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February 2005 - Posts

Monday, February 28, 2005 5:25 PM

C550 - The next Smartphone from Orange?

I really really *love* my smartphone.  I take it everywhere and do most of my email triage on it. I'm lost without it,  so I was really pleased to see rumours of the next Smartphone appearing in Marcus' blog this morning.  Then
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Monday, February 28, 2005 2:50 PM

TechNet Webcast: Managing Exchange 2003 with MOM 2005

I really wanted to highlight the time of this webcast again, as this management pack for Exchange puts all of the bells and whistles onto Exchange that the old Resource kit tools used to, back in the days of Exchange 4.0 and 5.0.  Take time to have
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Friday, February 25, 2005 12:28 PM

BlogCast: Configuring the Active Directory connector

Whenever I present at TechNet events I get questions on how to deploy the ADC so that the Exchange 5.5 Server coexists with AD.  There is a comprehensive walkthrough in the Exchange Deployment guide showing how this is done, and I've also
posted by Eileen_Brown | (Comments Off)
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Thursday, February 24, 2005 4:54 PM

mailbox size reports for Exchange 2003

Paul mailed me after my TechNet presentation to ask if we had any solutions for producing statistics for mailbox usage, size of mailboxes etc. He'd had a look around and had a look at Quest MessageStats but was asking if we had anything that would do
posted by Eileen_Brown | 3 Comments
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Wednesday, February 23, 2005 5:20 PM

Exchange 2003 error 1018

I received a mail from Ed today who had attended my TechNet session.  He wanted to know if I had any ideas about the errors he was getting in his Exchange 2003 server.  Information Store (6116) First Storage Group: The database page read from
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Wednesday, February 23, 2005 12:20 PM

Exchange 2003 Troubleshooting and Disaster Recovery

here are the links I referred to during my TechNet presentation last night.  I've also included the link the a previous blog entry about hardware failure and recovery.  here's the link to the BlogCast on the Recovery storage group also
posted by Eileen_Brown | 5 Comments
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Tuesday, February 22, 2005 5:09 PM

Checklist for upgrading to SMS 2003 SP1

Systems Management Server (SMS) 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1) Upgrade Checklist This document outlines the steps you should take to upgrade from Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS) 2003 to Microsoft SMS 2003 Service Pack 1 (SP1).  For a complete
posted by Eileen_Brown | 2 Comments
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Monday, February 21, 2005 6:03 PM

Video conversations on your Pocket PC

I was having a look at some of the fantastic stuff to come out of Microsoft research today and I came across this prototype that they've released called Microsoft Portrait.  So now you can have a video conversation with a buddy from your buddy list
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Friday, February 18, 2005 7:33 PM

BlogCast: Populating Active Directory using the Active Directory Migration Tool (ADMT)

I've been asked a few questions on the ADMT recently and how well it works in Exchange 5.5 upgrade scenarios, so I've created a blogcast on how Active Directory is populated using the tool.  This blogcast is 1mb and runs for 6mins 30 seconds.
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Thursday, February 17, 2005 4:58 PM

Exchange Error 0X8004010F - The Operation failed. An Object could not be found

Funny isn't it?  Exchange errors are like buses. Nothing for ages and ages and then 2 come along at the same time.  I was doing a Q&A for an customer in Education yesterday.  They have lots of schools in their care, and were upgrading from
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Thursday, February 17, 2005 2:26 PM

Windows mobile white papers

I found this collection of White Papers and Strategy papers about Windows mobile in the Enterprise, and thought that they were worth sharing.  Mobile E-mail access for the Enterprise Windows Mobile based Devices and Security Pocket PC Systems
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Wednesday, February 16, 2005 4:58 PM

SMS and MOM Webcasts for March

TechNet Webcast: Using the SMS 2003 Administrator Feature Pack (Level 200) Thursday, March 17, 2005 - 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM Pacific Time Wally Mead, Program Manager, SMS, Microsoft The Microsoft Systems Management Server (SMS) 2003 Administration Feature
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Wednesday, February 16, 2005 4:53 PM

Exchange Webcasts for March

TechNet Webcast: How Microsoft IT Does Storage Design In Exchange Scale Up Deployments (Level 200) Tuesday, March 01, 2005 - 8:00 AM - 9:00 AM Pacific Time Dave Lalor, Senior IT Operations Engineer, Microsoft This webcast will examine the storage design
posted by Eileen_Brown | 3 Comments
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Wednesday, February 16, 2005 4:47 PM

Office Webcasts for March

Discover Today’s Office: Learn tips and tricks for increased productivityLive and on-demand webcasts available now Discover how to get the most out of Microsoft Office System to save time and be more productive. Tune in to these live and on-demand webcasts
posted by Eileen_Brown | (Comments Off)
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Wednesday, February 16, 2005 4:40 PM

Real Time Collaboration webcasts for March

Real-Time Collaboration: Enable next-generation productivity Live and on-demand webcasts available now Learn how Microsoft Office Live Meeting and Microsoft Office Communications Server 2005 provide an extensible, real-time collaboration solution that
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Tuesday, February 15, 2005 2:58 PM

Technical Roadshow 2005 - UK dates.

