IT DOCUMENT: Collection: Exchange Server 2003 (1)

MS Exchange Interview Questions

1. What must be done to an AD forest before Exchange can be deployed?

- Setup.exe /forestprep

2. What Exchange process is responsible for communication with AD?

- DSACCESS

3. What 3 types of domain controller does Exchange access?

- Normal Domain Controller, Global Catalog, Configuration Domain Controller

4. What connector type would you use to connect to the Internet, and what are the two methods of sending mail over that connector?

SMTP Connector: Forward to smart host or use DNS to route to each address

5. How would you optimize Exchange 2003 memory usage on a Windows Server 2003 server with more than 1 GB of memory?

Add /3Gb switch to boot.ini

6. Name the process names for the following:

System Attendant- MAD.EXE, Information Store – STORE.EXE, SMTP/POP/IMAP/OWA – INETINFO.EXE

7. What is the maximum amount of databases that can be hosted on Exchange 2003 Enterprise?

- 20 databases. 4 SGs x 5 DBs.

8. What are the standard port numbers for SMTP, POP3, IMAP4, RPC, LDAP and Global Catalog?

- 25 SMTP

- 110 POP3

- 143 IMAP4

- 135 RPC

- 389 LDAP

- 636 LDAP (SSL),

- 3268 Global Catalog

- 465 SMTP/SSL,

- 993 IMAP4/SSL,

- 563 IMAP4/SSL,

- 53 DNS ,

- 80 HTTP ,

- 88 Kerberos ,

- 102 X.400 ,

- 110 POP3 ,

- 119 NNTP ,

- 137 - NetBIOS Session Service

- 139 - NetBIOS Name Service ,

- 379 LDAP (SRS) ,

- 443 HTTP (SSL) ,

- 445 - NetBIOS over TCP

- 563 NNTP (SSL) ,

- 691 LSA ,

- 993 IMAP4 (SSL) ,

- 994 IRC (SSL) ,

- 995 POP3 (SSL) ,

- 1503 T.120 ,

- 1720 H.323 ,

- 1731 Audio conferencing ,

- 1863 - MSN IM

- 3268 GC ,

- 3269 GC (SSL) ,

- 6001 Rpc/HTTP Exchange Store ,

- 6002 HTTP Exchange Directory Referral service ,

- - 6667 IRC/IRCX ,

- 6891-6900 - MSN IM File transfer ,

- 6901 - MSN IM Voice ,

- 7801-7825 - MSN IM Voice[/b]

9. What are the perquisite for installation of Exchange Serve

The pre requisite are- IIS, SMTP, WWW service, NNTP, W3SVC, .NET, Framework, ASP.NET

Then run Forest prep, the run domain prep

10. Which protocol is used for Public Folder? ANS: SMTP

11. What is the use of NNTP with exchange?

ANS: This protocol is used the news group in exchange

12. About the new features in Exchange 2003:

1. Updated Outlook Web Access.
2. Updated VSAPI (Virus Scanning Application Programming Interface)But in Exchange Server 2003 Enterprise, there are Specific Features which:
3. Eight-node Clustering using the Windows Clustering service in Windows Server (Ent. & Datacenter)
4. Multiple storage groups.
5. X.400 connectors which supports both TCP/IP and X.25.

13. What would a rise in remote queue length generally indicate?

This means mail is not being sent to other servers. This can be explained by outages or performance issues with the network or remote servers.

14. What is Operation Master Role?

Schema master Control all updates and modification to the schema itself. Control the object definition in the directory and attributes associated with those objects.

Domain Naming Master control addition and removal of objects within forest

Relative ID Master Controls the sequence number of domain controllers within the domain. It assigns a unique sequence of RIDs to each domain controller. When a object is created by domain controller it is assign with unique SID. SID is a combination of domain SID (constant ID) and RID. IF RID Master unavailable and domain controller exhaust its pool, then it will be unable to create new objects.

PDC Emulator This role in used when a domain contain non-active directory computers.

Infrastructure Master Responsible for maintaining inter-domain object reference. It informs certain objects that other objects in another domain are modified or updated.

15. What is active directory schema?

The schema is a definition of the types of objects that are allowed within a directory and the attributes that are associated with those objects. Theses definition must be consistent across domains for securities and access right to function correctly.

16. What is global catalog?

Domain controllers keep a complete copy of active directory database for a domain, so that information about each object in the domain is readily available to user and services. This works well within a domain but posse’s problem in crossing domain trees. Active directory solved this issue with a special limited database call global catalog. The global catalog stores partial replicas of the directories of other domains. It is stored on global catalog server. It performs two main functionsà logon capability and query within active directory.

17. What would a rise in the Local Delivery queue generally mean?

This indicates a performance issue or outage on the local server. Reasons could be slowness in consulting AD, slowness in handing messages off to local delivery or SMTP delivery. It could also be databases being dismounted or a lack of disk space.

