After installing Exchange Server 2007 with Client Access Server or Unified Messaging roles some of you might have noticed a new process - MSExchangeFDS.exe started. This is the Microsoft Exchange File Distribution Service, and it takes care of two independent Read More

Over time, several people have inquired about the differences between the "Delete Mailbox" and "Remove Exchange Attributes" functionality in Exchange 2000/2003. Note: The Remove Exchange Attributes option only appears in the Exchange Tasks wizard within Read More

In this post I'll talk a bit about the legacy Recipient Update Service (RUS) and explain the changes made to it for Exchange Server 2007.   Recipient Update Service   The Recipient Update Service was introduced in Exchange 2000 to discover Read More

Beginning with Exchange Server 2003 SP1, there are two methods for moving mailboxes depending on the organization mode in which your Exchange environment is operating. If you are in mixed mode, the Move Mailbox Task will present you with two options: Read More

Exchange 2003 servers can benefit from an Active Directory design that utilizes site architecture to isolate Exchange.  This is best achieved through creating a dedicated Active Directory site which contains both Exchange 2003 servers and Global Read More

We've seen a few issues recently where members of DGs (Distribution Groups) in mixed-mode Exchange 200x and 5.5 seem to randomly and mysteriously disappear. We thought we'd share one known root-cause and also show you how to prevent the problem while Read More

Lately I've seen a lot of questions regarding the use of homeMDB in policy filters. I want to use this post to explain the reason that ExBPA warns about this, and hopefully clear up the confusion about how to address this.   Linked Value Replication Read More

In November 2005 I posted an article on the DSProxy referral changes that are included in Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2.  For the full article, please see http://blogs.technet.com/exchange/archive/2005/11/04/413669.aspx.   To refresh Read More

In this article I will explain how the OAB Generation process discovers the domain controller that it will use for rebuilding an Offline Address List. Understanding this process can help you in troubleshooting.   As I have mentioned in other blog Read More

I was asked the following question recently:  What are the minimum permissions necessary I need to grant a user in order for that user to be able to access the data in another user’s mailbox?   Automatically I referenced following article Read More

Until last week I was under the impression that Exchange always uses local GCs (Global Catalog servers) and only uses out-of-site directory servers (GCs or DCs) if no local ones are available. I found out otherwise from working on the issue described Read More

With Exchange 5.5 coming to the end of its support life cycle, lots of companies have been migrating quickly from Exchange 5.5 to Exchange 2000 or Exchange 2003. One major component that is affected by mixed mode site migrations/consolidation is the OAB. Read More

I recently worked on an interesting issue where certain Distribution Groups (DGs) in the Active Directory (AD) were not replicating properly with the Exchange 5.5 Directory Service (DS).  After adding several members to a DG in the AD, the changes Read More

Pre-Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2 Behavior Prior to Exchange Server 2003 Service Pack 2, Outlook MAPI clients would receive either a referral to a global catalog server or use the Exchange server to proxy directory related requests; specifically, Read More

I recently worked on a few support cases where questions came up on "what exactly happens" when we use the Exchange System Manager (ESM) to pull up properties of public folders. How does the ESM find a matching public folder directory object in Active Read More