The C-spot

Some of our users were logging helpdesk tickets complaining about some of their sent items were missing from their sent items folder.

After looking in eventviewers and message tracking logs, all emails were delivered without a problem. I tried disabling outlook-rules and using various outlook switches like cleanviews and cleanrules, only to see them vanishing from the sent items folder. 

Another odd thing was, that the sent items were only disappearing if the user requested a read receipt.

 

After troubleshooting for some hours, I found that the affected users were all using a different DelegateSentItemsStyle.  These users were sending emails on behalf of other users and wanted the sent items to appear in the mailbox of the user and not in the mailbox of the delegate.  According to MS KB articles http://support.microsoft.com/kb/953803 and http://support.microsoft.com/kb/953804 this involved installing a Outlook 2003 hotfix package and adding a registry key.  Which I configured some weeks ago for a set of users.

After some more googling I found there was a bug in the Outlook hotfix package office2003KB953803GLB.

This bug is fixed in Outlook hotfix package office2003KB959628GLB

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/959628

After installing this hotfix all new sent emails showed again in the users sent items folder.

 

Grtzzzz

/Frederik

Last June, I was very happy to be a speaker at the yearly MCT Summit Europe in Stockholm Sweden (http://www.mctsummit.eu/Speakers.aspx?ID=41). As this was such a marvelous and enriching experience for me, I’m more than happy to announce I’ve been accepted as session speaker at MCT Summit USA in San Francisco – CA (http://www.mctsummit.org), taking place 18th-21st of October.

 

As the main theme is “Microsoft Cloud”, I’ll go and present a session on “Integrating your Exchange 2010 on-premise platform with Office365”

As always, I’ll share my experiences of this event in a couple of daily update blog posts when I’m there.

So stay tuned for some news and the end of October.

See yah,

/Peter

The Microsoft Exchange Team just announced availability of RU5 this morning.

More details can be found at their website:

http://blogs.technet.com/b/exchange/archive/2011/08/23/released-update-rollup-5-for-exchange-2010-sp1.aspx

The RU6 is also announced, being available somewhere round October.

Would this mean a monthly rollup update is coming our ways as of now?

Cheers, Peter

For all instructions on how to use the Lync 2010 client (schedule meeting, change presence status, make a call…) take a look at the following website.

http://www.lynctip.be/

/Tim

After preparing the environment we are ready to start the installation of Lync 2010.

Please keep in mind that the names and ip’s are fictive in this documentation.

In this setup I choose to install Archiving and Monitoring on seperate hardware. Also keep in mind that you first have to prepare thes servers the way I described in part 1.

If you need more information or if you have questions please send an e-mail to tim.peeters@ictinus.be and I will reply or help you as soon as possible.

 

Prepare Active Directory Domain Services for Lync Server 2010

The next area for preparation is Active Directory Domain Services. Preparing AD DS for Lync Server 2010 consists of three steps:

· Schema Preparation

· Forest Preparation

· Domain Preparation

Each of these steps can be performed by using the Lync Server Deployment Wizard or the Lync Server Management Shell cmdlets directly.

 

Install Topology Builder and define Topology for Lync Front-End Pool

Now we have all of the infrastructure preparation complete, so it’s time to move on to defining the topology for Lync 2010 Enterprise Edition in Topology Builder.

1. Log on to Lync Front-End server

2. Go to Start, click All Programs, click Microsoft Lync Server 2010, and then click Lync Server Topology Builder.

3. On the Topology Builder dialog box, select the New Topology option, and then click OK.

4. On the Save New Topology As dialog box, enter a name in the File name field, and then click OK.

5. On the Define the primary domain page, enter the primary SIP domain, and then click Next.

6. On the Specify additional supported domains page, click Next.

7. On the Define the first site page, enter a site name into the Name field, enter a description into the Description field if desired, and then click Next.

8. On the Specify site details page, enter the location details, and then click Next.

9. On the New topology was successfully defined page, ensure the Open the New Front End Wizard when this wizard closes option is selected, and then click Finish.