18. What are the disadvantages of circular logging?

In the event of a corrupt database, data can only be restored to the last full backup.

19. What is the maximum storage capacity for Exchange standard version? What would you do if it reaches maximum capacity?”

16GB.Once the store dismounts at the 16GB limit the only way to mount it again is to use the 17GB registry setting. And even this is a temporary solution.
If you apply Exchange 2003 SP2 to your Standard Edition server, the database size limit is initially increased to 18GB. Whilst you can go on to change this figure to a value up to 75GB, it’s important to note that 18GB is the default setting
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIS\{server name}\Private-{GUID
It therefore follows that for registry settings that relate to making changes on a public store, you’ll need to work in the following registry key:
HKLM\System\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeIS\{server name}\Public-{GUID}

Under the relevant database, create the following registry information:
Value type: REG_DWORD
Value name: Database Size Limit in GB
Set the value data to be the maximum size in gigabytes that the database is allowed to grow to. For the Standard Edition of Exchange, you can enter numbers between 1 and 75. For the Enterprise Edition, you can enter numbers between 1 and 8000. Yes, that’s right, between 1GB and 8000GB or 8TB. Therefore, even if you are running the Enterprise Edition of Exchange, you can still enforce overall database size limits of, say, 150GB if you so desire.

20. What is a Distribution List?

In e-mail applications, a distribution list is a group of mail recipients that is addressed as a single recipient. Distribution lists are used to send e-mail to groups of people without having to enter each recipient's individual address. A distribution list is different from an e-mail list in that members cannot reply to the distribution list's name to send messages to everyone else in the group.

Distribution list is a term sometimes used for a function of email clients where lists of email addresses are used to email everyone on the list at once. This can be referred to as an electronic mailshot. It differs from a mailing list, electronic mailing list or the email option found in an Internet forum as it is usually for one way traffic and not for coordinating a discussion. In effect, only members of a distribution list can send mails to the list.

21. GAL, Routing Group, Stm files, Eseutil & ininteg - what are they used for?

(.STM) Streaming store file. A file used by Microsoft Exchange (mail) server to store user emails. The file is

called a streaming file since data is added to it sequentially in its native format. The data itself inside

the STM file is not encoded or encrypted in any way so if a store is dismounted the file can be viewed

using a text editor.

ESEUTIL is a repair utility. It is a tool to defragment your exchange databases offline, to check their integrity and to

repair a damaged/lost database.

ESEUTIL is located in the \EXCHSRVR\BIN directory. This directory is not in the system path so you must open the

tool in the BIN directory or enhance the system path with the \EXCHSRVR\BIN directory.

GAL: is Global Address List, it contains most if not all email addresses in your Exchange organization.

22. What is MIME & MAPI?

MIME = Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions It defines non-ASCII message formats. It is a coding standard that defines the structure of E-Mails and other Internet messages. MIME is also used for declaration of content from other Internet protocols like HTTP, Desktop environments like KDE, Gnome or Mac OS X Aqua. The standard is defined in RFC 2045.

With MIME it is possible to exchange information about the type of messages (the content type) between the sender and the recipient of the message. MIME also defines the art of coding (Content-Transfer-Encoding).

These are different coding methods defined for the transportation of non ASCII characters in plain text documents and non text documents like Images, Voice and Video for transportation through text based delivery systems like e-mail or the Usenet.

The non text elements will be encoded from the sender of the message and will be decoded by the message recipient. Coding of non ASCII characters is often based on “quoted printable” coding, binary data typically using Base64-coding.

There is an extension of this Standard called S/MIME (Secure Multipurpose Internet Mail Extensions) that allows the signing and encryption of messages. There are other e-mail encryption solutions like PGP/MIME (RFC 2015 and 3156).

MAPI = Messaging Application Programming Interface It's the programming interface for email. It is a Microsoft Windows program interface that enables you to send e-mail from within a Windows application and attach the document you are working on to the e-mail note. Applications that take advantage of MAPI include word processors, spreadsheets, and graphics applications. MAPI-compatible applications typically include a Send Mail or Send in the File pulldown menu of the application. Selecting one of these sends a request to a MAPI server

23. Details of clustering Service?

Clustering Technology: - Network load Balancing and Microsoft Cluster Service

Network Load Balancing: - Available with any version of Server 2003.Configured through Network Load Balancing Manager. NLB can contain upto 32 nodes. NLB works on the concept of heartbeats. Does not require special shred HDD.

Microsoft Cluster Service: - It is application service-aware. It cannot consist of: - IDE disks, software raid, dynamic volumes, mount point; encrypt file system, remote storage. Three different cluster configurations areà single node server cluster, single quorum device server cluster and majority node set server cluster. It requires Windows server 2003 Enterprise or Datacenter edition. Cluster contains up to 8 nodes.

