You can download the RTM here.

As previously announced, the major features for this update focus on the following areas:

• A “Hybrid Configuration Wizard” (HCW) – which is used to guide administrators through the Office 365 Rich Coexistence setup.  BTW, you’ll notice Microsoft actually no longer uses the phrase “Rich Coexistence”, but instead prefers “hybrid” configuration.

• Address Book Policies (ABP) – which allow an Exchange organization to segment the address list so that separate user populations can be hidden from each other (such as in a multi-tenant environment).  Here is an article that describes how this works, as well as another discussing some of the limitations.

• Cross-Site Silent Redirection for OWA – which allows more seamless OWA redirection in a multi-site topology.

• OWA Mini – which provides a text-only OWA experience so that you can use OWA from phones that do not support ActiveSync.

Here are some other fun facts:

• Exchange 2010 SP2 extends the schema.  One interesting change is the new msExchExtensionAttribute attributes.  We’ve had 15 custom attributes for a while now, but this adds 30 more, all of which are multi-valued.  For your reference, Microsoft tracks Exchange schema extensions on this page.

• Administrators can now disable the auto-mapping of user mailboxes in Outlook 2007/2010.  This may be helpful if a user has the “Full Access” permission to many other mailboxes.  By default, Outlook will try to mount all of them which could cause performance issues.

• You’ll need to add the “IIS 6 WMI Compatibility” component if you are upgrading from RTM or SP1.  A fresh install would offer to add this for you, but if you’re upgrading, you’ll need add it yourself.  You can easily add the IIS role service with the following two PowerShell commands:
       Import-Module servermanager
      Add-WindowsFeature Web-WMI

• On some new hardware, I clocked the upgrade at ~22 minutes.  Ironically, Exchange Update Rollups often take longer than this!

• There are many new Wiki pages discussing the features of SP2.  Use these until formal TechNet documentation is available.
• UPDATE: TechNet documentation is here: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/hh529924.aspx

Planet Technologies is hosting a free webcast in which we will be providing some tips, insights and updates on Office 365 and Exchange Online.

If you’re interested in attending, or would like to read the agenda, please see the registration page below.

-REGISTER NOW-

About Planet Technologies

Planet Technologies, a leading Microsoft partner with multiple gold competencies, is recognized world-wide  as a leading expert in the integration and customization of Microsoft technologies, architecture, security and  management consulting. Planet’s clients include some of the largest public sector and  commercial  organizations  in the world.

Learn more at www.go-planet.com

Below are some screenshots of my experiences and insights along the way:

Before you start: Read and follow the instructions!  In this article, I assume you’re at the point where you’re actually ready to install this product.

1. First I installed the .Net Framework prerequisites as well as my favorite MMC snap-ins onto a new Windows 2008 R2 server. You can do this using the following two lines in PowerShell	Import-Module ServerManager Add-WindowsFeature NET-Framework,RSAT-ADDS -Restart
2. Then I ran dirsync.exe (downloaded from the portal.microsoftonline.com site). a. NOTE: Microsoft didn’t bother to change the installer’s executable name (dirsync.exe). This may be confusing if you plan to download and store both x86 and x64 versions.
3. A few clicks of the “Next” button…
a. NOTE: We install to the “Program Files” directory. If this were a x86 application we’d be using “\Program Files (x86)”
b. NOTE: This screen may take 5-10 minutes. It’s installing a few things in the background: i. SQL 2008 R2 Express ii. Forefront Identity Manager 2010 (FIM) iii. Configuration of the FIM Management Agents (MAs)
…
4. Once the background tasks have completed, you’re able to run the Configuration Wizard. This is where you will need to have your Office 365 tenant prepared and credentials identified, etc.
5. Next…
6. You should have created this account earlier. Whatever you put in here will be stored within FIM, and if you ever change the credentials, you’ll need to re-run this setup wizard.
a. Or for the expert user: Dive into FIM directly
7. Here you need to supply your forest’s Enterprise Admin credentials. This username is not saved anywhere, and is only needed once to set permissions for these new objects: a. Yourdomain\MSOL_AD_Sync b. Yourdomain\MSOL_AD_Sync_RichCoexistence
8. Selecting this box enables some extra features required for a “hybrid deployment” / “rich coexistence”, and by doing so you’ll allow FIM to update attributes IN YOUR Active Directory. If this box is not checked, FIM will read-only.
9. Next..
10. If you’re ready, you can run the initial full synchronization now. Otherwise, you can run it manually at any time. a. Once configured, DirSync runs every 3 hours.
11. If you promise to be careful, you can poke around in the FIM configuration. a. Note the “hidden” client UI b. If you get an error when opening the FIM console, log out and then back in. Your account was added to some groups that are not yet part of your login ticket. c. Clicking the Management Agents tab shows both sides of your configuration. “TargetWebService” is responsible for all of the Office 365 configurations and the “SourceAD” management agent contains your Active Directory connector information (double-click them to open). NOTE: Changing the DirSync configuration directly within FIM is unsupported by Microsoft. They would prefer you rerun the previously mentioned Configuration Wizard if you need to make any changes.	C:\Program Files\Microsoft Online Directory Sync\SYNCBUS\Synchronization Service\UIShell\miisclient.exe
12. Finally, be sure to run Microsoft Update again. You’ll notice that SQL 2008 R2 does not have SP1.

