An IIS directory entry couldn’t be created. The error message is The service cannot be started, either because it is disabled or because it has no enabled devices associated with it

You have added Exchange Trusted Subsystem Group  a member of local administrator group in Exchange 2007 and yet receiving fallowing errors and not seeing OWA directory on your Exchange 2010 server or servers.

See previous article

An IIS directory entry couldn’t be created. The error message is The service cannot be started, either because it is disabled or because it has no enabled devices associated with it.

Get-OwaVirtualDirectory

Possible cause

• You did not enable IIS Admin Service
• You have not restart IIS service yet
  

Restart-Service IISADMIN

 

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)
MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST
Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)

DR / High Availability Exchange 2010

If you have not seen how DAG works in Exchange 2010 I recommend downloading Videos made by Scott Schnoll and watch them when you have time.

I think if you deploy DAG which is very easy and start using it, you will appreciate the most and be amazed with its simplicity and power. There are no more complex cluster scenarios, entire process is build into Exchange 2010 and very much seamless to administrators.

High Availability in Exchange Server 2010 – Part 1

High Availability in Exchange Server 2010 – Part 2

High Availability in Exchange Server 2010 – Part 3

High Availability in Exchange Server 2010 – Part 4

More Vides on MSExchange Team blog

http://msexchangeteam.com/videos/9/drandha/default.aspx

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)
MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST
Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)

RPC OVER HTTPS SCRIPT NEW VERSION SUPPORTS OUTLOOK 2010,2007,2003

Here is real nice script provided by Gene. I made step by step instructions showing what to change in the script to make it work for you. After configuring this script you can have it hosted some internal website and distribute to your users if they need to use RPC & HTTPS or even e-mail them.

Click here to download this from skydive

• As professional courtesy if you use the script take one minute and leave some comments thanks (-: This is all we are asking. Remember the credits will go to
• Gene Strickland who modified the script and he is kind enough to share with exchange community,
  Thanks to Gene….

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)
MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST
Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)

A server-side seed operation has failed. Error: An error occurred while performing the seed operation….

Problem: Adding databases copied on Exchange 2010 DAG generates fallowing errors

Summary: 1 item(s). 0 succeeded, 1 failed. Elapsed time: 00:00:03 MB3 Failed Error: A server-side seed operation has failed. Error: An error occurred while performing the seed operation, which may indicate a problem with the source disk. Error: Failed to open a log truncation context to source mail2. Hresult: 0xc7ff1004. Error: Error returned from an ESE function call (-1305). [Database: MB3, Server: MAIL5.smtp25.local] Failed to open a log truncation context to source mail2. Hresult: 0xc7ff1004. Error: Error returned from an ESE function call (-1305). Exchange Management Shell command attempted: Add-MailboxDatabaseCopy -Identity ‘MB3’ -MailboxServer ‘MAIL5’ -ActivationPreference ‘2’ Elapsed Time: 00:00:03

Some useful information

What is seeding?

Seeding, also known as updating, is the process in which a database, either a blank database or a copy of the production database, is added to the target copy location on another Mailbox server in the same database availability group (DAG) as the production database. This becomes the baseline database for the copy maintained by that server.

Database mobility

• New architecture in Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 that removes the concept of storage groups and uncouples an Exchange 2010 mailbox database from a Mailbox server
• Continuous replication now operates at the database level
• Transaction logs are replicated to one or more Mailbox servers
• Transaction Logs replayed into one or more copies of a mailbox database stored on those servers.

Read more

Troubleshooting

Check health status (MB6 is the name of the Database in my case, replace this to suit your environment.

 

Get-MailboxDatabaseCopyStatus –identity mb6

 

Get-MailboxDatabase

 

When DB copy is added from source server to the destination server, process need some time to replicate the logs and then replay it to the database. ( this what happens behind the scene)

To see the status use below CMDLET

Get-MailboxDatabaseCopyStatus -identity mb6 | FL

Also if you are having troubles it is good idea to check the size of the catalogdata from the target database server and the source database server and compare them

In this case we see failure

Get-MailboxDatabaseCopyStatus -Identity mb4 | FL

Couple things to remember , DB is already suspended stage Source look good but destination seems to be having hard time

Source mail2

Target mail3

As you can see there is nothing in the target , I will copy the catalogdata from source to the destination & Target Exchange server.

I will resume the database copy after I am done copying.

bingo I get healthy status

If I look at it once more I can see the logs got replayed and DB got created on the destination server

Get-MailboxDatabaseCopyStatus | Format-Table Identity,ActiveDatabaseCopy,ContentIndexState -Aut0

 

Diagnose Exchange Search Issues

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb123701.aspx

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)

MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST

Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)

Exception has been thrown by the target of an invocation.

Problem: Trying to add mailbox database copy is generating fallowing errors exchange 2010 DAG.