24. List the services of Exchange Server 2003?

There are several services involved with Exchange Server, and stopping different services will accomplish different things. The services are interdependent, so when you stop or start various services you may see a message about having to stop dependent services. If you do stop dependent services, don't forget to restart them again when you restart the service that you began with. To shut down Exchange completely on a given machine, you need to stop all of the following services:

Microsoft Exchange Event (MSExchangeES)

This service was used for launching event-based scripts in Exchange 5.5 when folder changes were detected. Exchange 2000 offered the ability to create Event Sinks directly, so this use of this service has decreased. This service is not started by default.

Microsoft Exchange IMAP4 (IMAP4Svc)

This service supplies IMAP4 protocol message server functionality. This service is disabled by default. To use IMAP4 you must enable this service, configure it to auto-start, and start the service.

Microsoft Exchange Information Store (MSExchangeIS)

This service is used to access the Exchange mail and public folder stores. If this service is not running, users will not be able to use Exchange. This service is started by default.

Microsoft Exchange Management (MSExchangeMGMT)

This service is responsible for various management functions available through WMI, such as message tracking. This service is started by default.

Microsoft Exchange MTA Stacks (MSExchangeMTA)

This service is used to transfer X.400 messages sent to and from foreign systems, including Exchange 5.5 Servers. This service was extremely important in Exchange 5.5, which used X.400 as the default message transfer protocol. Before stopping or disabling this service, review MS KB 810489. This service is started by default.

Microsoft Exchange POP3 (POP3Svc)

This service supplies POP3 protocol message server functionality. This service is disabled by default. To use POP3 you must enable this service, configure it to auto-start, and start the service.

Microsoft Exchange Routing Engine (RESvc)

This service is used for routing and topology information for routing SMTP based messages. This service is started by default.

Microsoft Exchange System Attendant (MSExchangeSA)

This service handles various cleanup and monitoring functions. One of the most important functions of the System Attendant is the Recipient Update Service (RUS), which is responsible for mapping attributes in Active Directory to the Exchange subsystem and enforcing recipient policies. When you create a mailbox for a user, you simply set some attributes on a user object. The RUS takes that information and does all of the work in the background with Exchange to really make the mailbox. If you mailbox-enable or mail-enable objects and they don't seem to work, the RUS is one of the first places you will look for an issue. If you need to enable diagnostics for the RUS, the parameters are maintained in a separate service registry entry called MSExchangeAL. This isn't a real service; it is simply the supplied location to modify RUS functionality. This service is started by default.

Microsoft Exchange Site Replication Service (MSExchangeSRS)

This service is used in Organizations that have Exchange 5.5 combined with Exchange 2000/2003. This service is not started by default.

Network News Transfer Protocol (NntpSvc)

This service is responsible for supplying NNTP Protocol Server functionality. This service is started by default.

Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTPSVC)

This service is responsible for supplying SMTP Protocol Server functionality. This service is started by default.

25. Service dependency in Exchange Server 2003

Microsoft Exchange System Attendant (Event Log, NTLM Security Service Provider,RPC, RPC Locator, Server, Workstation)

Microsoft Exchange Information Store-- (MS Exchange System Attendant, Exchange Installable File System)

Microsoft Exchange IMAP4-- IIS Admin Service

Microsoft Exchange POP3- IIS Admin Service

Microsoft Exchange MTA Stack- MS Exchange System Attendant

Microsoft Exchange Management RPC, WMI

Microsoft Exchange Routing Engine IIS Admin Service

Microsoft Exchange Events Microsoft Exchange Information Store

26. How would you recover Exchange server when the log file is corrupted?

To resolve this issue, you must remove the corrupted log file from your Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server computer. To remove the corrupted log file, follow these steps:

Perform an offline backup of the Exchange databases in the storage group that contains the corrupted log file.

Important When you perform an offline backup, the Exchange 2000 computer is unavailable to users whose mailboxes are stored in the storage group that you are backing up. The Exchange 2000 computer is unavailable to the users because you must dismount the databases in the storage group.

To dismount the databases in the storage group, follow these steps.

1.	Click Start, point to Programs, point to Microsoft Exchange, and then click System Manager.
2.	Expand Servers, expand the server that you want, and then expand `Storage Group`. Note If you have administrative groups defined, expand Administrative Groups, expand `Administrative Group`, expand Servers, expand the server that you want, and then expand `Storage Group`.
3.	Right-click an information store, click Dismount Store, and then click Yes to continue.
4.	Dismount the remaining stores that are listed under `Storage Group`.

Back up the storage group by using the Microsoft Windows 2000 version of Windows Backup. You can run Windows Backup on any computer in the forest that is running Exchange 2000. To back up the storage group, follow these steps:

1.	Click Start, point to Programs, point to Accessories, point to System Tools, and then click Backup.
2.	Click Backup Wizard, click Next, click Back up selected files, drives, or network data, and then click Next.
3.	Expand Microsoft Exchange Server, expand *ServerName, expand Microsoft Information Store, click to select the check box for the storage group that you want to back up, and then click Next*.
4.	In the Backup media or filename box, specify a location where you want your backup to be stored, click Next, and then click Finish to start the backup.