Filed under: Office365 Tagged: Microsoft, Office365 ]]> http://mikecrowley.wordpress.com/2011/11/21/office-365-dirsync-x64-installation-walkthrough/feed/ 1 mikecrowley DirSync Install Screenshots DirSync Install Screenshots DirSync Install Screenshots DirSync Install Screenshots DirSync Install Screenshots DirSync Install Screenshots Directory Synchronization Configuration Wizard Screenshots Directory Synchronization Configuration Wizard Screenshots Directory Synchronization FIM Management Agent Directory Synchronization Configuration Wizard Screenshots Directory Synchronization Configuration Wizard Screenshots Directory Synchronization Configuration Wizard Screenshots clip_image027 Smile Unable to connect to the Synchronization Service Directory Synchronization FIM Management Agents Download Service Pack 1 for Microsoft® SQL Server® 2008 R2 http://mikecrowley.wordpress.com/2011/11/17/a-new-version-of-office-365s-directory-synchronization-tool-has-arrived/ http://mikecrowley.wordpress.com/2011/11/17/a-new-version-of-office-365s-directory-synchronization-tool-has-arrived/#comments Thu, 17 Nov 2011 23:42:46 +0000 Mike Crowley https://mikecrowley.wordpress.com/?p=739 ]]> Most medium and large organizations using Microsoft’s Office 365 service will also be using “DirSync” to provision and manage user identities. Until now, DirSync has been based on ILM 2007 FP1, which is a functional, but older application, with no x64 support. This means when installing DirSync onto a server, you had to go out of your way to deploy the Windows Server 2008 operating system since the Server 2008 R2 OS is x64 only.

ILM was replaced by Forefront Identity Manager (FIM) 2010, which uses the x64 CPU architecture and as therefore Windows Server 2008 R2 as well. 

Today (finally), Microsoft announced DirSync can now be downloaded for use with the 64-bit architecture.  This is great news for new Office 365 customers – no more legacy software needed.  However, this does raise a question for existing DirSync users: How do we migrate?

You should check out the announcement for details, but essentially, you reformat and rebuild.  Wait!  Before you start muttering nasty things about Microsoft – the new installation of DirSync will find all of the identities currently in Office 365 and match them up with the appropriate Active Directory accounts in your environment.  There is no downtime for the users. 

As promised, I have uploaded the slides. You can download them here:

• EXC22_Exchange_Online_Administration
• EXC23_Exchange_Online_Understanding_Archiving_and_Compliance

If you’re looking for slides from other presenters, you can find them here:

• http://www.devconnections.com/updates/LasVegas_Fall11/Exchange

http://press.rim.com/release.jsp?id=5261

Thanks to everyone who follows this blog and attends my Exchange Connections sessions; its because of you I am able to wear this badge of honor for another year.

