Unique technology for enterprise customers- Windows 7 and Windows 2008 R2 - Direct Access and others

Unique technology for enterprise customers

 

The Windows 7 Enterprise operating system (OS) is available to Microsoft Software Assurance customers. With Windows 7 Enterprise, you can take advantage of the following features that are not available in Windows 7 Professional:

• DirectAccess: Give mobile users seamless access to corporate networks without a need to VPN.

• BranchCache: Decrease the time branch office users spend waiting to download files across the network.

• Federated Search: Find information in remote repositories, including SharePoint sites, with a simple user interface.

• BitLocker and BitLocker To Go: Help protect data on PCs and removable drives, with manageability to enforce encryption and backup of recovery keys.

• AppLocker: Specify what software is allowed to run on a user's PCs through centrally managed but flexible Group Policies.

• Virtual desktop infrastructure (VDI) optimizations: Improved user experience for VDI with multimon and microphone support, which have the ability to reuse virtual hard drive (VHD) images to boot a physical PC.

• Multilingual user interface: Create a single OS image for deployment to users worldwide.

 

Enhance mobility and manageability with DirectAccess

• Working outside the office is easier than ever. DirectAccess in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 enhances the productivity of mobile workers by connecting them seamlessly and more securely to their corporate network any time they have Internet access—without the need to VPN. When your IT department enables DirectAccess, the corporate network's file shares, intranet websites, and line-of-business applications remain accessible wherever you have an Internet connection.

• Manage remote machines more effectively. Flexibility gives IT the opportunity to service remote machines on a regular basis and ensure that mobile users stay up to date with company policies. With DirectAccess, IT administrators can manage mobile computers by updating Group Policy settings and distributing software updates any time the mobile computer has Internet connectivity, even if the user is not logged on.

• Enhance security and access control. To keep data safer as it travels public networks, DirectAccess uses IPv6-over-IPsec to encrypt communications transmitted across the Internet. DirectAccess is designed to reduce unnecessary traffic on the corporate network by sending only traffic destined for the corporate network through the DirectAccess server (running Windows Server 2008 R2), or the administrator can choose to send all traffic through the corporate network. In addition to authenticating the computer, DirectAccess can also authenticate the user and supports multifactor authentication, such as a smart card. IT administrators can configure which intranet resources specific users can access using DirectAccess.

Improve application responsiveness with BranchCache

• Increase branch office user productivity. BranchCache in Windows 7 helps increase the network responsiveness of applications, giving users in remote offices an experience more like working in the head office. When accessing content stored on Windows Server 2008 R2, users in a branch office don't need to wait as long to download files from headquarters. When IT enables BranchCache, a copy of data accessed from an intranet website or a file server is cached locally within the branch office. When another user on the same network requests the file, the user gets access to the content almost immediately as it is downloaded from the local cache rather than over a limited bandwidth connection back to headquarters.

• Flexible architecture. BranchCache only serves content to users who have the right permissions and always checks to make sure it is delivering the latest version of the file. BranchCache can operate in one of two modes. In Hosted Cache mode, a server in the branch running Windows Server 2008 R2 hosts the cached files. In the second mode, Distributed Cache, a branch server is not required; copies of files are directly cached on PCs in the branch and sent to other Windows 7 clients as needed.

• Versatile and efficient protocols. BranchCache only retrieves data from headquarters when the user requests it. Because it is a passive cache, it decreases bandwidth utilization between headquarters and the branch. BranchCache only caches read requests, so it will never interfere with a user saving a file. BranchCache supports common protocols for web content (HTTP and HTTPS) and file servers (server messaging block [SMB]), enabling it to work with a wide variety of application types. Finally, it works seamlessly with network security technologies, including Secure Sockets Layer (SSL), SMB signing, and Internet Protocol security (IPsec) to improve application performance even if the content is encrypted.

Help users find what they need with Federated Search

• Search enhancements in Windows 7 make finding information easier. Enterprise users need to access data from a variety of sources in their daily tasks. With Windows Vista, Microsoft introduced advanced desktop search technology, enabling users to instantly find information on their computers. With Microsoft Office SharePoint Server 2007 and the Enterprise Search family of products, Microsoft delivered highly secure, manageable, server-based search. Windows 7 brings these experiences together and provides users with an improved and seamless search experience across local and networked corporate data directly within Windows Explorer and the Start menu.

• More intuitive ways to find and organize information. Advancements to the Windows 7 user interface (UI) make it easier for users to quickly find what they are looking for. Libraries are a new way of accessing documents that might be located in different folders, on different hard drives, or even on different computers that are backed by a Windows Search index—in a single view. Windows 7 creates several default libraries for items such as documents and pictures, allowing you to organize and browse files in an optimal way. You can also create custom libraries. For example, libraries can be created per project to provide one entry point under which you can organize, access, and search files spread across multiple locations.

• Searching beyond the local computer with federated search. Windows 7 enables users to search remote document repositories, SharePoint sites, and Web applications as easily as they search their desktops—through the familiar Windows interface. Windows 7 federated search uses an existing public standard called OpenSearch. Users can select which sites they want to search from, or IT can populate a list for the user. Federated search results are presented in Windows explorer much like local files, with rich views, file details, and previews.

• Flexible search scopes. Making it easy to discover and search intranet sites can help organizations maximize their return on these investments. With Enterprise Search Scopes in Windows 7, IT administrators can populate links on the Start menu and in the Windows Explorer search results. These links simplify access to the most appropriate, complete, authoritative data sources on the network. This setup makes content on intranet portals more discoverable and accessible. IT administrators can deploy Enterprise Search scopes on users' machines using Group Policy.

Help prevent loss or theft of data with BitLocker and BitLocker To Go

• Protect your data—even on removable drives. With the continued growth of the mobile workforce, protecting sensitive data on mobile computers continues to be a major concern of IT decision makers. In 2008, 42 percent of respondents to the Computer Security Institute Computer Crime and Security Survey of enterprise IT professionals report that their organizations experienced theft of laptops or mobile devices. With Windows 7, BitLocker Drive Encryption helps protect sensitive data from being accessed by unauthorized users who come into possession of lost, stolen, or improperly decommissioned computers. BitLocker to Go extends BitLocker data protection to USB storage devices, enabling them to be restricted with a passphrase. In addition to having control over passphrase length and complexity, IT administrators can set a policy that requires users to apply BitLocker protection to removable drives before being able to write to them.