When the backup is finished, continue to step 2.

Use the Eseutil utility (Eseutil.exe) to determine whether the databases are in a consistent state or in an inconsistent state. A consistent state is the same as a clean shutdown state. An inconsistent state is the same as a dirty shutdown state. To determine whether the databases are in a consistent state or in an inconsistent state, follow these steps:

a.	Make sure that the databases in the storage group are dismounted.
b.	Change to the C:\Program Files\Exchsrvr\Bin folder, and then run the eseutil /mh command by using the following syntax: eseutil /mh "C:\Program Files\Exchsrvr\Mdbdata\`Database`.edb" Note This step assumes that you installed Exchange 2000 on drive C. This step also assumes that you are running Exchange 2000 in the Program Files\Exchsrvr\Bin folder and that the .edb files are in the Program Files\Exchsrvr\Mdbdata folder. If you have performed an upgrade, the database files might be located in the C:\Exchsrvr\Mdbdata folder. If you have multiple storage groups, the database files might be located in a folder that is different from the Mdbdata folder.
c.	In the output results, locate the output line that is labeled "State." If the database state is consistent, you will see "State: Clean Shutdown." If the database is inconsistent, you will see "State: Dirty Shutdown."

For additional information about where to find the Eseutil utility, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

170091 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/170091/) XADM: Location of the Eseutil utility

For additional information about Eseutil command line switches, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

317014 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/317014/) XADM: Exchange 2000 Server Eseutil command line switches

If the databases are consistent, move all the log files out of the folder where your database files are located, and then mount the stores. The folder where your database files are located is typically the Exchsrvr\Mdbdata folder. As with any situation where a log file has been corrupted, some data loss will occur.

If the databases are inconsistent, you can try to perform a soft recovery of the files. Important To perform a soft recovery, you must stop the Microsoft Exchange Information Store service. When the Information Store service is stopped, all users who have their mailboxes stored on the server will not be able to send and receive mail.

To perform a soft recovery of the files, follow these steps:

a.	Click Start, point to Programs, point to Administrative Tools, and then click Services.
b.	Locate and then right-click the Microsoft Exchange Information Store service, click Stop, and wait for the Information Store service to stop.
c.	At the command prompt, change to the folder where the database and the log files are located. For example, change to the C:\Program Files\Exchsrvr\Mdbdata folder.
d.	Run the following command in the folder where the database and the log files are located: "C:\Program Files\Exchsrvr\Bin\Eseutil" /r E00 Note Replace `E00` with the three-character log file base name. For additional information about the soft recovery procedure, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base: 313184 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/313184/) HOW TO: Recover the information store on Exchange 2000 in a single site

If the soft recovery is unsuccessful, you can try to perform a recovery of the Exchange database by restoring from a backup. The databases in the storage group must remain dismounted if you try to restore from a backup.

Note If you enabled circular logging for the storage group that the inconsistent database is located in, you can only recover the data that was in the database when you performed the last working full backup. To determine if circular logging is enabled, right-click the storage group, click Properties, and then view the status of the Enable Circular Logging check box.

•

If you restore the databases from an online backup, only replay transaction logs that are older than the log file that is corrupted.

For additional information about how to restore Exchange from an online backup, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

232938 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/232938/) The "Last Backup Set" check box and hard recovery in Exchange

•

If you restore the databases from an offline backup, empty the database log folders and the transaction log folders. Only restore the .edb files and the .stm files.

For additional information about offline backup and restore procedures for Exchange, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

296788 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/296788/) Offline backup and restoration procedures for Exchange

If there are no backups available that you can use and if the database remains in an inconsistent state, you can try to repair your databases by using the eseutil /p command.

Note If you use the eseutil /p command, you may lose some Exchange 2000 data. The command is a hard command. A hard command is also known as a forcible-state recovery command. Microsoft recommends that you use this command only if the public information store or the private information store does not return to a consistent state after you perform the steps that are described earlier in this article.

For more information about the ramifications of using the eseutil /p command, click the following article number to view the article in the Microsoft Knowledge Base:

259851 (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/259851/) Ramifications of running the eseutil /p or edbutil /d /r command in Exchange

27. How can you recover a deleted mail box?

In Exchange, if you delete a mailbox, it is disconnected for a default period of 30 days (the mailbox retention period), and you can reconnect it at any point during that time. Deleting a mailbox does not mean that it is permanently deleted (or purged) from the information store database right away; only that it is flagged for deletion. At the end of the mailbox retention period, the mailbox is permanently deleted from the database. You can also permanently delete the mailbox by choosing to purge it at any time.

This also means that if you mistakenly delete a mail-enabled user account, you can recreate that user object, and then reconnect that mailbox during the mailbox retention period.