10. The Define the New Front End Pool wizard opens. Click Next.

11. On the Define the Front End pool FQDN page, type pool1.domain.local into the Pool FQDN field, ensure the Enterprise Edition Front End Pool option is selected, and then click Next.

12. On the Define the computers in this pool page, enter lyncserver.domain.local into the Computer FQDN field, click Add, and then click Next.

13. On the Select features page, check all options you need and then click Next.

14. On the Select collocated server roles page, collocate A/V Conferencing service, and then click Next.

15. On the Associate server roles with this Front End pool page, select all options, and then click Next.

16. On the Define the SQL store page, select the Define a new SQL store option, enter the specified into the SQL Server FQDN field, ensure the SQL Instance option is selected, enter the specified name into the Named Instance field, and then click Next.

17. On the Define the file share page, select the Define a new file share option, enter the specified name into the File Server FQDN field, enter the file share name into the File Share field, and then click Next.

18. On the Specify the Web Services URL page, click Finish.

19. On the Select an Archiving Server page, click New.

20. On the Define the fully qualified domain name page, enter the specified name into the FQDN field, and then click Next.

21. On the Define the SQL store page, select the Use a previously defined SQL store option, enter the specified name into the SQL Server FQDN field.

22. On the Define the file store page, select the Use a previously defined file share option, select the the specified file share from the drop down, and then click Next.

23. On the Select an Archiving Server page, click Finish.

24. On the Select a Monitoring Server page, click New.

25. On the Define the fully qualified domain name page, enter the specified name into the FQDN field, and then click Next.

26. On the Define the SQL store page, select the Use a previously defined SQL store option, enter the specified name into the SQL Server FQDN field, and then click Finish.

27. On the Select a Monitoring Server page, click Finish.

28. You will be presented with the Lync Server 2010, Topology Builder page, which is where you can view and modify the topology that was just created.

 

/Tim

Next part (part 3) will be Publishing the Topology and Setup the Lync 2010 Front-End server and Front-End pool.

This guide will run through a consolidated Enterprise edition install (without voice gateway integration, whereby all roles will be deployed on virtual machines.

The guide will be split up in different chapters.

The first chapter is all about preparing your Lync 2010 environment.

 

Prepare the Lync 2010 Enterprise Edition Server Infrastructure

The following sections outline the step to prepare the Lync 2010 Enterprise Edition server infrastructure.

1. Set Up Enterprise Edition Hardware and System Infrastructure

2. Install Prerequisite Software

· Lync Server requires Microsoft .Net Framework 3.5 with SP1.

· Prerequisite software for database servers.

· Message Queuing. Message Queuing (also known as MSMQ) role components and Directory Service Integration should be installed on the Front End Server, the Archiving Server, and the Monitoring Server if you plan to deploy the Lync Server 2010 Archiving or Monitoring Server roles. The Message Queuing components can be found in Server Manager or can be deployed by using servermanagercmd.exe or the Add-WindowsFeature Windows PowerShell cmdlet.

· Configure IIS:

Role Heading	Role Service
Common HTTP features installed	Static content
Common HTTP features installed	Default document
Common HTTP features installed	HTTP errors
Application development	ASP.NET
Application development	.NET extensibility
Application development	Internet Server API (ISAPI) extensions
Application development	ISAPI filters
Health and diagnostics	HTTP logging
Health and diagnostics	Logging tools
Health and diagnostics	Tracing
Security	Anonymous authentication (installed and enabled by default)
Security	Windows authentication
Security	Client Certificate Mapping authentication
Security	Request filtering
Performance	Static content compression
Management Tools	IIS Management Console
Management Tools	IIS Management Scripts and Tools

· Install the Remote Server Administration Tools

· Install Silverlight

Silverlight is required to run the Lync Server Control Panel. Although we won’t be using the Control Panel until everything is installed, you can install it now since we’re installing the prerequisite software. Silverlight needs to be installed on the Front-End servers.