• Easier to manage. Windows 7 gives administrators more control over how data in their environment is protected. From policy-configured Active Directory Domain Services integration for the escrow of recovery keys, to simple and efficient hardware recovery processes, BitLocker provides an integrated management experience for IT professionals. BitLocker to Go also gives administrators control over how removable storage devices can be utilized within their environment and the strength of protection that they require. Administrators can require data protection for any removable storage device upon which users want to write data, while still allowing unprotected storage devices to be utilized in a read-only mode. Policies are also available to require appropriate passwords, smart card, or domain user credentials to utilize a protected removable storage device.

• Easier to set up. Whether you need to protect internal or removable drives, BitLocker in Windows 7 makes that protection easy because it works with almost any drive. Windows 7 simplifies the encryption of internal drives by automatically creating the hidden boot partition necessary to use BitLocker to protect the OS volume, eliminating the need to manually select that option during installation or to repartition the drive afterward. Best of all, BitLocker can be enabled on drives running Windows 7 with a simple right-click.

Help prevent unauthorized software from running with AppLocker

• Powerful, yet easy to administer. Windows 7 offers new application control policies with AppLocker, a flexible, easy-to-use mechanism that enables IT professionals to specify exactly what is allowed to run on user desktops. AppLocker restricts unauthorized software while allowing applications, installation programs, and scripts that users need. With this capability, IT professionals can realize the security, operational, and compliance benefits of application standardization.

• Application updates don't change the rules. AppLocker provides simple, powerful, rule-based structures for specifying which applications can run that are centrally managed using Group Policy. It introduces "publisher rules" that are based on an application's digital signature, making it possible to build strong rules that account for application updates. For example, an organization can create a rule to "allow all versions greater than 1.0 of Microsoft Dynamics CRM to run if signed by Microsoft." With correctly structured rules, IT professionals can safely deploy updates to allowed applications without having to build a new rule for each version update.

download Technical Overview of DirectAccess in Windows 7 and Windows Server 2008 R2 for a more in-depth technical look.

 

How to configure Outlook 2007 Discover locally

If you have two organizations with spilt DNS to share the same SMTP domain xyz.com. You can only configure DNS SRV record for one Exchange 2007 organization. For the other Exchange 2007 users with Outlook 2007 SP2 or later  you would like to "disable" the autodiscover feature from Outlook 2007 client end. However, we cannot disable the autodiscover feature from Outlook 2007 client. You can only select "Manually configure server settings or additional server types" when configuring new Outlook profile without autodiscover feature. After that Outlook 2007 will use autodiscover feature for downloading OAB, querying Free/Busy information etc. So, the workaround is that you can configure one autodiscover DNS SRV record for one Exchange organization. Or you can configure autodiscover for locally. For more information, please refer to the following article: Automatically configure Office Outlook 2007 user accounts http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc511507.aspx

Exchange 2007 Out of Office sent to Internet recipients with empty return path (Null Sender) e.g. "<>".

This behavior occurs because the OOF messages created in Exchange Server 2007 will be sent to internet recipients with empty return path (nullsender) e.g. "<>". Some third party Spam AV/Smart host does not accept messages with empty return path.

 

This behavior has changes since Exchange 2003 which send OOF messages as the OOF mailbox. The changes of the Exchange 2007 OOF behavior is because sending the OOF messages with no return path will prohibit the messages to bounce. As per RFC 2298 Message Disposition Notification (MDN) messages should be sent with blank sender. The OOF reply messages are an MDN.

 

To workaround this issue in this scenario, you can create Outlook rule to auto reply messages to instead of OOF messages, thus or configure the third party Spam AV/Smart host to accept messages with empty return path.

 

Note The Exchange 2007 edge server will not reject the OOF message as the edge server will be incorporated in to the Exchange organization. The HUB server will transfer the OFF messages in the address of OFF mailbox to the edge server and the edge server will then send the messages with empty return path e.g. blank sender, MAIL FROM: <> "null" to Internet.

Grant PF access permission to a shared mailbox on Exchange 2007 server

If you try to grant public folder access permission to a shared mailbox, you will get the following message and failed to add the user to PF access list, Permission TAB:

 

One or more users cannot be added toe the folder access list. Non-local users cannot be given rights on this server

 

 

To work around with this issue, we will have to use Exchange 2007 management

Shell cmdlet to set the mailbox to user mailbox. Here is the cmdlet I used and tested it works.

 

Set-mailbox mailbox_Name –type regular

 

Where: mailbox_name could be mailbox alias or associated account ID, say, Your_Netbios_domain_name\user_ID

 

Note: a shared mailbox could be a resource mailbox or a manager's mailbox shared with other users.

 

BES 5.0 SP1 upgrade

Upgraded BES 5.0 MR 3 to BES 5.0 SP1. Everything seems OK except the fact that it put UDP ping back to default that cause BAS services can be accessible to one node at a time. However, RIM have a KB to address the issue to turn on TCPPing and turn off UDP PING

 

http://www.blackberry.com/btsc/viewAttachment.do?attachID=Configure_BAS_instances_to_communicate_using_TCPPing.pdf&documentID=KB19654

 

Note: Before SP1, you only need to change two XML files (see my previous post regarding this), i.e. commend out UDP Ping and enable TCP Ping. After applying SP1, we will have to make 4 xml files modified, respectively. After that, BAS works great on both nodes.

 

 

How to change UDP ping to TCP Ping for BES 5.0 including MR3

How to change UDP ping to TCP Ping for BES 5.0 including MR3

 

Key Words:

 

BES 5.0 High Availability, BAS, Blackberry Administrative Services, Cannot Login to BAS, Blackberry Administrator Services. UDPPing and TCPPing

 

If you install Bes 5.0 High Availability for Blackberry Enterprise services on two Nodes, namely, BES50-Node1 and BES50-Node2. And you also install BAS, Blackberry Administrative services on Node1 and Node2. You will find out you can only login to BAS services to one of nodes. Once you try to login to the other node, you are prompt to login again page but never succeed.