Configure the deleted mailbox retention period at the mailbox store object level.

To Delete a Mailbox in Exchange

1. Right-click the user in Active Directory Users and Computers.

2. Click Exchange Tasks.

3. Click Next on the Welcome page of the Exchange Task Wizard.

4. Click Delete Mailbox.

5. Click Next, click Next, and then click Finish.

The mailbox is now flagged for deletion and will be permanently deleted at the end of the mailbox retention period unless you recover it.

To Reconnect (or Recover) a Deleted Mailbox

1. In Exchange System Manager, locate the mailbox store that contains the disconnected mailbox.

2. Click the Mailboxes object under the mailbox store.

3. If the mailbox is not already marked as disconnected (the mailbox icon appears with a red X), right-click the Mailboxes object, and then click Cleanup Agent.

4. Right-click the disconnected mailbox, click Reconnect, and then select the appropriate user from the dialog box that appears.

5. Click OK.

Note Only one user may be connected to a mailbox because all globally unique identifiers (GUIDs) are required to be unique across an entire forest

To Reconnect a Deleted Mailbox to a New User Object

1. In Active Directory Users and Computers, create a new user object. When you create the new user object, click to clear the Create an Exchange Mailbox check box.

You will connect this user account to an already existing mailbox.

2. Follow steps 1 through 4 in the preceding "To Reconnect (or Recover) a Deleted Mailbox" section.

To Configure the Mailbox Retention Period

1. Right-click the mailbox store, and then click Properties.

2. On the Limits tab, change the Keep deleted mailboxes for (days) default setting of 30 to the number of days you want.

3. Click OK.

28. What is the use of ESUtil.exe?

Repair the database. ESEUTIL is a tool to defragment your exchange databases offline, to check their integrity and to repair a damaged/lost database.

ESEUTIL is located in the \EXCHSRVR\BIN directory. This directory is not in the system path so you must open the tool in the BIN directory or enhance the system path with the \EXCHSRVR\BIN directory.

You can use the Eseutil utility to defragment the information store and directory in Microsoft Exchange Server 5.5 and to defragment the information store in Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server and in Microsoft Exchange Server 2003. Eseutil examines the structure of the database tables and records (which can include reading, scanning, repairing, and defragmenting) the low level of the database (Ese.dll).

Eseutil is located in the Winnt\System32 folder in Exchange Server 5.5 and in the Exchsrvr/Bin folder in Exchange 2000 and in Exchange 2003. The utility can run on one database at a time from the command line.

29. Difference between Exchange 2003 and 2007?

Exchange Server 2003

Exchange Server 2003 may be run on the Windows 2000 Server if the fourth service pack has already been installed. It may also be run on 32 bit Windows Server 2003. There is a new disaster recovery feature that is even better than before. It allows the server to experience less downtime. The Exchange Server 2003 received some features form Microsoft Mobile Information server as well. These include Outlook Mobile Access as well as ActiveSync. Improved versions of anti-spam and anti-virus were also included. Management tools for mailboxes and messages have been improved and Instant Messaging and Exchange Conferencing Server are now separate products. There are two versions available of Exchange Server 2003. These include the Enterprise edition and the Standard edition. There are many other features that are available on Exchange Server 2003.

Exchange Server 2007

When Exchange Server 2003 was released there were no immediate plans as to what would happen to the product. A 2005 edition was dropped and it was not until the end of 2006 that the new version was released. Some of the new features included integration of voicemail, improved filtering, Web service support, and Outlook Web Access interface. The new edition was run on a 64 bit x 64 version of Windows Server. This increases the performance significantly. There are quite a few improvements to Exchange Server 2007. These include better calendaring, improved web access, unified messages, and better mobility. From a system protection standpoint there is more clustering, antivirus, anti spam, and compliance included. The IT experience is improved overall with a 64-bit performance. Deployment is better; routing is simplified as well as the command line shell and GUI.

30. What is required for using RPC over Https with MS Outlook?

You can configure user accounts in Microsoft® Office Outlook® 2003 to connect to Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 over the Internet without the need to use virtual private network (VPN) connections. This feature — connecting to an Exchange account by using Remote Procedure Call (RPC) over HTTP — allows Outlook users to access their Exchange Server accounts from the Internet when they are traveling or are working outside their organization's firewall.

There are several requirements for this feature. These include:

Microsoft Windows® XP with Service Pack 1 and the Q331320 hotfix (or a later service pack) installed on users' computers

Outlook 2003

Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 e-mail accounts

Microsoft Windows Server™ 2003 (required for server components only)

Server requirements

RPC over HTTP/S requires Windows Server 2003 and Exchange Server 2003. RPC over HTTP/S also requires Windows Server 2003 in a Global Catalog role.

Client requirements

· The client computer must be running Microsoft Windows X
Professional Service Pack 1 (SP1) or later.

