250 Hello - Messaging

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Quick Tip – Sending Multiple Test Emails Using PowerShell (AKA Mailstorm)

Posted on 30th September 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

Mailstorm.exe was a utility to send multiple test emails to validate and test Exchange in the 5.5 timeframe, and was used on some of the Microsoft Official Curriculum (MOC) courses.

The utility is no longer used since relied upon a local Outlook install, and my fuzzy brain recalls issues with moving to "current" versions of Outlook such as Office XP.

This is no great loss as it is easy to send test … Read the rest “Quick Tip – Sending Multiple Test Emails Using PowerShell (AKA Mailstorm)”

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Exchange Support For Windows Server 2012 R2

Posted on 17th September 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

Previously Windows 8.1 and Windows Server 2012 R2 were released to the TechNet subscriber download centre. Prior to Windows Server 2012 R2 being tested and validated by the Exchange Product Group, we had asked to pause deployments of 2012 R2 DCs into environments where Exchange was installed.

Exchange 2013 Service Pack 1, Exchange 2010 SP3 RU5 and Exchange 2007 SP3 RU13 were all released today, the 25… Read the rest “Exchange Support For Windows Server 2012 R2”

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Exchange Autodiscover & Lync

Posted on 11th September 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

Via this blog we have discussed the fundamentals of Exchange Autodiscover, and also issues around the Set-AutodiscoverVirtualDirectory cmdlet.

At this point the message should be out there with regards to how Outlook functions internally and externally to locate Autodiscover and the difference that having the workstation domain joined makes. Lync on the other hand is a different beastie!

Both the O… Read the rest “Exchange Autodiscover & Lync”

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Exchange RPC Client Access Service Crash

Posted on 3rd September 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

RPC Client Access is the main conduit for Outlook clients communicating to Exchange 2010. So when something happens to it, the impact can be classified as “not good”…..

While Exchange 2010 SP3 RU2 addresses issues with RPC Client Access that may be caused by RPC Client Access threads hanging on a mailbox server that is experiencing issues, there is an additional update that was recently released to … Read the rest “Exchange RPC Client Access Service Crash”

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SkipAsSource Flag Cleared In Windows 2012

Posted on 27th August 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

For a while now I’ve been using the Netsh SkipAsSource Flag to allow multiple IPs on a server and only the primary IP registers in DNS. The previous series of articles in this series are here:

… Read the rest

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Offline Defrag And DAG Databases, Oh My!

Posted on 23rd August 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

Even though some of the very old KBs, which now refer to unsupported products, state that taking databases offline to run periodic offline defragmentation with ESEUTIL is not recommended some folks in the field still want to do this.

Previously when there was only a single copy of a database, running offline defragmentation would cause minimal impact, apart from the time required to do the defragm… Read the rest “Offline Defrag And DAG Databases, Oh My!”

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How To Check Database White Space In Exchange

Posted on 20th August 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

From time to time we need to see how our Exchange databases are doing so that they are being managed proactively. One aspect is tracking size and the utilization of each database. At the simplest level we want to ensure that the database and transaction log LUNs do not run out of disk space. That would be bad.

Sometimes we want to take a peek at the database, and check that the size of the datab… Read the rest “How To Check Database White Space In Exchange”

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Exchange 2013 Security Update Available For MS13-061

Posted on 13th August 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

Update 14-8-2013: The security update for Exchange 2013 has been temporarily removed due to an issue with the search infrastructure.

If you have installed it please refer to article “Update 2874216 breaks the content index in Exchange Server 2013”

Update 14-8-2013: Please see an update on the Exchange team blog.

Update 27-8-2013: Updated release of the security update for Exchange 2013 CU1 and CU… Read the rest “Exchange 2013 Security Update Available For MS13-061”

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Exchange 2010 SP3 RU2 Released

Posted on 13th August 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

Exchange 2010 SP3 RU2 has been released to resolve the security issues described in Microsoft Security Bulletin MS13-061. Additionally Exchange 2007, Exchange 2010 SP2 and Exchange 2013 also received updates to resolve the security issues as mentioned in the MS13-061 bulletin and other product specific fixes.

Click the above image to download, or the direct download link is here.

Exchange 2010 SP3 RU2 … Read the rest “Exchange 2010 SP3 RU2 Released”

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Exchange 2010 SP2 RU7 Released

Posted on 13th August 2013 by Rhoderick Milne [MSFT]

It’s a busy day in the land of Exchange today, with updates also released for Exchange 2007, Exchange 2010 SP3, and Exchange 2013.

Exchange 2010 SP2 RU7 is now available as update 2874216.

Exchange 2010 SP2 RU7 is also released as part of Patch Tuesday to resolve the security issues that are addressed in Exchange 2007 SP3 RU11. For reference they are, CVE-2013-2393 and CVE-2013-3776 as discussed in t… Read the rest “Exchange 2010 SP2 RU7 Released”