The issue started with BES 5.0 initial release, until the most recently MR3. RIM code the bug with SDR329691

 

The work around:

 

To change default UDPPing to TCPPing by modifying Cluster-service.xml file and bas-object-versioning-cache-service.xml files under installed folder...

 

C:\Program Files (x86)\Research In Motion\BlackBerry Enterprise Server\BAS\jboss\ejb\server\default\deploy\Cluster-service.xml

C:\Program Files (x86)\Research In Motion\BlackBerry Enterprise Server\BAS\server\default\deploy\bas-object-versioning-cache-service.xml

Before you make any change on these two files, please make a copy of the file to your backup folder (not in the folder where is the is located)

 

A. Change of bas-object-versioning-cache-service.xml

 

1. open the file with notepad, find the following string

<attribute name="ClusterConfig">

locate...

before change...

<!--* UDP config stack *-->
       
         <Config>
            <UDP mcast_addr="${jboss.partition.udpGroup:228.1.2.5}"

After the change (note: you add <!--* to start comment out <Config>

<!--* UDP config stack *-->
         <!--*
         <Config>
            <UDP mcast_addr="${jboss.partition.udpGroup:228.1.2.5}"

and locate... (the end of UDP Config Stack)

        /<Config>

.....

before the change

    <pbcast.STATE_TRANSFER down_thread="false" up_thread="false" use_flush="false"/>
         </Config>
        

After the change...

    <pbcast.STATE_TRANSFER down_thread="false" up_thread="false" use_flush="false"/>
         </Config>
         *-->

Note... you added *--> to end of the comment out of UDP Stack

2. Leave MPING unchanged (by default, it's commented out)

 

3. Enable TCPPING by locating...   <!--* TCP with TCPPING (TCP ping) config stack *--> string

 

a) remove the <!--* to enable TCPing

 

before the change

         <!--*
         <Config>

   <TCP bind_addr="${jboss.bind.address}"

after the change

  <Config>

   <TCP bind_addr="${jboss.bind.address}"

....

before the change
 

            <pbcast.STATE_TRANSFER down_thread="false" up_thread="false" use_flush="false"/>
         </Config>
         *-->

after the change

            <pbcast.STATE_TRANSFER down_thread="false" up_thread="false" use_flush="false"/>
 </Config>

4. find the string of "TCPPING initial_hosts"

 

before you change

 

<TCPPING initial_hosts="host1[17800],host2[17800],host3[17800]" port_range="200"

 

after the change

 

<TCPPING initial_hosts="BES50-Node2[17800],BES50-Node1[17800]" port_range="200"

 

Note: replace host1 with your real node1 name and replace host2 with your real node2 name and delete host3[17800] if you have two instance of BAS

 

That's end for Node1 bas-object-versioning-cache-service.xml file. For Node2, you just copy the file to node 2 and edit the oder of node name

 

<TCPPING initial_hosts="BES50-Node1[17800],BES50-Node2[17800]" port_range="200"

and save change of the file

B.Change of Cluster-service.xml

 

1. comment out UDP stack as shown in previous section as follows:

 <!--* UDP config stack *-->
         <!--*
         <Config>
            <UDP mcast_addr="${jboss.partition.udpGroup:228.1.2.1}"
                 mcast_port="${jboss.hapartition.mcast_port:48855}"
                 receive_on_all_interfaces="false"
                 tos="8"
                 ucast_recv_buf_size="20000000"
                 ucast_send_buf_size="640000"
                 mcast_recv_buf_size="25000000"
                 mcast_send_buf_size="640000"
                 loopback="true"
                 discard_incompatible_packets="true"
                 enable_bundling="false"
                 max_bundle_size="64000"
                 max_bundle_timeout="30"
                 use_incoming_packet_handler="true"
                 use_outgoing_packet_handler="false"
                 ip_ttl="${jgroups.udp.ip_ttl:6}"
                 down_thread="false" up_thread="false"/>
            <PING timeout="10000"
                  down_thread="false" up_thread="false" num_initial_members="3"/>
            <MERGE2 max_interval="200000"
                    down_thread="false" up_thread="false" min_interval="20000"/>
            <FD_SOCK down_thread="false" up_thread="false"/>
            <FD timeout="20000" max_tries="5" down_thread="false" up_thread="false" shun="true"/>
            <VERIFY_SUSPECT timeout="10000" down_thread="false" up_thread="false"/>
            <pbcast.NAKACK max_xmit_size="60000"
                    use_mcast_xmit="false" gc_lag="0"
                    retransmit_timeout="300,600,1200,2400,4800"
                    down_thread="false" up_thread="false"
                    discard_delivered_msgs="true"/>
            <UNICAST timeout="300,600,1200,2400,3600"
                    down_thread="false" up_thread="false"/>
            <pbcast.STABLE stability_delay="1000" desired_avg_gossip="50000"
                    down_thread="false" up_thread="false"
                    max_bytes="400000"/>
            <pbcast.GMS print_local_addr="true" join_timeout="10000"
                    down_thread="false" up_thread="false"
                    join_retry_timeout="10000" shun="true"
                    view_bundling="true"/>
            <FRAG2 frag_size="60000" down_thread="false" up_thread="false"/>
            <pbcast.STATE_TRANSFER down_thread="false" up_thread="false" use_flush="false"/>
         </Config>
         *-->

 

2. Leave MPING section unchanged.

 

3. remove "comment out: TCPPing " <!--- before  <Config> *-->" after /<Config>

 

After the change

 

        <!--* TCP with TCPPING (TCP ping) config stack *-->
<!-- To use this config stack, uncoment it and replace 'TCPPING initial-hosts' with the list of host names in the cluster keeping the same format of hostx[17600] -->
<!-- Also coment out the UDP config stack above -->

