GoDaddy issued certificates are not trusted by the Sony P1i phone and so if you are using a GoDaddy issued digital certificate for ActiveSync on one of these phones you will be prompted to accept the certificate at each sync. As this kills the purpose of push email sync you will want to stop the prompt.
You do this by installing the GoDaddy trusted root certificate. On any Windows computer that works when connecting to a website protected with your GoDaddy certificate run mmc.exe and add the Certificates snap-in, selecting the local user option. Browse to Trusted Root Certification Authorities and click on the Certificates node. Find and right-click the Go Daddy Class 2 Certification Authority and choose All Tasks > Export. Export the certificate as a DER encoded binary X.509 (.CER) file to a folder on that computer.
Email that file to the owner of the Sony P1i and sync the phone to download their email (confirming the prompt that we want to remove). Open the email and download the attachment. Once the attachment is downloaded (which might involve syncing again and confirming the certificate prompt) open the attachment. The phone will install the certificate into its certificate store. No more prompts!
Labels: 2003, 2007, activesync, exchange, mobile phones, pki
permalink posted by Brian Reid : 7:06 PM
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The following errors are reported in the Event Log Windows Logs/Application when you run the built-in backup that is part of Small Business Server 2008 (SBS) or Windows Essential Business Server 2008 (WEBS):
Event ID 565 - Consistency check for component StorageGroup-GUID\'Microsoft Exchange Server\Microsoft Information Store\SERVER' failed. Application 'Exchange' will not be avaliable in the backup done at time 'date time'
The Event Viewer log at Application and Services Logs/Microsoft/Windows/Backup/Operational shows that everything completed fine but the Windows Server Backup administrative tool says backup completed with warnings. Double-clicking the backup record shows:
Application will not be available for recovery from this backup. Consistency
check failed for component Microsoft Exchange Server\Microsoft Information
Store\Server-Name\Store-GUID
This seems to be related to having enabled Local Continous Replication (LCR) on the Exchange mailbox database. This is unfortunate as LCR is such a useful tool in recovery for Exchange Servers that I would want to enable it as a matter of course, and spec my SBS servers to have enough disk space to store LCR copies. Note that the actual Exchange databases and log files are backed up as part of the volume backup, just not as part of the application aware backup and that might result in invalid restores as the volume level backup is not Exchange aware.
Please Microsoft, will you make the VSS backup for Exchange 2007 that is included in SBS and WEBS LCR aware. Thanks.
Labels: backup, ebs 2008, exchange, sbs 2008, windows
permalink posted by Brian Reid : 2:05 PM
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This rather imposing message is found if you try to force replication between to Active Directory Domain Controllers when one of the controllers machine account password is out of sync with the password as stored on the other domain controller.
I have seen this a number of times on Virtual PC or Virtual Server Active Directory deployments with more than one DC in the virtual environment.
So, how do you fix it:
- On the DC that is broken (the one that when using replmon reports the error above) set the Kerberos Key Distribution Center Service to manual and stop the service.
- From a command prompt on the broken DC enter the following:
netdom resetpwd /s:name_of_working_DC /ud:domain\user /pd:*
where domain\user is an administrator of the domain in the domain_name\user_name format. You will be prompted to enter your password. - Upon pressing Enter, if the command fails then restart the broken DC and repeat the above command (this restart clears the Kerberos ticket cache and so clears the broken credential attempts that it has stored).
- Upon successful completion of the command in step 2 restart the broken DC. You must do this even if done already in step 3.
- Check that replication is working, and if so restart the Kerberos Key Distribution Center Service and set the service back to automatic.
This is a summary of Microsoft Knowledgebase Article 325850, with some more specific detail mentioned.
Labels: 2003, 2007, active directory, error, exchange, kerberos, virtual pc, virtual server
permalink posted by Brian Reid : 4:06 PM
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Blog updated 22nd February 2008
As Microsoft plan to release Update Rollups for Exchange Server 2007 every six to eight weeks (see
KB937194), I will use this blog entry to list the current latest update:
The latest version of the Exchange 2007 update is Update Rollup 6 for Exchange Server 2007 - this can be downloaded
from here (64 bit and 32 bit versions now available).
Microsoft plan to do these releases rather than issue hotfixes as the method of engineering Exchange has changed since the previous versions, and KB937194 (see earlier) describes why this is. Each update rollup contains all the previous updates, so you only need to deploy this patch and not any earlier patches as well.
If you have not yet installed Exchange 2007 yet, copy this patch to the
Update folder on your installation point and it will get slipstreamed into the installation automatically upon running Setup.