Needless to say:

The strict support statement, combined with Microsoft’s release of Office 365 really came as a one-two punch to some of the smaller companies who wished to host Exchange but could not afford to employ developers and/or take the risk of forfeiting support from Microsoft.  It seemed like Microsoft may have lost some love for their hosting partners.

With the Exchange 2010 SP2 update (scheduled to launch later this year), you will be able to host a multi-tenant environment with a regular deployment of Exchange.  This is made possible by the new Address Book Policies and specific configurations to be documented with the SP2 release.

Personally, I’d look at this very carefully before deploying any new /hosting environments.  This (SP2) seems like a much simpler deployment to maintain.

Before I get into the steps themselves let’s take a look at one of the simulators, which is based on Blackberry OS 7 device software:

You should know this software is free!  You can download it here after you complete the registration.

Once you run through the application setup, you’re greeted with this intuitive interface

———>

Within, you can do all softs of fun things such as navigate the menus, take screenshots, simulate use of the touchscreen, compass and more.

What we’re after today however is Enterprise Activation (the process of associating the handheld with a Blackberry Enterprise Server).

Initially, I was discouraged to see Enterprise Activation was not working via the normal process:

But after some research I learned it can be completed via simulating a USB connection to the BAS interface instead.

To accomplish this, follow the below steps:

(Click images to enlarge)

1. Launch the simulator. You may need to resize the screen and click through a few pop-ups to get to the device’s main screen.
2. From the Simulate menu button, select USB Cable Connected.
3. From the same computer, launch the BAS web site. Accept certificate warnings and install ActiveX CAB files as prompted. Depending on your browser configuration you may need to adjust the security settings.	The default URL is: https://server.domain.local:443/webconsole/login (Bad)
4. You can verify the device is properly connected by expanding the Devices menu tree on the left and selecting Device properties.
5. Before you can begin the  EA process, you need to create a user. Select a user from your directory that does not currently have a Blackberry device. To do this, expand the BlackBerry solution management menu tree on the left and select Create a user. 6. Once on this screen, simply select Search from the right. It will pull up all of the users in your Exchange Server environment.
7. Select a test user and click Continue.
8. On the following screen, select Create a user without activation password.
9. Expand the Devices menu tree on the left and select Manage current device.
10. Select Assign the current device to a user.
11. Click Search once again and select the test user. 12. Click Associate user.
13. Once complete, notice a new envelope icon on the simulator (covered with a briefcase). This represents the new EA relationship.
14. Touch the new envelope and compose a test message.
15. Verify it reached its destination and that the message was saved to your test user’s Sent Items folder.

And we’re done! I hope this was helpful.

Or heck, maybe it’s just been a while since you’ve been to Vegas? 

Join me and other Microsoft enthusiasts at the DEVCONNECTIONS conference this fall!  This semiannual event covers many tracks from Visual Studio to Exchange Server to Microsoft’s hot new cloud products: Azure and Office 365.

In addition to attending some great sessions, I will also be presenting on two topics:

Sign up here, and use the SPKR discount code to save $50.

And if that’s not incentive enough, I’ll close by reminding you that Halloween in Las Vegas should prove to be very interesting…

It seems that Microsoft has finally created a way to upload pictures to the forums!  No more feeling around in the dark, trying to guess what’s wrong.

As the seasoned forum participants will tell you, this isn’t entirely new.  You’ve always been able to add an image if it was hosted by another site via editing the thread’s HTML manually, but the introduction of this button will now allow you to store images with Microsoft; no 3rd party site needed.  And more importantly, this will allow anyone to upload a screenshot.

Once you upload an image, there are controls to drag it into place, as well as controls to resize.

I’m curious to see how this goes.  While I think it’s a needed addition, I would imagine there is a high risk of abuse, or worse, administrators accidently exposing sensitive information about their environments.

Do you use the TechNet forums?  If no, why not?  What other forums do you like?

The long awaited release of Microsoft Office 365 has arrived. Now what? As nice as it would be to flip a switch and perform your migration, we all know the process is a bit more involved. So, how do you get there from here?