         <Config>
            <TCP bind_addr="${jboss.bind.address}"
                 start_port="17600"
                 end_port="17799"
                 loopback="true"
                 tcp_nodelay="true"
                 recv_buf_size="20000000"
                 send_buf_size="640000"
                 discard_incompatible_packets="true"
                 enable_bundling="false"
                 max_bundle_size="64000"
                 max_bundle_timeout="30"
                 use_incoming_packet_handler="true"
                 use_outgoing_packet_handler="false"
                 down_thread="false" up_thread="false"
                 use_send_queues="false"
                 sock_conn_timeout="300"
                 skip_suspected_members="true"/>
            <TCPPING initial_hosts="host1[17800],host2[17800],host3[17800]" port_range="200"
                     timeout="10000"
                     down_thread="false" up_thread="false"
                     num_initial_members="3"/>
            <MERGE2 max_interval="200000"
                    down_thread="false" up_thread="false" min_interval="20000"/>
            <FD_SOCK down_thread="false" up_thread="false"/>
            <FD timeout="20000" max_tries="5" down_thread="false" up_thread="false" shun="true"/>
            <VERIFY_SUSPECT timeout="10000" down_thread="false" up_thread="false"/>
            <pbcast.NAKACK max_xmit_size="60000"
                           use_mcast_xmit="false" gc_lag="0"
                           retransmit_timeout="300,600,1200,2400,4800"
                           down_thread="false" up_thread="false"
                           discard_delivered_msgs="true"/>
            <pbcast.STABLE stability_delay="1000" desired_avg_gossip="50000"
                           down_thread="false" up_thread="false"
                           max_bytes="400000"/>
            <pbcast.GMS print_local_addr="true" join_timeout="10000"
                        down_thread="false" up_thread="false"
                        join_retry_timeout="10000" shun="true"
                        view_bundling="true"/>
            <pbcast.STATE_TRANSFER down_thread="false" up_thread="false" use_flush="false"/>
         </Config>

4. find the string of "TCPPING initial_hosts"

 

before you change

 

<TCPPING initial_hosts="host1[17800],host2[17800],host3[17800]" port_range="200"

 

after the change

 

<TCPPING initial_hosts="BES50-Node2[17800],BES50-Node1[17800]" port_range="200"

 

Note: replace host1 with your real node1 name and replace host2 with your real node2 name and delete host3[17800] if you have two instance of BAS

 

That's end for Node1 bas-object-versioning-cache-service.xml file. For Node2, you just copy the file to node 2 and edit the oder of node name

 

<TCPPING initial_hosts="BES50-Node1[17800],BES50-Node2[17800]" port_range="200"

and save change of the file

 

After you made the change, shutdown the standby BES and wait till you can login to BAS on node1, then turn on the standby node and wait till you can login to BAS on node2

open task manager check memory size for process BAS-AS.exe, if it is greater than 310 KB, you should be able to BAS on the node for MR3 installed, 210 KB for BES 5.0 without MR.

 

If you need a complete working version of both files, please post request in comments section.

 

Thank you.

 

 

 

 

Outlook Sync error code: 80004005-501-4B9-560

Key Word:

 

Outlook Sync error, Outlook Synchronization error, error code: 80004005-501-4B9-560, Client operation failed, Offline

 

Solution:

 

First rule with Outlook troubleshooting - does it follow the user to another machine?

If not, then the problem is local to that system.

If it does, then you may have a more serious problem.

 

Turn off offline files and folders, make sure the client is not in cached mode, delete any ost files (*.ost) on the machine. Make sure you search hidden files and folders are revealed when doing this search. Then put the client back in cached mode or offline files/folders, whichever you have configured and allow it to resync.

Exchange Server 2007 mailbox stamped as legacy mailbox

User's mailbopx has been moved to Exchange 2007 server. User complains he or she cannot access the mailbox via OWA. However, Outlook works fine. Find the mailbox via EMC, it stamped as a legacy mailbox instead of user mailbox.

 

Solution:

 

    To remove the legacy tag from mailboxes, use the following Exchange Shell command:

 

Set-Mailbox jsmith -ApplyMandatoryProperties

 

MS KB Link:

 

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/931747

 

 

Please also note that: If you use the Exchange Server 2003/2000 extensions to Active Directory Users & Computers (ADUC) console to create mailboxes residing on Exchange Server 2007 servers, these mailboxes get stamped as legacy mailboxes.

 

Get-ExchangeServer | Where {$_.IsExchange2007OrLater} | Get-Mailbox | where {$_.RecipientTypeDetails -eq "legacymailbox"} >C:\ex07_LegacyMailbox.txt

 

To Apply mandatory properties to all Exchange Server 2007 mailboxes stamped as legacy mailbox, please us e the following shell cmdlet:

 

Get-ExchangeServer | Where {$_.IsExchange2007OrLater} | Get-Mailbox | where {$_.RecipientTypeDetails -eq "legacymailbox"} | Set-Mailbox -ApplyMandatoryProperties

 

 

"Unspecified error" when replying or forwading mail in outlook 2003

Issue: Outlook's Users experienced the issue ("Unspecified error" when replying or forwading mail in outlook 2003) when users use Microsoft Word as Outlook's default editor and the message contains html embedded format.

 

Workaround:   Once changed the HTML format to Rich Text format (next to option) while forwarding or replying to this email, and it goes perfect.

Fix “username” is not valid for UserPrincipalName issue

After an upgrade to Exchange 2007, you may get some errors related to your account and User Principal Name (UPN). This particularly occurs when you have users where no domain name is filled in at User Logon Name at the Account tab in Active Directory.

The following error indicates that you have not set a domain name at the User Logon Name:

Warning:
Object domain/organizational unit/username has been corrupted and it is in an inconsistent state. The following validation errors have occurred:

Warning:
"username" is not valid for UserPrincipalName. Valid values are: Strings that includes '@', where '@' cannot be the last character..

To solve the problem, you should fill in a domain name for every user who hasn't got one. If you have only a few users without domain name, you could do it manually. If there are more than 10, I would suggest using ADModify. ADmodidy is a tool with a GUI, which offers you many functionality in a very easy way to modify attributes in Active Directory.

You can download ADModify

Practical note: When setting attributes with ADmodify, don't forget to test first with a small group of users!