If you're running SP1, you must install the following update package:

Outlook 2003 Performs Slowly or Stops Responding When Connected to Exchange Server 2003 Through HTTP - 331320

If you have installed Windows XP SP2, you do NOT have to install the update package.

You can also run Windows Server 2003 as the client operating system.

· The client computer must be running Microsoft Office Outlook 2003.

Recommendations

Here are some of Microsoft's (and my) recommendations when using Exchange with RPC over HTTP:

· Use basic authentication over Secure Sockets Layer (SSL) - You should enable and require the use of SSL on the RPC proxy server for all client-to-server communications.

· Use an advanced firewall server on the perimeter network - A dedicated firewall server is recommended to help enhance the security of your Exchange computer. Microsoft Internet Security and Acceleration (ISA) Server 2000 is an example of a dedicated firewall server product.

· Obtain a certificate from a third-party certification authority (CA) - When using the Basic Authentication you MUST use an SSL-based connection, and you will have to configure a Digital Certificate for your Default Website. Read Configure SSL on Your Website with IIS for more on this issue.

A Digital Certificate needs to be obtained from a CA (Certification Authority), either a 3rd-party commercial CA such as Verisign, Thawte and others, or from an internal CA.

Windows 2000/2003 has a built-in CA that can be installed and used, however, when issuing a Digital Certificate from your internal CA you MUST be 100% sure that the client computers that are going to connect to the server are properly configured to trust this CA.

Most operating systems are pre-configured to trust known 3rd-party CAs such as Verisign, Thawte and others. However unless these computers are made members of the Active Directory domain where you've installed your CA, they will NOT automatically trust your internal CA, and thus your connection will fail! In these scenarios, when a user tries to connect by using RPC over HTTP/S, that user loses the connection to Exchange and is NOT notified.

In such scenarios you must import the ROOT CA Digital Certificate into the client computers in order to make them trust your CA.

When using 3rd-party trusted CAs, in most cases you won't be required to import anything to the client computers, however you will be required to pay a few hundred dollars for such a Digital Certificate.

Additionally, if you use your own certification authority, when you issue a certificate to your RPC proxy server, you must make sure that the Common Name field or the Issued to field on that certificate contains the same name as the URL of the RPC proxy server that is available on the Internet.

32. Which protocol is used for Public Folder?

NNTP Network News Transfer Protocol, both nntp and imap helps clients to access the public folder. but actually,SMTP send the mails across the public folder.

33. What is latest service pack Exchange 2003? SP2

34. What is latest service pack Exchange 2000? SP4

35. What is the name of Exchange Databases? priv1.edb

36. How many databases in Standard Exchange version? 1

37. How many databases in Enterprise Exchange version? 20

38. What is Storage Group?

The Exchange store has several logical components that interact with each other. These components can reside on a single server, or they can be distributed across multiple servers. This topic provides details about the following primary components of the Exchange store:

· Storage groups (including recovery storage groups)

· Mailbox databases

· Public folder databases

Storage groups

An Exchange storage group is a logical container for Exchange databases and their associated system and transaction log files.

Storage groups are the basic unit for backing up and restoring data in Microsoft Exchange (although you can restore a single database). All databases in a storage group share a single backup schedule and a single set of transaction log files.

Exchange Server 2007 Enterprise Edition supports up to 50 storage groups. Exchange 2007 Standard Edition supports up to five storage groups.

1. What is mail store?

The mail store is a directory or Universal Naming Convention (UNC) path where the POP3 service stores all e-mail until users retrieve it to their client computer.

The basic structure of the mail store, or mail root, is a directory on the local hard disk where all e-mail is stored.

When a domain is created, the POP3 service creates a corresponding directory in the directory that has been designated for the mail store. For each user with a mailbox in that domain, POP3 creates a directory in the domain directory. E-mail that a user receives is stored as an individual file within the user's directory until the user retrieves it using a POP3 e-mail client.

The following is an example of the path to an e-mail message in the mail store:

C:\inetpub\mailroot\mailbox\example.com\P3_someone.mbx\P347865.eml

Where mailroot corresponds to the mail store directory, example.com to the domain directory, P3_somone.mbx to the directory for a mailbox named someone and P347865.eml to a single saved e-mail message.

The directory and file permissions for each directory in the mail store are identical. When you configure the mail store, the permissions are set so that only local or domain administrators and the local network service, which the POP3 service is configured to run under, are assigned permissions to the directories. No other user is assigned read/write permissions.

The mail store's functionality depends on having adequate hard disk space available. To ensure the mail store's functionality, you should develop a disk-space requirement estimate based on the number of users on the server, the volume of e-mail that they will receive, and the average size of the e-mail they will receive.

In addition, you can protect the server from situations where the mail store's disk usage might increase unexpectedly by implementing disk quotas. Disk quotas monitor and control disk space that is used on NTFS file system volumes.