Summary: 1 item(s). 0 succeeded, 1 failed. Elapsed time: 00:00:00 MB4 Failed Error: Exception has been thrown by the target of an invocation. Exchange Management Shell command attempted: Add-MailboxDatabaseCopy -Identity ‘MB4’ -MailboxServer ‘MAIL3’ -ActivationPreference ‘2’ Elapsed Time: 00:00:00

Running CMDlet for the same purpose is giving much better idea why this is happening

Add-MailboxDatabaseCopy –identity MB4 –MailboxServer Mail3 –ActivationPreference 2

• Restart WMI service and try again

 

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)
MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST
Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)

An error caused a change in the current set of domain controllers. It was running command ‘Get-FederationTrust”

Problem: Receiving fallowing error on Exchange 2010 server after opening EMC and expending Mailbox tab under organization configuration.

Possible causes:

To be honest first thing I checked was to make sure Exchange server is able to talk to all domain controllers as its configured on its TCP/IP properties.Also as always check to see anything catches your attention under application logs.

Fair enough I was able to locate the event log “2080” MsExchangeADAccess” was showing me one DC only, however the TCP/IP stack was configured to talk to secondary DC.

Make sure Exchange is able to talk to all DC’s within its “Site”

Above example the second DC was not even discovered by MSExchange AD access, due to replication problems existed among the DC’s in the  site where exchange is residing. After fixing the relocation issues and restarting MSExchangeADTopology service took care of the error.

Note:

Some other people who had same error assumed to fix this issue by deleting the local profile ( corrupted profile) for the user account they logged into Exchange server.

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)
MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST
Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)

Step by Step creating DAG, Exchange 2010 PART#2

Now we are ready to move on with installing DAG. The configuration we are doing is very basic here. We will use ForeFront to achieve redundancy for OWA and Outlook anywhere later on, most likely on part 4, for now we will move on finishing the configuration of DAG. As reminder our goal is to bring two exchange 2010 servers in DAG configuration and make our messaging environment redundant, if one server goes down, the other server will pick up the production users. As you know DAG member can be added or taken out from DAG (Data Availability Group) any time. In very basic thinking the way DAG works is to assign active databases and passive databases to each DAG members. Renaming Databases to some sort of meaningful names seems to be the way to go. Remember Storage groups no longer exist in Exchange 2010 and logs are associating with each database.

***IF you go to ADUC you will see computer object called “DAG1” if you go to DNS you will see below A and PTR (if reverse zone exist), after creating the DAG group and assigning IP to it.***

Read more:

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd298065.aspx

*** We recommend that you use an Exchange 2010 Hub Transport server in the Active Directory site containing the DAG. This allows the witness server and directory to remain under the control of an Exchange administrator.***

*** If the witness server you specify isn’t an Exchange 2010 server, you must add the Exchange Trusted Subsystem universal security group to the local Administrators group on the witness server prior to creating the DAG. These security permissions are necessary to ensure that Exchange can create a directory and share on the witness server as needed. ***

*** Hub Transport server that doesn’t have the Mailbox server role installed, and it will automatically create the default directory***

Creating DAG

• Go to EMC Under organization configuration select
• New Data Base Availability Group and fallow the simple wizard.

 

 

As you can see the Witness Server and Witness directory is not selected, DAG is configured with a witness server and witness directory, the DAG Wizard will search and locate the HTS server and create everything it needs automatically. (Witness Server = HTS server, Witness Directory will be on the HTS server also)

 

New-DatabaseAvailabilityGroup -Name ‘DAG1’

Now we will check the fail over clustering

• Click start on the search type
• Cluadmin.msc

 

 

CMDLET

Set-DatabaseAvailabilityGroup DAG1 –DatabaseAvailabilityGroupIpAddresses 10.10.10.150

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)
MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST
Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)

Becoming Father

My daughter Aura Yagmur, Dedeal born yesterday  6.05PM EST at Sibley Hospital in Washington DC.

Aura was born 9.9.4 pounds and here she is on my arms. My team at work seems to modified one of the picture my little girl and happy daddy (-: of course  this would be Jeff (-:

Here is my little girl, I am not sure if she moves into IT when she grow up, but of she ever does I will do everything in my power to make her work with Exchange (-:

By the way Aura mean is the light and luck , Yagmur mean is “Rain” in Turkish. Those of you who have kids will understand, this is incredible unexplainable experience and just the beginning of another great journey for me …………………..

Oz Casey &  Aura Yagmur, Dedeal

Step by Step creating DAG, Exchange 2010 PART#1

One of the most exciting future in Exchange 2010 no questions is the DAG (Database Availability Group).

Although the arguments of using JBOD and whatever RAID level is good for you, possible in Exchange 2010, I recommend consulting your vendor and see what will be their recommendations for implementing DAG for Enterprise network scenario, The Storage area vendors most likely will give you certain IOPS numbers with DAS or any similar storage device selection. I personally worked many times with NetAPP and I do know from experience they are ROCK solid appliances and if I would be implementing Exchange 2010 with DAG scenario I would  get their opinion by given numbers of users and usage of the mail servers to get their recommendation for the choice of DAS, SAN end RAID level needs to be used etc.