 

Forcing Exchange 2007 to use a static Global Catalog

For best pratice, by default, let exchange servers to pickup DCs and GCs automatically, However, for some case, you may have to force Exchange 2007 to use a static Global Catalog

 

Set-ExchangeServer -Identity EX-HUB01
-StaticDomainControllers:dc1.domain.com,dc2.domain.com,dc3.domain.com,dc4.domain.com
-StaticGlobalCatalogs:dc1.domain.com,dc2.domain.com,dc3.domain.com,dc4.domain.com -StaticConfigDomainController:dc2.domain.com

 

To Exclude DC's

 

Set-ExchangeServer -identity <server> -StaticExcludedDomainControllers:<domaincontroller>;<domaincontroller>

 

Get-ExchangeServer cmdlet afterwards, the DCs/GCs that I
listed in the Set cmdlet, are NOT listed.

You will need to add the  -Status switch to the command to see the DCs.

 

You may also need to know

 

How to configure Outlook to a specific global catalog server or to the closest global catalog server

 

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/319206

 

 

 

How to wirelessly delete calendar data on a BlackBerry smartphone

How to wirelessly delete calendar data on a BlackBerry smartphone

 

Overview
Warning: The following procedures will delete all calendar data on the BlackBerry smartphone. Back up the data prior to performing the procedure. For instructions, see KB12487.

Complete the steps for the version of BlackBerry Device Software installed on your BlackBerry smartphone.

BlackBerry Device Software 4.2.x
On the BlackBerry smartphone, complete the following steps:

Display the menu in the Calendar application, then select Options.
Scroll to the bottom of the screen, and type RSET.

Note: For BlackBerry smartphones that support SureType® technology, use the multi-tap input method.

BlackBerry Device Software 4.3.x
On the BlackBerry smartphone, complete the following steps:

Display the menu in the Calendar application, then select Options.
In the Options screen, type RSET.
Note: For BlackBerry smartphones that support SureType technology, use the multi-tap input method.

 

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Additional Information
Wireless calendar synchronization process
If wireless synchronization of the calendar is turned on, the following message will appear:

This will erase your <nameofcalendar> calendar, and reload it from your server. Continue?

After the calendar data has been deleted, the following message will appear:

The <nameofcalendar> calendar has been wiped. It will be repopulated from your server.

The calendar will be repopulated with calendar data from the server.

Wireless calendar synchronization is turned off
If wireless synchronization of the calendar is turned off, the following message will appear:

Wireless Calendar, for <nameofcalendar>, is not enabled. Wipe Calendar anyway?

After the calendar data has been deleted, the following message will appear:

The <nameofcalendar> calendar has been wiped.

The calendar will be repopulated with calendar data using BlackBerry Desktop Manager.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Re-population of calendar
During re-population of the calendar, the following message may appear on the BlackBerry smartphone:

Organizing Calendar

The performance of the BlackBerry smartphone may be affected during the re-population of the calendar. The speed of re-population depends on the amount of data transmitted and the speed of the wireless network.

Windows 7 - 6 Edition Which one fits you

Windows 7 Starter: Great for netbooks and older systems that will never act as a DVR and don't need to join an Active Directory domain. It's a bummer that it lacks Aero and Touch, but what do you expect for something that tacks on a paltry $15 to the price of the hardware. Your netbook probably won't have a touch-screen or decent graphics chip anyway.

Windows 7 Basic: For "emerging markets" which means you'll only see it on an internet café computer somewhere in old world.

Windows 7 Home Premium: This edition of Windows has existed for years, but used to be called Media Center Edition (MCE) in the XP days. This is what to use if you want to be able to hook your computer up to your TV to use as a DVR and media hub. Virtually all home computers and non-business laptops will run this.

Windows 7 Professional: Basically the same as Home Premium, but adds Active Directory domain membership support. This is the edition that will come with most office computers.

Windows 7 Enterprise: It doesn't matter what this has because you'll never see it unless you're given a computer from a large corporation. (It adds booting from a virtual drive and BitLocker encryption to the Business edition.)

Windows 7 Ultimate: This is for the person who also bought an "Extreme Edition" CPU and cannot stand the thought that somehow, someone out there might have something better than him. Microsoft deserves the opportunity to milk all the money they can from this kind of user

How to move mailboxes across Forest using Exchange 2007 cmdlet

 

$SourceCredential = Get-Credential

 

$TargetCredential = Get-Credential

 

Here is the cmdlet to move all mailboxes on NYBNCEM-1\Mailbox store 2:

 

get-mailbox –Database "NYBNCEM-1.corp.mysourcedomain.com\First Storage Group\Mailbox Store 2 (NYBNCEM-1)" -Credential $SourceCredential -DomainController nyshadc-2.corp.mysourcedomain.com | Move-Mailbox -TargetDatabase "NYXSRV-10\BINC - DB1\BINC - DB1" -GlobalCatalog nydc-4.us.mydesdomain.com -SourceForestGlobalCatalog nyshadc-2.corp.mysourcedomain.com -NTAccountOU "OU=NY,OU=Binc,DC=us,Dc=mydesdomain,DC=com" -SourceForestCredential $SourceCredential -TargetForestCredential $TargetCredential

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

Exchange Server 2010 has lots 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:


[PS] C:\>New-ManagementRoleAssignment -Name "auditor" -Role DiscoveryManagement
-User 'Legal Group'
Name Role User Enabled
---- ---- ---- -------
auditor DiscoveryMana... True

[PS] C:\>

Now, the Auditor user can use IE browsers and type:

/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 ...

Cannot start Microsoft Exchange RPC Client Access service - Exchange 2010 Beta

Issue:

If you have installed both Client Access Server (CAS) role and Mailbox role (Exchange 2010 beta) at same server, Microaoft Exchange RPC Client Access service cannot be started. Therefore Outlook mapi clients (Outlook) won't be able to access their mailboxes unless you enable Outlook anywahere (http over RPC when you configure your Outlook Clients)

Cause:

For Exchange 2010, Microsoft instroduces Microsoft Exchange RPC Client Access service on CAS server role to respond Mapi clients, such as Outlook's requests to access mailboxes on Exchange 2010 server. The issue will be fixed in Exchange 2010 later build.