Notes

Because the mail store can potentially use large amounts of disk space, you should either set a disk quota limit on the volume of the mail store (to control its disk space usage) or set it to use a volume other than the one where the operating system is installed. This will prevent the possibility of the operating system running out of disk space if the mail store becomes too large.

The mail store must be configured to use either a directory on the local hard disk or a UNC path; other storage options, such as mapped drives, are not supported.

You cannot set the mail store to the root directory of the hard disk, for example C:\, or to a directory in which files are currently in use.

If you transfer the mail store to a new directory, you must move the mail store directory to ensure the directory retains the correct ownership; copying the mail store will not work.

Physical access to a server is a high security risk. To maintain a more secure environment, restrict physical access to the server where the mail store resides.

2. Explain Exchange transaction logs

Before changes are actually made to an Exchange database file, Exchange writes the changes to a transaction log file. After a change has been safely logged, it can then be written to the database file.

One of the most important components of Exchange server is the transaction logs. Exchange server was designed to write all transactions to these log files and commit the changes to the databases when the system allows. Users can send and receive messages without touching the database thanks to this write-ahead method of logging.

When a message is sent, the transaction is first recorded in the transaction logs. Until the transaction is committed to the Exchange database (EDB), the only existence of this data is in the system memory and the transaction logs. In the event of a crash, you lose the contents of the memory and all you are left with is the record in the transaction log. These transaction logs are crucial to the recovery of a failed Exchange server, whether it was a minor crash that required a reboot, or a more catastrophic failure requiring the deployment of your disaster recovery plans. The same goes for other transactions such as received messages, deleted items and messages moved to different folders.

3. What is default size for Transaction logs?

5 MB for 2003 and 1 MB for 2007

4. Why exchange is using transaction logs? Why not to write to data directly to the Exchange database?

For this reason, it is recommended to house the transaction files on a redundant storage system, like a RAID 1 array, so that in the event of a hardware failure, no data is lost. Losing a set of transaction logs will not prevent you from restoring from your backups, but you will lose all the messages and changes since the last full backup.

5. How exchange database gets defragmented?

There are two types of Exchange database defragmentation: online and offline.

Online Defragmentation

Online defragmentation is one of several database-related processes that occur during Exchange database maintenance. By default, on servers running Exchange 2000 Server and Exchange Server 2003, Exchange Server database maintenance occurs daily between 01:00 (1:00 A.M.) and 05:00 (5:00 A.M.). Online defragmentation occurs while Exchange Server databases remain online. Therefore, your e-mail users have complete access to mailbox data during the online defragmentation process.

The online defragmentation process involves automatically detecting and deleting objects that are no longer being used. This process provides more database space without actually changing the file size of the databases that are being defragmented.

Note: To increase the efficiency of defragmentation and backup processes, schedule your maintenance processes and backup operations to run at different times.

Offline Defragmentation

Offline defragmentation involves using the Exchange Server Database Utilities (Eseutil.exe). ESEUTIL is an Exchange Server utility that you can use to defragment, repair, and check the integrity of Exchange Server databases. It is available through the following sources:

If you are running Exchange 2000 Server, ESEUTIL is located in the E:\Support\Utils folder of your Exchange 2000 CD (where E:\ is the drive letter of your CD-ROM drive).
If you are running Exchange Server 2003, ESEUTIL is located in the F:\Program Files\exchsrvr\bin directory after running Exchange Server 2003 Setup (where F:\ is the drive letter of the drive to which you installed Exchange Server).
You can only perform offline defragmentation when your Exchange Server databases are offline. Therefore, your e-mail users will not have access to mailbox data during the offline defragmentation processes.

During the offline defragmentation process, Eseutil.exe creates a new database, copies the old database records to the new one, and then discards unused pages, resulting in a new compact database file. To reduce the physical file size of the databases, you must perform an offline defragmentation in the following situations:

After performing a database repair (using Eseutil /p)
After moving a considerable amount of data from an Exchange Server database.
When an Exchange Server database is much larger than it should be.

Defragmenting an Exchange 2000 or Exchange 2003 database

Defragmenting a database requires free disk space equal to 110 percent of the size of the database being processed.

1. In Exchange System Manager, right-click the information store that you want to defragment, and then click Dismount Store.

2. At the command prompt, change to the Exchsrvr\Bin folder, and then type the eseutil /d command, a database switch, and any options that you want to use.

For example, the following command runs the standard defragmentation utility on a mailbox store database:

C:\program files\exchsrvr\bin> eseutil /d c:\progra~1\exchsrvr\mdbdata\priv1.edb

Use the following database switch to run Eseutil defragmentation on a specific database:

eseutil /d <database_name> [options]

6. What is white space, and how can it be reclaimed?

White space is nothing but free space. When the 16 GB database size limit is reached on the Standard version of Exchange and white space must be reclaimed in order to mount the database. If you are running Exchange Server 2003, then Service Pack 2 (SP2) should be installed to raise the limit to 75 GB.