This example I am going to set  DAG for small company who has 200 users. Choosing RAID level also on the single server is totally up to you. In nutshell make sure you are redundant and you have configured the “Fastest” write and read RAID level as general rule. Server specs hasto be fallowed MS best practices guidelines.

 

Check List

• Fallow MS best practices all the times
• Exchange 2010 System Requirements

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa996719.aspx

Installing Exchange 2010 on Windows R2

This section is taken from Henrik Walter Blog, he has excellent article series also showing DAG in much Details, links to his blog is fallows, Henrik has been good mentor to many of us, not only with technical aspect but also his professionalism in my opinion is top quality.

http://www.msexchange.org/articles_tutorials/exchange-server-2010/high-availability-recovery/uncovering-exchange-2010-database-availability-groups-dags-part2.html

After Installing Windows 2008 R2

 

Import-Module ServerManager

Read more

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd378896(WS.10).aspx

 

Before we can install the Exchange 2010 Server roles on the two Windows 2008 R2 servers, we must first make sure the required features and components have been installed. The following components should be installed on all Exchange 2010 server roles:

• NET-Framework
• RSAT-ADDS
• Web-Server
  
• Web-Basic-Auth
  
• Web-Windows-Auth
  
• Web-Metabase
  
• Web-Net-Ext
  
• Web-Lgcy-Mgmt-Console
  
• WAS-Process-Model
  
• RSAT-Web-Server
  
• Web-ISAPI-Ext
  
• Web-Digest-Auth
  
• Web-Dyn-Compression
  
• NET-HTTP-Activation
  
• RPC-Over-HTTP-Proxy

Copy and paste fallowing into PS

Add-WindowsFeature NET-Framework,RSAT-ADDS,Web-Server,Web-Basic-Auth,Web-Windows-Auth,Web-Metabase,Web-Net-Ext,Web-Lgcy-Mgmt-Console,WAS-Process-Model,RSAT-Web-Server,Web-ISAPI-Ext,Web-Digest-Auth,Web-Dyn-Compression,NET-HTTP-Activation,RPC-Over-HTTP-Proxy –Restart

Copy and paste fallowing into PS

Set-Service NetTcpPortSharing –StartupType Automatic

NET BINDINGS

 

Replication NIC Card (Private network)

• NIC BINDINGS
• Go to Network Connections
• Advance
• Advance Settings
• Make sure the replication NIC is listed on TOP

***Press ALT key to see the advance settings***

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)
MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST
Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)

 

 

 

This mailbox database contains one or more mailboxes or arbitration mailboxes…..

Problem: Trying to remove first Database on Exchange 2010 Server.

As you can see Exchange is complaining about existing mailboxes on the DB, hence it is not letting us to remove the DB.

Lets see what are these mailboxes in this database…..

Get-Mailbox -Database MB1

As you can see the CMDLET is returning no mailbox at all, so why exchange is complaining about?

there is no mailbox in this database, yet removing it wont work Exchange is complaining about “arbitration mailboxes” obviously these mailboxes are hidden and either GUI or command line is not showing them to you and making you pull your hairs (-:

What are these “arbitration mailboxes” ?

Arbitration mailbox   The arbitration mailbox is used to store the original message that’s awaiting approval. By default, one arbitration mailbox is created for moderated transport during setup. It’s used for all moderated recipients. You can add additional arbitration mailboxes for load balancing purposes. If you’re using multiple arbitration mailboxes, you need to specify which mailbox to use for each moderated recipient

http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/dd297936.aspx

• Okay how do I see them?

Get-Mailbox -Database mb1 -Arbitration | ft -wrap –auto

• How do I get rid of them?
• we will move them to another DB, so to see what DB we have

Get-MailboxDatabase

• Move them

New-MoveRequest -Identity "SystemMailbox{1f05a927-5e2d-4fa3-814b-c8329f9f64a5}" -TargetDatabase M5DB1

 

• Now we need to see the Move Request, What we are looking for is “Complete”

Get-MoveRequest -SourceDatabase MB1

• Get more Detailed information

Get-MoveRequest | FL

• Clear the Move Request

Remove-MoveRequest "SystemMailbox{e0dc1c29-89c3-4034-b678-e6c29d823ed9}"

Or use GUI (-:

• Now Let’s try to delete the DB once more

 

Best regards,

Oz Casey , Dedeal

MCITP (EMA), MCITP (SA)
MCSE 2003, M+, S+, MCDST
Security+, Project +, Server +

Http://smtp25.blogspot.com (Blog

Http://telnet25.spaces.live.com (Blog)

Http://telnet25.wordpress.com (Blog)