Workaround:

You may copy and paste the following txt to textpad and save it as *.reg file to fix the issue:

==========================================

Windows Registry Editor Version 5.00

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIS\ParametersSystem]
"Mapi Rpc Endpoint Registration"=dword:00000002

[HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeRPC\ParametersSystem]
"ExecutionFlags"=dword:00000002

User cannot open or edit Outlook Distribution List using Outlook on an Exchange mailbox

Issue:

Outlook user cannot open or edit Outlook Distribution List (DL) using Outlook on an Exchange mailbox or user receives a "This distribution list has reached the maximum size for your network e-mail server" error message when you try to open or add many items to a contact distribution list in Outlook

Solution:

Use Outlook Web Access to open the problematic DL and trim the members of the DL

Cause:

This is a limitation of distribution lists that are created and stored in a Microsoft Exchange Server mailbox store. There is no definite limit to the number of contacts that you can add to a distribution list. The exact limit is based on the total file size of the contacts.

If you use only the very basic information for contacts, your distribution list limit may be as many as 125 contacts to 130 contacts. For example, the information for the contacts in a list of this size may include only the name and the e-mail address for each contact. You can create very large distribution lists that contain over a 1,000 contacts. However, these very large lists may not function as expected in Outlook.

For best results, the typical number of contacts that you should add to a distribution list is between 50 contacts and 70 contacts. However, if the contacts contain lots of information, the distribution list limit should be as small as 25 contacts.

Additionally, the distribution list limit is based on the property size limit of the computer that is running Exchange Server. The property size limit for an Exchange server is about 8 kilobytes (KB). The Exchange server stores all contact links in one property store. Therefore, the distribution list limit also depends on the average length of the contact's name and the average size of the entry ID. The size of the entry ID depends on the type of e-mail address and the length of the message.

Once a large DL created and near the limit, then you modified members of the DLs in your contact list that could potentially increased the size of the DL and over the limit then you are not able to open or edit the DL.

How to use OSQL osql command-line tool to backup and restore MSDE Database - How to bring Standby BES server online

Issue: Production BES 4.1 SP6 server failed.

Solution: Fortunately we have a standby BES 4.1 SP6 running.we used the osql command-line tool to backup Production BES MSDE database with Windows scheduler every 30 minutes and xcopy the BESMGMT Database to multiple servers and we were able to bring the standby BES online within minutes with no interactive response from BB client end.

You can use the osql command-line tool to access, query, or run scripts against, your SQL Server or MSDE database. For example, to backup your ENT Server databases you could run the following from the command line:

osql -S BES01 -E -Q " BACKUP DATABASE BESMGMT TO DISK = 'C:\Temp\BES01-BESMGMT.bak' with init"

• -S BES01 specifies the server name to be "BES01" For a database on the local machine, specify either "(local)", or "(local)\[InstanceName]" if you are using a named instance.
• -E specifies that osql should use a trusted connection. You could instead specify a username using the -U option.
• -Q specifies that oSQL should execute the SQL query that follows in double-quotes and then exit
• BACKUP DATABASE BESMGMT TO DISK = 'c:\Temp\' this is the actual query that will get exexuted... as you can see this simply backs up the BESMGMT database to the file C:\Temp\BES01-BESMGMT.bak.
• "with init" to tell osql backup to overwrite the existing backup file to save your disk space.

Similary, to restore the above backup you could run the following from the command line on Standby BES server:

osql -S BES02 -E -Q " RESTORE DATABASE BESMGMT FROM DISK = 'C:\Temp\BES01-BESMGMT.bak' "

After you successully restore your MSDE database, Disconnect your old Production server network cable, and start your all BES related services on your Standby BES server. Please see RIM doucumentation on how to setup BES 4.X standby BES.

Note: with BES 5.0, RIM has HA solution for BES.

Windows Server 2008 Upgrade Paths

Before performing an upgrade to Windows Server 2008 the key prerequisite is that the currently installed operating system provides an upgrade path to the chosen edition of Windows Server 2008. It is not, for example, possible to upgrade to Windows Server 2008 from Windows XP. In addition, it is vital that the target hardware be of a suitably high specification to support Windows Server 2008. For details of the system requirements refer to Windows Server 2008 Editions and System Requirements.

Upgrades are possible from a number of older Windows Server versions as outlined in the following table:

Operating System	Upgrade Options
Windows Server 2003 R2 Standard Edition Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition with Service Pack 1 (SP1) Windows Server 2003 Standard Edition with Service Pack 2 (SP2)	Windows Server 2008 Standard Windows Server 2008 Enterprise
Windows Server 2003 R2 Enterprise Edition Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition with Service Pack 1 (SP1) Windows Server 2003 Enterprise Edition with Service Pack 2 (SP2)	Windows Server 2008 Enterprise Windows Server 2008 Datacenter
Windows Server 2003 R2 Datacenter Edition Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition with Service Pack 1 (SP1) Windows Server 2003 Datacenter Edition with Service Pack 2 (SP2)	Windows Server 2008 Datacenter
Windows Server 2008 Standard	Windows Server 2008 Enterprise
Windows Server 2008 Enterprise	Windows Server 2008 Datacenter

How an Upgrade to Windows Server 2008 Works

During the Windows Server 2008 upgrade process the files, folders and applications associated with the previously installed Windows version are relocated to a windows.old folder and all user settings stored. Once this task is complete, a clean installation of the new operating system is performed and the saved user settings migrated to the new environment. Upon completion of a successful upgrade the Windows Server 2008 system will include all applications, settings and user files from the previous operating system installation.

