SuperTekBoy

Practical Help for Exchange & Office 365

Presence missing in Outlook after Teams Only switch

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If you have recently made the switch from Skype to Teams Only mode in Office 365, you may have lost your presence data in Outlook.

Skype and Teams share their presence data with Outlook. When viewing or composing an email in Outlook you can also see the presence of anyone internal in your organization and any external users you have federated presence data with. That presence date will look like the screenshot below.

Presence data from Teams and Skype in Microsoft Outlook

In the example above, I have a green checkmark which identifies my presence as available. This could also be yellow to show away, red to show busy and, other presences such as do-not-disturb, out of office, or, unknown. This presence data can show up in other Office applications as well, such as Microsoft Word when co-authoring a document in real-time.

If you have recently switched to Teams-Only mode and there is no presence circle at all, then you may need to reconfigure your Teams client to share presence data. Below is an example of what that will look like.

Note: Presence data will also be missing if your Microsoft Teams client is not running.

Missing Presence Data in Microsoft Outlook
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Save Time with FindTime

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One of the great plugins for Outlook is FindTime. FindTime makes scheduling meetings easy by allowing organizers to poll attendees for their preferred date and time to meet. But FindTime is more than just a simple polling app, it integrates fully into your calendar. FindTime recommends meeting times, can place tentative placeholders on your calendar for each proposed time, and can automatically schedule the meeting if a consensus is met. Gone are the days of emails flying back and forth to find a time that works for everyone.

Note: There is one stipulation. The meeting organizer does require an active subscription to Office 365. The attendees do not. Attendees can be on any other email system.

Installing FindTime

To install FindTime, navigate to findtime.microsoft.com (alternatively, you can install FindTime from the Office 365 App Store – to do this, log into Office 365 and select Add-Ins). 

From the website click Install For Free (Requires Office 365).

Installing FindTime for Outlook

Select whether to receive FindTime announcements, updates, and information. Click I’m Ready.

Installing FindTime for Outlook
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The following servers in Windows Failover Cluster are not in Active Directory

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The Following Servers in the Windows Failover Cluster are not in Active Directory
The following servers in the Windows Failover Cluster are not in Active Directory: <server name>. This is usually the result of an incomplete membership change (add or remove) of the database availability group.

I ran into this error recently while trying to remove two Exchange 2010 members from a database availability group (DAG).

The error stated that a member of the DAG, a server named EXC3, did not exist in Active Directory. This was odd because queries to the Exchange 2010 management tools only returned two Exchange servers–EXC1 and EXC2.

We further confirmed that there was no computer account for EXC3 in Active Directory Users and Computers. We did however, see remanents of EXC3 in ADSI Edit.

Talking with our customer we discovered that there had been a third Exchange server, named EXC3, that had crashed and was never recovered.

Fix–The following servers in the Windows Failover Cluster are not in Active Directory

To verify the status of all nodes in your database availability group, open PowerShell and import the Windows Failover Clustering cmdlets with Import-Module.

 C:\> Import-Module FailoverClusters

Next, run the Get-ClusterNode cmdlet. This will retrieve the status of all our nodes.

 C:\> Get-ClusterNode

Name                                                  State
----                                                  -----
EXC1                                                     Up
EXC2                                                     Up
EXC3                                                   Down

In the example above, we can see EXC1 and EXC2 are operational, whereas EXC3 is offline.

Because EXC3 no longer exists (and the fact we plan to collapse the entire DAG anyway) we can forcibly evict the failed node. To do this issue the following command.

 C:\> Get-ClusterNode -Name "EXC3" | Remove-ClusterNode

Remove-ClusterNode
Are you sure you want to evict node EXC3
[Y] Yes [N] No [S] Suspend [?] Help (default is "Y"): Y

You will be prompted to confirm. Press enter to accept the default action of “Yes”.

If we repeat the first Get-ClusterNode command we will only have the two operation cluster nodes remaining.

 C:\> Get-ClusterNode

Name                                                  State
----                                                  -----
EXC1                                                     Up
EXC2                                                     Up

With no more failed nodes we can remove the two operational nodes using either the Exchange 2010 management console or PowerShell.

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Have you run into this error while add or removing members to a DAG? What did you do to fix it? Drop a comment below or join the conversation on Twitter

RunAs Radio #618 – Exchange 2019 with Gareth Gudger

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On November 30th I had the great pleasure of being a guest on the RunAs Radio podcast. I joined host Richard Campbell to discuss all the new features in Exchange 2019. We discuss the MetaCache Database (MCDB), the benefits of the new search architecture, and several client-side features.

Listen to the podcast

(Originally posted at http://runasradio.com/shows/show/618)

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The F12 easter-egg in Hybrid Configuration Wizard

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One of the best-kept secrets in the hybrid configuration wizard (“HCW”)
 is the F12 easter-egg. Jeff Kizner demonstrated this feature during his Ignite session back in September.

Tip: For a break down of Jeff’s session, with notes and timers, I highly recommend checking out 15 Ignite sessions every Exchange admin should see.

If you press F12 this enables a new section called Diagnostic Tools. This section provides shortcuts to the following tools or folders.