Free Space Reclamation

The version store is the area of the database that manages version control. When a transaction is committed to the database, a cleanup process returns space that is freed by modify and delete transactions to the database. For each modify or delete operation, the existing version of the record is written to the version store so that the database maintains a copy of the old version until the new version is written to the database. After the transaction is committed to the database, any space that is freed from deleted records and long values is returned to the table or index that owns the space. Until the change is committed to the database, requests for the object continue to access the old version. If the transaction is rolled back, the version store record is used to undo the transaction.

The version store has a size limit that is the lesser of the following: one-fourth of total random access memory (RAM) or 100 MB.

Because most domain controllers have more than 400 MB of RAM, the most common version store size is the maximum size of 100 MB. If too many large changes or deletions occur simultaneously, it is possible for the version store to run out of processing space. In this event, cleanup of free space is suspended temporarily. On domain controllers running Windows 2000 Server, the most common cause of version store overload is large-scale bulk deletions.

Bulk deletions and database growth in Windows 2000

Delete operations are the most CPU-intensive operations that the version store processes. On domain controllers running Windows 2000 Server, bulk deletions, such as the deletion of an entire tree of objects at one time, can cause a temporary condition in which free space cannot be returned to the database in a timely fashion because the cleanup process cannot keep up with the deletions. Event ID 602 is logged in the Directory Services event log to indicate this condition.

During the time that pages are being skipped by the cleanup process, free space is not released to the database, and space is not reclaimed until the next scheduled online defragmentation occurs. In the meantime, processing requirements can cause the database to grow. In particular, when bulk deletions or other bulk changes coincide with database additions, significant growth can occur. In addition, space from the deletion of long values is not returned to the database by online defragmentation. As a result of these conditions, the directory database on domain controllers running Windows 2000 Server can actually increase in size following a bulk deletion.

On domain controllers running Windows Server 2003, the effects of these conditions are greatly reduced by improvements in version store cleanup and online defragmentation. However, if event ID 602 is logged in the Directory Services event log, running online defragmentation manually can alleviate the problem. On domain controllers running Windows 2000 Server, the only way to prompt online defragmentation is to change the garbage collection interval to the minimum value of one hour to force garbage collection and online defragmentation to occur as soon as possible.

Improved space processing in Windows Server 2003

Two improvements in the Windows Server 2003 processing of free space eliminate the database growth problems that can result from large-scale bulk deletions:

•	The threshold at which the database begins skipping cleanup operations is increased from 5 percent to 90 percent.
•	Space is reclaimed from long-value deletions.

The threshold of maximum pages that can be processed by the version store is the limiting factor in whether the cleanup process can keep pace with deletions. The version store cleanup process can take place only as long as the version store has sufficient space. With a maximum version store size of 100 MB, only 5 MB (5 percent) is available in Windows 2000 Server, and this low threshold is responsible for early suspension of the cleanup process. The threshold of 90 MB (90 percent) in Windows Server 2003 eliminates this problem. For this reason, large-scale bulk deletions that can be problematic on domain controllers running Windows 2000 Server present no significant growth concerns on domain controllers running Windows Server 2003.

In addition, online defragmentation on domain controllers running Windows Server 2003 returns the space that is freed by long values to the long-value table, which further optimizes the availability of space in the database.

7. What time online maintenance runs by default in Exchange?

Exchange Server database maintenance occurs daily between 01:00 (1:00 A.M.) and 05:00 (5:00 A.M.).

8. What event log exchange logs after online defragmentation. What is the maximum storage capacity for Exchange standard version? What would you do if it reaches maximum capacity?”

For Exchange Server 5.5, an Event 179 from source ESE97 is logged for each database at the beginning of online defragmentation. An Event 180 signals completion of online defragmentation. An Event 183 indicates that online defragmentation did not complete, but has been suspended and will finish later. Online defragmentation may be suspended if the online maintenance period that is defined for the database expires before online defragmentation completes. In this case, online defragmentation will resume where it left off during the next online maintenance window.

In Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server and in Microsoft Exchange Server 2003, event ID 700 signals the beginning of a full pass, and event ID 701 signals the completion of a full pass.

You may view or adjust the Information Store Maintenance schedule in the Exchange Server Administrator program for individual databases.

The free space that is reported by Event 1221 is a conservative estimate. If you perform offline defragmentation, you will recover at least the amount of space that is reported as free. All space in an Exchange database is owned either by the database root or by particular tables in the database. Event 1221 estimates free space by calculating the number of empty pages owned by the messages table, the attachments table, and the database root. Free pages that are owned by other tables in the database are not taken into account.

9. Retention Period:

The retention period specifies how long Exchange will keep items that users have deleted. Upon deleting an item, Exchange marks the item for complete removal based on the retention period. The default retention period is set to 30 days:

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Monday 17 October 2011

Collection: Exchange Server 2003 (1)

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