Performing the Upgrade

An upgrade to Windows Server 2008 can only be performed by launching the installation process from within the currently installed operating system. It is not possible to perform an upgrade by booting from the installation media. To initiate the upgrade process, therefore, boot the existing Windows installation (if not already running), log into an account with administrative privileges and insert the installation DVD. If the system is configured to do so, the setup process on the DVD will autorun once it is mounted displaying the Windows Server 2008 installation screen:

From this screen the installation may be started by clicking on the Install now button. Alternatively, the What To Know Before Installing Windows Server 2008 link will provide information of system requirements and advice about issues such as application and driver compatibility. Clicking on Install now proceeds to the next screen. If the setup program detects an internet connection on the host operating system the next screen displayed will provide the option to have the installation process download any available updates and incorporate them into the installation. The recommended course of action at this point is to accept the default here and install the latest updates:

After Setup has searched for, and downloaded any available updates the Product Key Activation screen shown in the following figure will appear:

 Windows Server 2008 Activation

As mentioned previously it is not necessary to enter a key at this point in order to run Windows Server 2008. Failure to enter an activation key simply means that the operating system will run in trial mode which can only be extended for a total of 270 days. If you have an activation key enter it here. Alternatively click on the Next button to proceed to the next stage of the installation. If an activation key was not entered a warning dialog will appear stating that it may be necessary to re-install Windows at a later date (i.e. when the trial ends) resulting in lost data. In practice it is possible to perform the activation before the trial ends without the need to re-install. If presented with this dialog click "No" to proceed.

If an activation key was not entered the next screen will ask that the required Windows Server 2008 Edition be selected. Select the desired edition, check the box to confirm the selection and click Next to proceed. If an activation key was entered the installer already knows which edition to install. Note that Core versions of each edition are available. The core installation is a minimal installation of the operating system with no GUI interface and only a subset of services available by default. This configuration is intended for headless servers and situations where the smallest possible attack surface is required.

Read and agree to the license terms and proceed to the next screen where the options to upgrade or perform a clean installation are provided. If the installer was invoked by booting from the DVD, or the host operating system is not suitable for upgrade only the clean installation option will be provided.

 Windows Server 2008 Compatibility Report

Assuming that the installation was launched from within a compatible operating system, the Upgrade option will be provided. Click on this option to proceed and carefully read the Compatibility Report to get information about any potential problems that may be encountered after the upgrade. Having read the report click Next to proceed.

At this point the installation will begin and continue until completed.

 Accessing the Command Prompt during Installation

At any point during the setup process (except when the installation is actually being performed) Shift+F10 may be pressed to gain access to the command-prompt. From within this command prompt window most of the standard Windows Server 2008 command-line tools are available allowing tasks to be performed that might otherwise not be possible from within the setup interface.

Exchange 2010 Archiving and Retention

As the volume of e-mail continues to grow within organizations, the need to systematically archive this information has become a growing priority. Archiving can provide users a better e-mail experience by freeing up space inside a user's mailbox for better performance. Archiving also helps the organization better address compliance and legal electronic discovery requirements by making e-mail easier to manage and search. To address these needs, Exchange Server 2010 now features new archiving capabilities that combine with other enhanced mailbox management features, including advanced, multi-mailbox search, legal hold and granular retention polices to provide a comprehensive solution. Easy-to-use and deploy, this built-in functionality helps organizations reduce reliance on separate archiving solutions and simplify legal and compliance processes.

Functional Descriptions

Personal Archive: is an additional mailbox associated with a user's primary mailbox. It appears alongside the primary mailbox folders in Outlook. In this way, the user has direct access to e-mail within the archive just as they would their primary mailbox. Users can drag and drop PST files into the Personal Archive, for easier online access – and more efficient discovery by the organization. Mail items from the primary archive can also be offloaded to the Personal Archive automatically, using Retention Polices, reducing the size and improving the performance of the primary mailbox. In addition, users can search both their Personal Archive and primary mailbox simultaneously using Outlook.

Retention policies: enable application of retention settings to specific items or folders in a mailbox. Policies are configured by the Exchange Administrator and are displayed inside each e-mail, along with a header stating the applied policy and delete date. These headers make it easier for the end user to identify when an e-mail is set for expiration and apply a new expiration policy if the e-mail needs to be retained for a longer period. Administrators can set also default policy that can move messages from the primary mailbox to the Archive automatically.

Multi-Mailbox Search: enables multi-mailbox searches of mailbox items, including e-mail, attachments, calendar items, tasks and contacts as well as IRM-protected files. Multi-mailbox search works simultaneously across both primary mailboxes and Personal Archives with an easy-to-use control panel. This enables authorized HR, legal, and compliance users to perform searches without reliance on IT. For legal discovery purposes, mail located through search can be copied and moved to a specified mailbox or external store, as defined by the administrator for further investigation. Advanced filtering capabilities include: sender, receiver, expiry policy, message size, sent/receive date, cc/bcc, and regular expressions.

Legal Hold: enables immediate preservation of a user's deleted and edited mailbox items (e-mail, appointments, tasks, etc.) from both their primary mailbox and Personal Archive. Litigation Hold can be set on individual mailboxes or across the enterprise and also includes an option that automatically alerts users that a hold has been placed on their mailbox.

Note:

Alternative/archive mailbox can be used either with OWA or Outlook 2010 (but not with legacy Outlook clients).

Beta version of Outlook 2010 is not yet released for testing.
In Exchange 2010 Beta1, module is not ported in OWA to access Archive mailbox but it is available in later build as told.

So we need to wait for next Exchange 2010 public build...

The Exchange server address list service failed to respond

"The Exchange server address list service failed to respond. This could be because of an address list or email address policy configuration error"

 

Issue: When you try to move a mailbox to an Exchange 2007 mailbox server, you get error that "The Exchange server address list service failed to respond. This could be because of an address list or email address policy configuration error"

 

Test Acct6
Failed

Error:
The address list service on the server 'EX-07.us.yourdomain.com' is not running. The Exchange server address list service failed to respond. This could be because of an address list or email address policy configuration error.

The Exchange server address list service failed to respond. This could be because of an address list or email address policy configuration error.

Exchange Management Shell command attempted:
'us.yourdomain.com/Exchange Test Accounts/TestAcct6' | move-mailbox -TargetDatabase 'Ex-07\EX-DB3\EX-DB3' -GlobalCatalog 'dc-2.us.yourdomain.com'

Elapsed Time: 00:00:00

 

 

Address List Service

 

The Address List Service is a Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 service that updates recipient objects within a domain with specific types of information. For example, the Address List Service updates recipient objects with e-mail addresses and address list membership at scheduled intervals. Usually an administrator is responsible for determining the intervals at which this service runs.