We've just released the dates and locations for the UK Technical Roadshow this year.  I'll be presenting at each location talking about Exchange (Day 1) and Live Communications Server (Day 2).  Here are the links for registration: Agenda Topics.
posted by Eileen_Brown | 5 Comments
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Tuesday, February 15, 2005 2:28 PM

BlogCast: The Intelligent Message Filter

Ewan has really got into the spirit of blogcasting and has done some amazing recordings for me which I'll be posting over the coming weeks.  Todays blogcast is about the IMF. Thanks Ewan, you're doing a really fantastic job with these.. It’s an overview
posted by Eileen_Brown | 4 Comments
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Tuesday, February 15, 2005 1:33 PM

MSI tools for SMS 2003

Details of an upcoming Webcast... Web-Seminar: New Tools for SMS 2003 Admins in using the Windows Installer Service More and more customers are using MSI as their standard installer technology on Windows.  This session will cover some new free tools
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, February 15, 2005 1:31 PM

MOM 2005 Management Pack for ISA Server - now available

The ISA Server Management Pack monitors ISA Server events and alerts. With detailed alert information you can quickly identify and troubleshoot ISA Server issues, minimizing time-to-resolution when problems occur. Collect and analyze performance trends
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Tuesday, February 15, 2005 1:23 PM

MOM and SMS documentation - does it meet your needs?

The documentation teams doe MOM 2005 and SMS 2003 want to know what you think about the documentation for the management products.  Take this 15 minute survey - and tell them how well the documentation meets your requirements.   
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Monday, February 14, 2005 5:38 PM

Exchange Best Practices Analyser - the Virtual Consultant in your organisation

I went to a TechNet evening hosted by Paul and Brett on the Exchange Best Practices Analyser (ExBPA).  What a wealth of information this tool gives.  You know how frustrating it is when you call technical support with the problem you've
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Monday, February 14, 2005 11:17 AM

Nokia licenses Exchange Active Sync

I noticed this post  from the Windows Mobile Team this morning about Nokias plans to license Exchange Active Sync for synchronisation between Exchange and Nokia series 60 and series 80 devices.  Fantastic! So now there's another good reason
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Friday, February 11, 2005 10:53 AM

BlogCast: Customising themes in OWA

I was over in Seattle in January at dinner with some of the Exchange team, and over a glass or two of Merlot, I managed to persuade Kristian to do this really cool blogcast for me.  It runs for 8 minutes, is 3mb in size and demos how to change
posted by Eileen_Brown | 6 Comments
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Friday, February 11, 2005 10:27 AM

Migrating to Exchange 2003?

If you're thinking about migrating or upgrading to Exchange 2003, why don't you have a go at these 90 minute hands on guided lab sessions?  There are 7 Exchange Modules: Controlling Junk e-mail with Exchange 2003 and the Intelligent Message
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Thursday, February 10, 2005 5:21 PM

LCS 2003 hotfixes

If you're deploying LCS 2003 and want to know all of the current hotfixes available - I've listed them here.  All of the supporting documentation for LCS 2003 is here. KB833331 - Updated scripting files available to migrate from Exchange 2000 Server
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Thursday, February 10, 2005 5:09 PM

How to find the size of mailboxes on Exchange Server

John P is trying to consolidate his Exchange 2000 servers and migrate to Exchange 2003.  He's also looking at implementing a SAN for the consolidated mailboxes.  I found this useful KB article which shows how you can programatically obtain the
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Thursday, February 10, 2005 3:48 PM

Hotmail Statistics

I've enjoyed reading Mikes blog for a while - its how I found him and persuaded him to present at our internal event last month, but he knew about me already due to the referrals from one of my previous entries.  He's categorised on my RSS reader
posted by Eileen_Brown | 5 Comments
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Thursday, February 10, 2005 2:42 PM

Common ports used by Exchange

I can never remember most of the ports that Exchange uses - apart from Ports 25(SMTP), 389 (LDAP) and 443(SSL) which seemed to be burned into my brain somehow.  It's funny, as I used to be able to remember almost all of the ports in the file in NT4's
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Wednesday, February 09, 2005 4:37 PM

Developing Applications for Pocket PC

If you're intrerested in developing applications for a Pocket PC then these new articles have been released on to the MSDN Library:  How to Create a Database Browser Application for Pocket PC in C# by Using Visual Studio .NET 2003http://msdn.microsoft.com/library/default.asp?url=/library/en-us/dnppc2k3/html/intro_winmobile_csharp.asp?frame=true
posted by Eileen_Brown | 10 Comments
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Wednesday, February 09, 2005 3:37 PM

MOM 2005 Management Pack Documentation for Active Directory in French, German and Japanese

Now released: This document provides a detailed technical reference for Active Directory Management Pack (ADMP) for Microsoft Operations Manager (MOM) 2005.  ADMP is designed for administrators who are responsible for maintaining a healthy Active
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Wednesday, February 09, 2005 3:30 PM

MMS 2005 in Las Vegas - registration open

Ron and Rod have been blogging about MMS for a while now and Martin has been tracking the event and questions.  If you haven't registered - here's the link.  There is also a one day pre-event for SI's.  here's the text: Announcing One Day
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Wednesday, February 09, 2005 1:49 PM

Protecting messaging from viruses and spam.