Note that unlike updates #3, #4 and #5, a 32bit version of this update is not currently available.
Labels: 2007, exchange, hotfix, update
permalink posted by Brian Reid : 3:28 PM
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A new feature in digital certificates is the Subject Alternative Name property. This allows you to have a certificate for more than one URI (i.e. www.c7solutions.com and www.c7solutions.co.uk) in the same certificate. It also means that in web servers such as IIS you can bind this certificate to the site and use up only one IP address.
A number of commercial companies now sell certificates with the Subject Alternative Name field set, but this article describes how to use the Exchange Server 2007 command line to create certificate requests for other web sites that can be uploaded to Microsoft Certificate Server (which does not support this property in its own web pages) to create certificates for web servers such as IIS (which also do not support this property in the requests that they make).
The command that you need to run is via PowerShell, and specifically via the Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 extensions to PowerShell. So start up the Microsoft Management Shell and enter the following (replacing your domain names as indicated:
New-ExchangeCertificate -GenerateRequest:$true -Path c:\newCert.req -DomainName www.domain.com,sales.domain.com,support.domain.com -PrivateKeyExportable:$true -FriendlyName "My New Certificate" -IncludeAcceptedDomains:$false -Force:$true
The DomainName property is set to each URL that you want the certificate to be valid for, with the first value in the string being the value for the Subject field and all the values each being used in the Subject Alternative Name field.
Once you have executed the command above you will have a file with the name set in the Path property. This file can be opened in Notepad and used in Microsoft Certificate Services:
- Browse to your Microsoft Certificate Services URL and click Request a certificate
- Click advanced certificate request
- Click submit a certificate...
- Copy and paste the entire text of the certificate request from notepad into the Saved Request field on this page and select Web Server as the Certificate Template. Click Submit.
- With a default installation the Web Server template value will not be present and that needs to be enabled by your Certificate Services administrator for your user account
- With the default installation of Certificate Services, the certificate will now be ready to download. Click Download certificate (or Download Certificate Chain if the end server does not trust your issuer) to save your certificate to the computer.
- Install the certificate on to the same computer that you issued the request from (this is a very important step), and then you can export the certificate and import it on your web server or firewalls.
To install the certificate, run the Import-ExchangeCertificate powershell command on the same computer as the request was issued from (this is a very important, it must be on the same computer). This is a simpler command to run that the creation of the request above.
The syntax of this command is (where the filename is the name of the file downloaded above):
Import-ExchangeCertificate c:\newCert.cer
To export the certificate to your web server or firewall you need to open the local computer certificate store in the Microsoft Management Console - run mmc, add a snap-in and choose Certificates, Computer account. You will find your certificates under the Personal store. You can right-click these certificates and export them (with the private key) to a .pfx file. This file can then be imported using the MMC tool on the web server or firewall ready for importing using an mmc with the certificates/computer account snap-in load into it.
Labels: 2007, certificates, exchange, iis, microsoft, pkcs, powershell, web
permalink posted by Brian Reid : 9:26 AM
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I need a place to store useful Powershell commands for the administration of Exchange Server 2007, so I thought I would add them here:
Upgrading Exchange OrganisationPlace Replicas of Public Folders on New Exchange Serverget-publicfolder -recurse Set-PublicFolder -Replicas:"server\public folder
database","server\public folder store (server)"
Enable ActiveSync Policy for Windows Mobile 2003 Smartphones and Pocket PC'sNew-ActiveSyncMailboxPolicy "Windows Mobile 2003 Users" -AttachmentsEnabled:$false -DevicePasswordEnabled:$false -AlphanumericDevicePasswordRequired:$false -PasswordRecoveryEnabled:$false -DeviceEncryptionEnabled:$false -AllowNonProvisionableDevices:$true -AllowSimpleDevicePassword:$false -DevicePasswordExpiration:unlimited -WSSAccessEnabled:$false -UNCAccessEnabled:$false
Enable ActiveSync Policy for Windows Mobile 5 Smartphones and Pocket PC'sNew-ActiveSyncMailboxPolicy "Windows Mobile 5 Users" -AttachmentsEnabled:$true -DevicePasswordEnabled:$true -AlphanumericDevicePasswordRequired:$false -PasswordRecoveryEnabled:$true -DeviceEncryptionEnabled:$false -MinDevicePasswordLength:4 -MaxInactivityTimeDeviceLock:00:15:00 -MaxDevicePasswordFailedAttempts:8 -AllowNonProvisionableDevices:$false -AllowSimpleDevicePassword:$false -DevicePasswordExpiration:unlimited -WSSAccessEnabled:$true -UNCAccessEnabled:$true
Set ActiveSync Policy Against All Users for a Given Policyget-mailbox Set-CASMailbox -ActiveSyncMailboxPolicy:"Name Of Policy"
Labels: 2007, exchange, powershell, upgrade
permalink posted by Brian Reid : 8:53 AM
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Having recently obtained my first Windows Mobile powered SmartPhone, I needed to connect to my Exchange Server over the internet using ActiveSync. For those of you unfamiliar with Windows Mobile SmartPhones, they let you connect, using the phones internet connection (typically over a GPRS network), to your Exchange 2003 Servers to download your email at a given schedule. Additionally the SmartPhones running Windows Mobile 2003 and later support “Up-to-date Notificationsâ€, where the emails are synchronised to your phone automatically upon arrival at the Exchange Server independent of the schedule. It was this Up-to-date Notifications feature that I wanted to implement, but it was not as straight forward as I thought it would be when I got down to it!