Note:
This feature was called Recipient Update Service in Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 and earlier versions of Exchange Server.

When you modify or create a recipient policy, the e-mail addresses for the address types that you have modified or added will be generated the next time that the Address List Service is scheduled to run. The Address List Service only processes changes that were made since the last time that it was run, so it is very efficient. You must have at least one Address List Service for each domain in your organization, and it must be run from a computer that is running Exchange 2007.

 

On your Exchange 2007 server, there is no service called "Address List Service" that you can turn on or off, however, in Exchange 2007,

Address List Service is integrated with Exchange 2007 System Attendant Service. Therefore, your solution is:

 

Solution: Restart your Exchange 2007 System Attendant Service on the server.

Named properties bloat

Your Exchange will generate the following event if the the number of named properties reached the quota limit (8192) (default for Exchange 2003):

 

Application

 Category:      General

 Computer:      EXSRV-1

 User:          N/A

 Event:         9667

 Type:          ERROR

 Source:        MSExchangeIS

 CreationTime:  5/14/2009 10:00:25 AM

 Description:

 

Failed to create a new named property for database 'First Storage Group\Mailbox Store1-2 (EXSRV-1)' because the number of named properties reached the quota limit (8192).

 

User attempting to create the named property: 'Blackberry'

 

Named property GUID: 00020386-0000-0000-c000-000000000046

 

Named property name/id: 'X-valueof-SURNAME'

 

Every mail item has some MAPI properties on them perhaps some non MAPI properties. Each of these properties get's an ID and is store in the Named properties cache table. This table is located in each Exchange database and consist of three categories, nonMAPI properties, MAPI properties and Replication ID's
Named property cache has a limit of 32766 ID's. You can monitor how much of the table that is used with performance counter but you must first enable additional Information Store logging. http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=254606 Article is for older version of Exchange, but it still apply for Exchange 2007

Change the Library string located in HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIS\Performance
Change the string value from c:\exchsrvr\bin\mdbperf.dll to C:\Program Files\Microsoft\Exchange Server\bin\mdbperfX.dll (or to wherever your mdbperfx.dll is located)
After you modify this registry value, you must restart Performance Monitor to see the new counters. The new counters are located under the MSExchangeIS Mailbox and MSExchange Public object. Counters that you should monitor is:
Rows in NamedProps Table
Rows in ReplidMap Table
Rows in NamedProps Table
Rows in ReplidMap Table

How does the named properties table get populated?
Remember that this table is per database, this means that when a message is stored in a database, property ID's from the message is stored in named properties table and if those ID doesn't exist they will be added. So over time this table grows. Message can be from outlook, a public folder replication message or a message received by SMTP.

Properties on messages within Exchange are transferred with help of the XEXCH50 blob or with help of X- headers. X- Header in SMTP messages is not mandatory and is user defined. This means that if some application wants to add functionality to SMTP they can add their own commands with help of the X- header. For more info about X- header see RFC822 and Extension-Field and User-Defined-Field. http://tools.ietf.org/html/rfc822
X- headers cannot only be for additional SMTP verbs but also for transferring information so when Exchange receives a mail with some x- header in it, Exchange will translate this x-header to a named property.
Exchange writes info to application log when there is something added to namedprop table.
Here you see the 'x-myownheader' getting added.

EventID: 9873
Source: MSExchangeIS
A named property has been created for the database "/o=Home/ou=Exchange Administrative Group (FYDIBOHF23SPDLT)/cn=Configuration/cn=Servers/cn=MB2/cn=Microsoft Private MDB".
ID: 0x8519
Named property GUID: 00020386-0000-0000-c000-000000000046
Named property name/ID: x-myownheader
The following user is attempting to create the named property: "N/A"
Protocol: MAPI
Client type: Transport
Client version: 2049.0.33059.1

This is all good, but there is one problem, you can run out of space in the named properties table and when this happens you're in deep problem since it will cause mail flow issues.
Here is some more info about named properties http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb851495(EXCHG.80).aspx there is also a resolution at the end of the article.
The short version is to move all mailboxes to another database, delete the original database files and move mailboxes back to its original database, nothing you want to do more than necessary.
Here is more info about this problem http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb851492(EXCHG.80).aspx

When this table start to get near the quota limit you get warnings in the application eventlog like this.

The number of named properties created for database "SG02\Store02" is close to quota limit.
Current number of named properties: 8172
Quota limit for named properties: 8192
User attempting to create the named property: "MB2$"
Named property GUID: 00020386-0000-0000-c000-000000000046
Named property name/id: "x-myownheader"

There is some tweaking you can do regarding to the cache, but it will probably not help you in the long run since there is a hardcoded upper limit on 32766 ID's in the table. http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb851493(EXCHG.80).aspx

How to stop the named prop table population?
Well you cannot stop the population but you can stop unwanted x- headers to reach Information Store and that will stop most of the population. Most of these x- headers come with mail received from Internet. If you have a gateway that can strip out the x-headers from mail you're lucky. If you don't have this functionality in your gateway you can install the HeaderFilterAgent on your Exchange 2007 Edge or Hub server. Download and installation instruction is at http://www.codeplex.com/HeaderFilterAgent

This beautiful small piece of code strips all x- headers from anonymous received mail except from a white list that you can create. By only handle anonymous mail; you will allow mail between Exchange servers flow untouched.
This agent is something that help protect your databases from getting the named properties table full and you into trouble.

But what if you don't have Exchange 2007?
With Exchange 2003 or Exchange 2000 you should be able to write a SMTP transport sink that does the same thing even though it's much harder than writing managed code for Exchange 2007.
There is also KB 941060 http://support.microsoft.com/kb/941060 that doesn't say it handles namedproperties cache but it contains some other handling that decrease the problem a bit.
of course you can also put an Exchange 2007 Edge or Hub server role in front of your Exchange 2000/2003 servers and run HeaderFilterAgent on Exchange 2007