I talk a lot about the anti spam and anti virus features in Exchange whenever I present about messaging security at events, so I was intewrested to read that we had signed definitive agreements to acquire Sybari software. Customers are always interested
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Tuesday, February 08, 2005 10:44 AM

BlogCast: Exchange 2003 Deployment tools

My BlogCast today talks about the Deployment tools available for Exchange 2003 which walk you through the upgrade to Exchange 2003, either from Exchange 5.5 or 2000.  You can download the tools and the associated documentation from here.  The
posted by Eileen_Brown | 3 Comments
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Monday, February 07, 2005 2:34 PM

Clustered Exchange 2003 Servers

I've been meaning to blog about Exchange and clustering for some time now, and have flagged a few resources ready to include.  Usually a comment from a customer, or someone I meet at an event usually provides me with the impetus to start writing. 
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Monday, February 07, 2005 2:00 PM

SMS - how the client calculates network saturation

I was looking through the SMS 2003 Planning guide from the documentation library.  I was looking for references to slow networks and how the client worked out whether the network bandwidth was saturated or not.  I found this interesting
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Friday, February 04, 2005 4:27 PM

MSN Search for blogs

I followed the instructions exactly and now you can search my blog.  And it worked. Totally amazing.....(I cant write code!) Thank you VERY much Evan.      
posted by Eileen_Brown | (Comments Off)
Friday, February 04, 2005 2:23 PM

Exchange 2003 Intelligent Message Filter (IMF) updates

There is an update to the IMF with improved filters available.  Download it here.  I'd been searching for it on the web, and found it from the TechNet "whats new" page... Great link!  
posted by Eileen_Brown | 2 Comments
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Friday, February 04, 2005 2:13 PM

TechNet - What's new

This is a fantastic link to all of the new stuff thats gone up onto the TechNet website with links to previous additions to the site.  Now can we have one on Microsoft.com please. What a time saving link.  Thanks TechNet team!   
posted by Eileen_Brown | 2 Comments
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Friday, February 04, 2005 1:40 PM

How to secure your SMS 2003 environment

How to get secure and stay secure with SMS 2003 (updated for SP1 also).  An evolving subject - not a set and forget option.  I was reading through the KB article as I'd been playing around with ExtADsch.exe  and messed up my security
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Friday, February 04, 2005 12:39 PM

Optimising your Storage architecture for Exchange 2003

Yes we all know that Exchange likes I/O, lots of it.  And I've been telling customers for ages, spindles spindles spindles whilst waving my finger in the air knowledgeably, and chatting confidently about LUNs and SANS.  Well, I've found this
posted by Eileen_Brown | 1 Comments
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Friday, February 04, 2005 12:02 PM

Exchange 2003 messaging security

I was reading a dicsussion thread about a customer who has an interesting problem concenring messaging security in Exchange:  They needed to find information on how to use Window 2003 Certificate Authority to auto install digital certificates
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Friday, February 04, 2005 11:42 AM

Live Communications Server 2005 - Chinese simplified and Korean

I was chatting to a customer yesterday who still use Exchange IM in their organisation and is reluctant to move to LCS.  They're quite a large organisation who had been toying with hosted services.  I'd been through all of the differences between
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Thursday, February 03, 2005 6:29 PM

Applying Exchange service packs

I've been building an Exchange 2003 server for an event that I'm doing in a couple of weeks time, and going round and round the loop of service packs and hotfixes. Grrr.   I noticed this kb article detailing how to apply service packs
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Wednesday, February 02, 2005 3:33 PM

New to email?

No, most of us aren't.  It really seems to be the ball and chain that keeps us tied to our desks doesn't it - unless we're really disciplined (how can I be desciplined when that piece of toast pops up in Outlook 2003 with an interesting
posted by Eileen_Brown | 3 Comments
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Wednesday, February 02, 2005 2:52 PM

Do you want a career as an Outlook Web Access developer at Microsoft?

Kent has published a post looking for an OWA developer to  work in Redmond, USA.  Have a look at his blog entry. I've been excited about OWA since I discovered that you could customise the look and feel of the interface, and Kristian had
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Tuesday, February 01, 2005 5:28 PM

BlogCast: Removing an Orphan ntdsDSA Object from Active Directory

I’ve finally been persuaded to record my own blogcast instead of persuading Ewan to talk for me.  I’ve been asking my colleagues in the product team if they’d like to do some blogcasts, and they've told me that they'd be glad to – but only after
posted by Eileen_Brown | 3 Comments
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Tuesday, February 01, 2005 3:19 PM

Using SMS 2003 for hardware inventory of your Dell

I've been scanning through my mails whilst preparing to record my next blogcast and noticed that we've released a new tool that scans Dell servers and is now available for download.  Here's the blurb...if you haven't noticed it already on Jonathan
posted by Eileen_Brown | 3 Comments
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