· Install and Configure SQL Server

Lync Server 2010 leverages SQL Server for the back-end database and the Archiving and Monitoring databases. SQL Server needs to be installed before we can install Lync Server 2010. For this lab, SQL Server 2008 with Service Pack 1 will be used, and installed on the Back End Server as well as the Monitoring/Archiving Server.

3. DNS records

Lync Server 2010 leverages DNS for various features. Certain DNS records are required as part of the infrastructure preparation. Each server within this lab will already have an A record in DNS. This is attributed to the fact that I am using Active Directory-Integrated DNS, which has Dynamic DNS enabled by default. However, there are additional DNS records that are required before we proceed, including:

pool1.domain.com	A	IP of Front End Server
admin.domain.com	A	IP of Front End Pool
sip.domain.com	A	IP of Front End Pool
_sipinternaltls._tcp.domain.com	SRV	sip.domain.com Port: 5061

4. Grant Administration Permissions

Follow these steps to grant Administration permissions:

1. Ensure you are in the Users Container in Active Directory Users and Computers.

2. In the details pane, locate the CsAdministrator group, right-click on it, and select Properties.

3. On the CsAdministrator Properties page, click on the Members tab.

4. Click Add.

5. On the Select Users, Contacts, Computers, Service Accounts, or Groups dialog box, type Administrator in the Enter the object names to select field, and then click OK.

6. On the CsAdministrator Properties page, click OK.

5. Create the Lync File Share

The user account that we will use to publish the topology must have full control (read/write/modify) on the file share in order for Topology Builder to configure the required permissions. Because I’m going with an Enterprise Edition deployment, the file share cannot be located on the Front End Server. As a result, We prefer to create the file share on the Monitoring/Archiving Server.

Log on to Lync Monitoring/Archiving server

2. Go Start, click Computer, and then click Local Disk (C:).

3. Right-click in the Details Pane, select New, and then select Folder.

4. Name the new folder LyncShare.

5. Right-click on the LyncShare folder, select Properties, click on the Sharing Tab, and then click Advanced Sharing.

6. On the Advanced Sharing dialog box, select the Share this folder option, leave the Share Name field as LyncShare.

 

/Tim

When renaming a custom addresslist in exchange 2007 through the EMC, the rename is not visible in the addressbook.  This is because the addressbooks in Outlook use the DisplayName. 

Solution: Change the DisplayName of the addresslist with PowerShell.

Get-addresslist “name” | set-addresslist –Displayname “name”

 

Another happy day in Powerhell

/Frederik

When installing Lync at a customer on Server 2008 R2 SP1, the installation failed with the following error while adding the first Lync Server Components:

Problem: The Lync Server 2010 Setup or Remove Component installation prerequisite check cannot locate the  Server 2008 R2 SP1 version of Microsoft Windows Media Format.

Use the command line listed below from a command prompt window to install Windows Media Format Runtime for Server 2008 R2 SP1 before you begin the installation of Lync Server 2010:

%systemroot%\system32\dism.exe /online /add-package /packagepath:%windir%\servicing\Packages\Microsoft-Windows-Media-Format-Package~31bf3856ad364e35~amd64~~6.1.7601.17514.mum /ignorecheck

 /Tim

After installing Lync at one of our customers we experienced the following problem when the user was trying to log in.

When I try to make the remote sign-in with the appropriate credentials, Lync reports me “Cannot sign in to Lync. Lync was unable to sign in. Please verify your logon credentials. But it only happened on Windows XP/Windows 7 machines.

When I try to sign-in using the same credentials and Windows 2008 R2 as the client, Lync is signin in!

TheLync server was running Windows 2008 R2. With Windows 7 and Windows 2008 R2, 128-bit encryption is (by default) required for all NTLM authentication requests. After disabling the 128-bit encryption requirement using information from http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd566199(WS.10).aspx and running a gpupdate the computer was able to authenticate successfully.

/Tim