UC Unleashed

Our beloved Exchange product group has released a great video on some of the features coming in OWA for E14. These included threaded conversations, embedded IM, and more. But the most anticipated feature if rich features for non Microsoft browsers including Firefox and Safari.

Microsoft is also rebranding the “Exchange Labs” service as “Outlook Live”.

Check out the info and video at http://msexchangeteam.com/archive/2009/02/12/450639.aspx

In a press release that came out yesterday, Microsoft announced the Google has licensed ActiveSync for their Google Sync offering.

This is indeed good news. With the Apple iPhone using ActiveSync, as well as third party solutions that provide ActiveSync access for Blackberry devices, more companies are realizing that ActiveSync is a viable solution for getting access to Exchange based content. And, since ActiveSync is much more efficient than, say, Blackberry Enterprise Server, enterprises are more likely to use these devices.

Way to go, Google!

Even Lotus has licensed ActiveSync.

Now if Apple could only get their iPhone to support syncing tasks and notes, and also give us copy & paste in email, life would be good.

Microsoft has released the following update rollup for Exchange Server 2007:

• Update Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2007 SP1 (959241)

If you’re running Exchange Server 2007 SP1, you need to apply Update Rollup 6 for Exchange 2007 SP1 to address the security issues listed below.

Remember, you only need to download the latest update for the version of Exchange that you’re running. RTM updates can’t be installed on SP1 and vice versa.

Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2007 SP1 supersedes the following:

1. 945684 Update Rollup 1 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1
2. 948016 Update Rollup 2 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1
3. 949870 Update Rollup 3 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1
4. 952580 Update Rollup 4 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1
5. 953467 Update Rollup 5 for Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1

Here is a list of the fixes included in rollup 6:

1. 959239 MS09-003: Vulnerabilities in Microsoft Exchange could allow remote code execution
2. 950675 Downloaded .xls file attachments are empty when you open the files by using Outlook Web Access on Exchange Server 2007 Service Pack 1
3. 955443 Some free/busy messages are not replicated from Exchange 2007 to Exchange 2003 servers after some mailboxes are migrated from Exchange Server 2003 to Exchange Server 2007
4. 956356 The Microsoft Exchange File Distribution service uses lots of memory and processor time when Exchange Server 2007 processes many OABs
5. 956624 The Microsoft Exchange Transport service crashes continuously after you enable journal rule or deploy an antivirus application on an Exchange Server 2007 server
6. 957748 The custom message class of contact object is overwritten by the normal IPM.Contact class when an Exchange 2007 server replicates the contact object to any other public store

Download the rollup here. It is available via Windows Update now.

Installation Notes:

If you haven’t installed Exchange Server yet, you can use the info at Quicker Exchange installs complete with service packs and rollups to save you some time.

Microsoft Update can’t detect rollups for Exchange 2010 servers that are members of a Database Availability Group (DAG). See the post Installing Exchange 2010 Rollups on DAG Servers for info, and a script, for installing update rollups.

Update Rollups should be applied to Internet facing Client Access Servers before being installed on non-Internet facing Client Access Servers.

If you’re installing the update rollup on Exchange servers that don’t have Internet access, see “Installing Exchange 2007 & 2010 rollups on servers that don’t have Internet access” for some additional steps.

For the most part, the AV engines in Forefront Security for Exchange update without issues. But occassionally, I see event ID 6014 in the application event log, which say:

Event Type: Error
Event Source: GetEngineFiles Event
Category: Engine Error
Event ID: 6014
Date: 2/7/2009
Time: 10:53:00 PM
User: N/A
Computer: troy-email2
Description: Microsoft Forefront Server Security encountered an error while performing a scan engine update. Scan Engine: Kaspersky5 Update Path: http://forefrontdl.microsoft.com/server/scanengineupdate/x86/Kaspersky5 Proxy Settings: Disabled Error Code: 0xC0001F58 Description: The operation timed out.

When trying to update the engine manually from within the Forefront console, the same problem happens – the update fails to finish in a timely manner. Eventually, we see event ID 7006, which says:

Event Type: Error
Event Source: Microsoft Forefront Security
Event Category: Health Status
Event ID: 7006
Date: 2/7/2009
Time: 10:51:59 PM
User: N/A
Computer: troy-email2
Description: At least one of the engines enabled for updates has not been updated in the last week. For more information, see Help and Support Center at http://go.microsoft.com/fwlink/events.asp.

I’ve seen this enough on both Hub Transport and Edge Transport servers to go diving for a solution. Fortunately, we can extend the timeout period so that the engine can be updated. Here’s how:

Open the trusty regedit on the server and navigate to

HKLM\SOFTWARE\Wow6432Node\Microsoft\Forefront Server Security\Exchange Server

Create a new DWORD, “EngineDownloadTimeout“. Give it a decimal value of 600. Close regedit. No service or server restarts are necessay. This increases the timeout from the default of 5 minutes to 10 minutes. My testing has shown that this is long enough for the Kaspersky engine to update successfully. You can force an update in Forefront by opening the Forefront Server Security Administrator console, and going to Settings>Scanner Updates. Highlight the Kaspersky Antivirus Technology engine, and click Update Now. Or, you can just wait for the next update cycle.