Interview Questions - Exchange Server 2007/2010

What are the Exchange 2007/2010 server roles?
What are the benefits of using roles, vs. the way Exchange 2000/2003 worked?
What are the Exchange 2003 equivalents of the various Exchange 2007/2010 roles?
Name the system prerequisites for installing Exchange 2007/2010 in your existing Active Directory forest.
You have an Exchange 5.5 organization and finally decided to move forward and upgrade to Exchange 2007/2010. What's your next obvious step?
You're looking to install Exchange 2007/2010 and Outlook on the same machine. Should you do that? Why?
Where does Exchange store its configuration settings?
How do you prepare the AD for Exchange 2007/2010? Name 2 methods.
What permissions do you need to prepare the AD for Exchange 2007/2010?
How would you verify that the schema was in fact updated?
In the installation folder root you see setup.com and setup.exe. Which would you use and when?
How would you easily install all the Windows Server 2008/R2 roles and features required for Exchange 2007/2010?
How would you check your Exchange configuration settings to see if they're right?
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Remote Desktop Connection Manager

Наткнулся в уроках по Exchange на отличную прогу:
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads…
Это бесплатная консоль от MS, которая обладает всем необходимым джентльменским набором.
Почитать и посмотреть скрины можно здесь:
http://rublog.alex-trofimov.com/20…


Populating Test Labs with User Accounts…

Взято отсюда: http://www.telnetport25.com/compon…

Those of you that have been following this blog will know that recently I have made a number of posts that are either based around the virtues of Test Labs or indeed that work that I have been doing in relation to them – for information my posts on the subject are here, here, here, here and finally here.

Now one of the most daunting things about test labs, is not always the construction of the Domain, or indeed the creation of the servers within them, but how to you populate them with any meaningful user data as part of the Directory (e.g. creating a number of users).

In this article I would like to provide all of you with the following tools that will help you construct the users in your test lab:

  • A CSV file with 389 unique users within it – this files contains the following data FirstName, Surname, samAccountName, Display Name, Password, and a UserPrincipleName
  • A VBSCRIPT that will parse the data in the CSV file and create 389 users account in your test LAB which are ready to be used as part of either an Exchange 2003 or Exchange 2007 test lab
 Before I begin (and if you are interested in using this article) you will need to download the following files to your Exchange server or domain controller in your LAB:
LabUsers.csv – 389 Fictonal People just for you!
LAB_CreateUsers.vbs – the script that parses the CSV file and creates the file in your directory.
When you have downloaded them place them in a Directory Called “LBUsers”
Then create a new Organizational Unit in Active Directory called “ExchangeUsers” – it is easier to make this OU in the root of your AD structure, however, the script can handle nested OU’s as well.
What you will need to do now is modify the UPN (User Principle Name) for all users within the csv file – now, don’t panic you do not have to go through all 389 users – all you need to do is:
Open the CSV file on your server in NOTEPAD – then go to the Edit menu and select the replace option – see below

When the replace dialog box appears in the “Find What” area type in: “@ldn.com” (without quotes) and then in the “Replace with” area type in the name of your test domain –  “@” (without quotes) – so if you had a test domain called @billy.com, billy.com is what you would type into the “Replace with” area – see below

Click on the “Replace All” button, NOTEPAD will then go away and replace all entries with the values that are relevant to your test lab domain.
When NOTEPAD is finished – save the file. 
When you are happy with the content of the CSV file you can begin by double clicking on the Lab_CreateUsers.vbs file – which when first launched will prompt you for the following information:
sc1
Enter in the full path to the CSV file (do not enter in the file name) and ensure that you add in the trailing slash for the path – then click the “OK” button.
sc2
You will then be presented CSV filename dialog box – enter in LabUsers.csv and then click on the “OK” button.
sc3 
Then you will be prompted for the target OU that you wish to use this should be entered in the format of “OU=ExchangeUsers” (without quotes) – if you have placed your OU inside a parent OU then the format will change to “OU=ExchangeUsers,OU= ” – again without quotes.
When you are happy with your OU settings click on the “OK” button.
sc4
When the script has completed, you will be presented with the dialog box above – go to Active Directory Users and Computers and navigate to the OU that you created and you should see something similar to the following:
sc5
At the end of this process you should now have 389 users, in an OU called “ExchangeUsers” ready to be part of your test lab.
For reference the following is the contents of the LAB_CreateUsers.vbs script:

strCSVPath = InputBox(”Please enter in the full path to your CSV (PLEASE INCLUDE THE END SLASH \)”)
strCSVName = InputBox(”Please Enter in the FileName”)
strOU = InputBox(”Please Enter in the destination OU (FORMAT: OU=,OU=”)

set csvInputConn = createobject(”ADODB.connection”)
set csvInputRS = createobject(”ADODB.recordset”)

csvInputConn.Open “Provider=Microsoft.Jet.OLEDB.4.0;” & “Data Source=” & strCSVPath & “;” & “Extended Properties=”"text;HDR=NO;FMT=Delimited”"”
csvInputRS.open “SELECT * FROM ” & strCSVName,csvInputConn

Set RootLDAP = GetObject(”LDAP://rootDSE“)
Set ADLocation = GetObject(”LDAP://” & strOU & “,” & RootLDAP.Get(”defaultNamingContext”))

do until csvInputRS.EOF
 On Error Resume Next
  strFirstName = csvInputRS.Fields.Item(0).value
  strSurName = csvInputRS.Fields.Item(1).value
  strSam = csvInputRS.Fields.Item(2).value
  strDisplayName = csvInputRS.Fields.Item(3).value
  strPassword = csvInputRS.Fields.Item(4).value
  strUPN = csvInputRS.Fields.Item(5).value
 
  Set strUser = ADLocation.Create(”User”,”cn=” & strSam)

  strUser.put “sAMAccountName”,strSam
  strUser.put “givenName”,strFirstName
  strUser.put “sn”,strSurname
  strUser.put “UserPrincipalName”,strUPN
  strUser.put “DisplayName”,strDisplayName
  strUser.put “name”,strDisplayName
  strUser.put “mail”,strUPN
  strUser.SetInfo
  strUser.SetPassword sPassword
 
  strUser.Put “userAccountControl”, 512
  strUser.SetInfo
 
  csvInputRS.movenext

Loop

WScript.Echo “Script Completed - Hit F5 in the OU that you selected”
WScript.Quit


How to Set Up 300 Lab Users in Under a Minute, AD, Exchange OU

Взято и перепечатано с сайта www.telnetport25.com
http://www.telnetport25.com/compon…

A long time ago I posted a VBSCRIPT and CSV file which when executed created over 300 user accounts in Active Directory which was designed to give you a number of test accounts which could be used within a LAB environment to test Exchange Server.
As mentioned the original script was based around VBSCRIPT and Exchange 2003 and also required a little bit of manual intervention in order for it to work within your specific environment.

Predominantly it was designed to work against Windows 2000 / 2003 server AD environments – however as time has elapsed its underling functionality has been superseded with the advent of Powershell / Windows 2008 and Exchange 2007 and 2010 to the point that under certain system configurations it will no longer work.
Therefore given the above (and that I have been rebuilding my test lab) I am pleased to present to you with an updated CSV file and script (where the script is now Powershell based) – which supports the following scenarios:
  • Can be executed via Powershell versions 1.0 and 2.0
  • Can be run on the following Operating Systems: Windows 2008 and Windows 2008 R2 (will also support Windows 2003 with Powershell installed)
  • The accounts created can be configured with mailboxes for Exchange 2007 and Exchange 2010
So, if you are creating a test lab which is based around the above technologies and would like an easy way to get over 300 unique accounts into your Active Directory environment please feel free to download the following file to either your LAB Domain Controller or Exchange Server:


Create-Users.exe [ 142KB ]

The above file is a self extracting ZIP which when executed with extract two files to you Exchange Server / Windows 2008 Domain Controller.
When you have downloaded and extracted the scripts to your server – open a Powershell Console and navigate to the location where they are located – when there type in:
.\CreateUsersFromCSV.ps1 and then press – see below;
LabUsers01
When the script executes you will be presented with a Windows “Open” dialog box – navigate to the location where you extracted the files and then choose the sample CSV – see below;
LabUsers02
The script will then execute creating each user in your Active Directory Lab environment – the Default password is “Password1” – see below;
LabUsers03
When the script has completed – open Active Directory Users and Computers – you will see a new OU called “ExchangeUsers” – within this OU are the new accounts that you can play with – see below;
LabUsers04 

I hope that you find the above useful.