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IIS SMTP Virtual Server Component No Longer Supported

IIS SMTP Component Not Supported

Please consider this a quick PSA (Public Service Announcement) as it is still common that I run into environments with the IIS SMTP service still running and processing mail.

While the component has had a long and interesting life, it is now unsupported as it is tied to the support lifecycle of Windows Server 2003.

For more details and information please see:

How to: Install and Configure SMTP VirtuaRead the rest “IIS SMTP Virtual Server Component No Longer Supported”

0

Why Is The Exchange Security Update Not Installed?

The issue of "Why is the Exchange Security Update not installed?" has popped up frequently over the last few months due to the number of security releases for on-premises Exchange.

Due to Hafnium, security teams have increased the monitoring of Exchange to make sure that it is fully patched.  In some of these cases, the Exchange and server admins think that they are all good as they run Windows Upd… Read the rest “Why Is The Exchange Security Update Not Installed?”

6

Unable To Renew Exchange Certificate – Friendly Name Is Too Long

Your Exchange certificate is about to expire, so you initiate a standard process to renew it.  It's only a 5 minute job as that's how long it took last time, right?

Well, no.  All is fine until you try to renew the existing certificate.  The easiest way to initiate the renewal is by using the Renew option in the Exchange Admin Center.

The current certificate is the one selected in the below screensho… Read the rest “Unable To Renew Exchange Certificate – Friendly Name Is Too Long”

0

Add Domain to Azure, What Is Its EXO Status?

Add Domain To Azure AD - What Is The Domain Type in Exchange Online

A recent discussion revolved around adding domains to Azure, and how that would manifest iteslf in Office 365 and Azure.  This was a customer where one set of admins was focused on Azure and others on Office 365 and they did not interact much.

Lab Starting Configuration

You will note that initially there are three domains shown in Exchange Online portal.  One is a custom vanity domain - tailspintoysRead the rest “Add Domain to Azure, What Is Its EXO Status?”

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Exchange 2016 CU22 and Exchange 2019 CU11 Setup Changes

With the release of this month's Exchange updates, there are changes to not only the installation prerequisites but also the installation parameters.

These changes break down into two main areas.  What you must ensure is installed prior to installing this or a subsequent CU, and secondly that the command line options have been updated along with the corresponding GUI.

To summarise:

  • IIS URL rewrite mo
Read the rest “Exchange 2016 CU22 and Exchange 2019 CU11 Setup Changes”
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Exchange 2019 CU11 Released

Exchange 2019 CU11 has been released to the Microsoft Volume Licensing Center and the public Microsoft Download site!  Exchange 2019 has a different servicing strategy than Exchange 2007/2010 and utilises Cumulative Updates (CUs) rather than the Rollup Updates (RU/UR) which were used previously.    CUs are a complete installation of Exchange 2019 and can be used to install a fresh server or to upd… Read the rest “Exchange 2019 CU11 Released”

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Exchange 2016 CU22 Released

Exchange 2016 CU22 has been released to the Microsoft download centre!  Exchange 2016 has a different servicing strategy than Exchange 2007/2010 and utilises Cumulative Updates (CUs) rather than the Rollup Updates (RU/UR) which were used previously.    CUs are a complete installation of Exchange 2016 and can be used to install a fresh server or to update a previously installed one. Exchange 2013 h… Read the rest “Exchange 2016 CU22 Released”

0

Exchange Online Transport Rule Audit

Impact Of Not Enabling ETR Audit

This is a topic that still comes up when doing email investigations.  After there has been an issue, we want to perform analysis to determine what may have happened any potentially why certain security controls did not act the way we expected.

With email one example would be around the audit information collected when an Exchange Online transport rule acts upon a message.

It is common to see that ad… Read the rest “Exchange Online Transport Rule Audit”

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Is Exchange Fully Updated? If Not, Go Update Now

The Exchange team just posted that the September 2021 updates are going to be slightly delayed.  The priority will always be to ship quality updates rather than force it out to meet a specific day.

You can look at the announcement, and Nino's additional comments here:

Delay of September 2021 Cumulative Update for Exchange Server - Microsoft Tech Community

This means that we have a little bit more tim… Read the rest “Is Exchange Fully Updated? If Not, Go Update Now”

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Unable to Prepare Schema For Exchange Server 2019–Forest Functional Level

Imagine that you have spent weeks planning for your upgrade to Exchange 2019.  There are no unsupported down-level versions of Exchange, only Exchange 2016 is present.  Those pesky public folders were also taken out behind the farmer's shed never to return.  That only taken 15 or so years, but hey life is a journey...

 

Imagine your surprise when you go to perform step #1 which is extending the… Read the rest “Unable to Prepare Schema For Exchange Server 2019–Forest Functional Level”