The reason was the phone. I have an Orange SPV C550 which is locked by Orange, the network operator. This means that you cannot install any software on the phone including any digital certificate that you need to connect to your Exchange Server.
To configure across the mobile network synchronisation of your e-mail you need to have Exchange ActiveSync enabled on your Exchange Server (it is on by default) and ensure that the “/Microsoft-Server-ActiveSync/*†path to an Exchange Server in your organisation is available through your firewall. If you do not use SSL to protect this HTTP session (not recommended) then you need do nothing to your phone apart from configure it to use the server synchronisation to get your email, but if you want to use HTTPS and the certification authority you are using to provide your digital certificates is a private certification authority you will find that you will not be able to connect as your phone will not trust the certificate issuer. Note that in test environments you can use the Disable Certificate Verification tool (see links below) to avoid this issue, but for a production network this is not recommended.
Therefore you need to unlock the phone and install the root certificate from your private certification authority and then relock the phone before you can make a secure connection to your Exchange Server from your Windows Mobile SmartPhone. The last step of locking your phone again is optional, but recommended as it maintains the security of your phone.
To unlock your Orange phone you need to follow these steps, though note that other mobile network operators will either provide unlocked phones or might have an equivalent process:
- Make at least one GPRS connection so that your device is registered at Orange
- That your handset is switched on and it has a good signal
- That you have a record of your IMEI number. You can get this by typing *#06# on the phone.
- Visit http://developer.orangews.com/orgspv/comdefq.aspx on a computer (you can do this on the phone, its just easier on a computer). At the time of writing this web page does not list the C550 phone as a phone it unlocks, but it does work.
- Choose to “Disable Certificate Security†and click Proceed. Enter the required information and your phone will make an internet connection (which you will be billed for) and it will unlock your phone. Once the phone is unlocked you will see a message in English and French telling you that “Your handset has had its certificate security disabled.â€
Once the handset is unlocked you can install any application on the phone that you like, but for the purposes of connecting to your Exchange Server for Up-to-date Notifications:
- Start Internet Explorer on your phone and browse to a web site containing your root digital certificate (or use SPAddCert.exe if you already have the certificate downloaded to the phone’s memory. SPAddCert’s download location is on the list of links below). For example if your certificate server is the version that comes with Windows then visit http://servername/certsrv/certcarc.asp and download the certificate.
- Confirm that you want to install the certificate at the prompt. Assuming that the phone unlock was successful, the certificate will be installed.
- You can now relock your phone using the same process as described above, just choosing the “Enable Certificate Security†option instead. Though whilst your phone is unlocked you might want to investigate Global Contact Access from Microsoft (see the links below) to give your phone more access to your Exchange Server, such as the Global Address List and Free/Busy information.
Configuring Exchange ActiveSync on the Exchange Server is beyond the scope of this article, but full instructions can be found in the Microsoft Press Exchange Server 2003 Resource Kit on pages 892 onward to the end of the chapter.
Once you have the certificate installed you can configure the device to connect to the Exchange Server. This is done by starting the ActiveSync application on your phone and setting the options. Option 3, Server Settings controls this functionality and you need to choose menu item 4 (Connection). Here you need to enter your username, password and domain along with the server name, which is the web address to the Exchange ActiveSync server (for example mail.company.com). You can leave the SSL option selected as you now have the ability to do this connection securely, without needing to purchase a digital certificate from a public certification authority.
Links
Labels: 2003, certificates, exchange, orange, spv
permalink posted by Brian Reid : 8:57 AM
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