Join Planet and Microsoft experts who’ve been in the trenches participating in thousands of migrations to O365 to date. In this one hour interactive roundtable, they’ll share insights into:

• Lessons learned from the early Beta adopters regarding the biggest challenges and hurdles to deployment
• The critical need to address the underlying health of your Active Directory PRIOR to migration, and specific steps for cleaning up your environment
• Security issues and features
• Realistic migration timeline expectations
• A head-to-head analysis of O365 and the competition

There is no cost to participate but space is limited so register today!

REGISTER NOW

About Planet Technologies

Planet Technologies is recognized world-wide as a leading expert in the integration and customization of Microsoft technologies, architecture, security and management consulting.  We offer Microsoft based solutions around business intelligence, CRM, collaboration and messaging, cloud services, desktop deployment, SharePoint solutions, unified communications, virtualization and more. Visit us a www.go-planet.com

If you haven’t seen this tool, you should definitely check it out:

http://www.TestExchangeConnectivity.com (or the short link: http://exrca.com)

Last week, Microsoft updated this tool to include support for Office 365.  While you wouldn’t actually be troubleshooting Microsoft’s Exchange environment, this new tab allows you to validate your URLs and configurations related to the “Rich-Coexistence” scenario.

Another interesting fact: Microsoft announced plans to incorporate other products into this tool, beyond Exchange Server. 

For a complete list of changes in this version, see the release notes.

List of all Office 2010 SP1 packages

There are 3 primary enhancements for Outlook 2010 (Who uses Word and Excel anyway ):

• Outlook 2010 SP1 includes Office 365 support.
• Outlook 2010 SP1 can be set to always use the default sending account.
• Fixes an issue in which the snooze time does not between appointments.

You can see the complete list of fixes (on all of the Office 2010 products) via KB 2460049.

Once the installation finished, I was a bit concerned because I didn’t see “SP1” appended to the version number, but after clicking “Additional Version and Copyright Information” I was reassured:

As you can see version Service Pack 1 is “14.0.6023.1000”

http://www.microsoft.com/presspass/press/2011/jun11/06-28MSOffice365PR.mspx

This is not just another product announcement.  If your work is to support Microsoft technologies, this is something you must learn about…

Recently, I had a chance to chat with Richard Campbell and Greg Hughes on the popular RunAS Radio Show.  The topic was Information Rights Management and how it relates to Exchange Server.  This was also a feature I demonstrated on stage at the Exchange Connections event in Orlando earlier this year. 

If you’re not sure what IRM is or does, or if you wish to learn more about it, be sure to tune in on May 4th to listen to show #210!

www.runasradio.com

Microsoft released an updated version today which adds this support.  You can download it here:

Remote Server Administration Tools for Windows 7 with Service Pack 1 (SP1)

Comodo CEO Melih Abdulhayoglu calls the breach the certificate authority’s version of the September 11th terror attacks!

If you’re running Windows you need to apply this patch immediately.

http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=2524375

If you’re using Mac or Linux, this affects you too, however I do not have links for you at this time.

1. Microsoft’s Hosted Exchange (BPOS / Office 365) will offer free Blackberry licenses (provided you’re already paying for your mailbox)
2. RIM will soon offer a cloud-based BES service

Read more here:

http://community.office365.com/enus/office365/b/microsoft_office_365_blog/archive/2011/03/16/office-365-and-blackberry.aspx

IE9 released to the Microsoft Download Center tonight:

Windows Vista / Server 2008:

• Windows Internet Explorer 9 for Windows Vista 64-bit Edition and Windows Server 2008 64-bit Edition
• Windows Internet Explorer 9 for Windows Vista and Windows Server 2008 (x86)

Windows 7 / Server 2008 R2:

• Windows Internet Explorer 9 for Windows 7 64-bit Edition and Windows Server 2008 R2 64-bit Edition
• Windows Internet Explorer 9 for Windows 7 (x86)

I’ve been using this for a while and after getting over a few bumps and learning curves, I can now say I really like it!

Read more about it here: http://microsoft.com/ie