offers TLS for inbound messages, but does not require it. Exchange also tries to use TLS for outbound messages, but does not require it. We have one client that works with an insurance company. In order to ensure that data is secure, they request that their customers force the use TLS instead of relying on opportunistic TLS. This is more secure because the messages will wait in the queue if TLS cannot be established. To use TLS for inbound messages, you need to have a valid certificate installed on your Exchange server and have assigned the SMTP service to that certificate. That certificate needs to include the name that external servers use to reach your server, such as mail.conexion.ca. As long as Transport Layer Security is enabled as an authentication mechanism on the Receive connector, opport...