Hybrid Configuration Wizard F12 Diagnostic Tools HCW
  • Open Exchange Management Shell opens a remote PowerShell session to your on-premises Exchange servers.
  • Open Exchange Online PowerShell opens a PowerShell connection to Exchange Online. This supports MFA-enabled admin accounts.
  • Open Log File opens the active HCW log file in Notepad. The logs are stored in the profile of the user running the HCW. For example, C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Exchange Hybrid Configuration
  • Create Support Package will combine your HCW log files into a single ZIP file which can easily be sent to Microsoft support. This link actually opens a second screen where you can specify to ZIP logs from the last 24 hours, or, between a certain date range. You then have the option to copy the file to the clipboard so it can be easily attached to an email.
  • Open Logging Folder opens the folder location of the HCW logs. 
    The HCW logs are stored in the profile of the user running the HCW. For example, C:\Users\<user>\AppData\Roaming\Microsoft\Exchange Hybrid Configuration
  • Open Process Folder opens a Command Prompt to the HCW process directory.

Pressing F12 a second time will hide these tools.

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What do you think about this easter-egg? Have you run into any cool easter-eggs in other Microsoft products? Drop a comment below or join the conversation on Twitter

Connect-MsolService may fail when MFA is enabled

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When attempting to use Connect-MsolService with an MFA-enabled admin account you may receive a legacy auth prompt as opposed to a modern auth prompt. This incorrect prompt is due to the MSOnline PowerShell module being out of date. 

Unable to use Connect-MsolOnline with MFA - Exception of type Microsoft.Online.Administration.Automation.MicrosoftOnlineException

If you were to enter credentials in the legacy prompt you would be unable to connect and would receive the following cryptic error.

 C:\> Connect-MsolService

Connect-MsolService : Exception of type 'Microsoft.Online.Administration.Automation.MicrosoftOnlineException' was thrown. 
At line:1 char:1

Connect-MsolService
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
CategoryInfo          : OperationStopped: (:) [Connect-MsolService], MicrosoftOnlineException
FullyQualifiedErrorId : 0x800434D4,Microsoft.Online.Administration.Automation.ConnectMsolService

So, all we need to do is update, right?

Well, depending on how you originally installed the MSOnline module the update process may not be intuitive as you might think.

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What Ignite taught us about Exchange 2019

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Microsoft Ignite

It’s amazing to believe that Microsoft Ignite was over a month ago. With 1,610 sessions Microsoft gave us a massive amount of announcements and demonstrations of new product features. This included Exchange 2019.

If not already, I highly recommend checking out 15 Ignite sessions every Exchange admin should see.  Each session in this article includes extensive notes on what each session contained. In addition, those notes contain timers so you can jump to the section that interests you the most. Hopefully, it will also serve as a reference if you need to search for a certain announcement or feature weeks (or even months) down the road.

Here is what Ignite taught us about Exchange 2019.

Changes to Exchange development

The tagline for Exchange 2016 was that it was “forged in the cloud”. This was a result of Exchange Online and Exchange on-prem sharing a common code base. The greatest benefit of this common code was that it ran in the cloud for a number of months before shipping on-prem as a cumulative update. By the time the code was released on-prem, it had been more than validated as stable and able to run at scale.

Going forward Microsoft has separated Exchange on-prem into its own code branch. This means that Exchange online is no longer driving cumulative updates for on-prem. What will drive updates are security patches and feature requests from customers. So, be sure to make your voice heard on UserVoice, at conferences, and in the various TAP programs.

Exchange 2019 Forked Code Base From Exchange Online

While Microsoft currently plans to keep cumulative updates quarterly, they have opened up the conversation on whether updates should occur less frequently. Common feedback is that the current release cadence of quarterly cumulative updates is too aggressive for some customers. The product group also believes this could result in more stable releases.

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Exchange October 2018 Updates

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Exchange Server 2016 CU11

Last week was a big week for Exchange 2016. Microsoft released Cumulative Update 11. At this time no updates were released for Exchange 2013 or Exchange 2010. Exchange 2013 entered extended support back on April 10th, and Microsoft announced in June that cumulative update 21 was the last planned update for Exchange 2013.

As always, test these updates in a lab first! I recommend checking out this 7-part guide on configuring Exchange in your lab. It doesn’t take much to get one going.

The updates are as follows:

Exchange 2016 Mini

Exchange 2016 Cumulative Update 11 | KB4134118 | UM Language Pack

Exchange 2010 Mini

Exchange 2010 SP3 Rollup 24 | KB4458321 (released September)

Exchange 2010 Mini

Exchange 2010 SP3 Rollup 23 | KB4340733 (released August)

So, what’s new in these Cumulative Updates?

Cumulative Update 11 now officially supports .NET Framework 4.7.2. Framework 4.7.2 is only optional at this point and will not become mandatory until the June 2019 updates. Due to no quarterly update scheduled for December, it is expected that CU13 will be the first version to enforce 4.7.2 as a requirement.

Support for 4.7.2 has been officially added to Exchange 2013 CU21, which was released back in June. 4.7.2 will also be a requirement for Exchange 2019. However, 4.7.2 is preinstalled with Windows Server 2019, so it will not require a separate download. For a great resource on navigating which .NET update goes with which CU I recommend reading Upgrade Paths for CU’s & .NET by Michel de Rooij.

In the June updates, it was stated that all Exchange roles would require Visual C++ 2013. Microsoft has since clarified this statement to the following:

  • Mailbox role will require both Visual C++ 2012 & Visual C++ 2013
  • Edge & Management tools only require Visual C++ 2012

Cumulative Update 11 will now perform prerequisite checks to confirm the necessary versions of Visual C++ are installed.

These updates contain 22 security and bug fixes. Check KB 4134118 for a list of issues CU11 resolves.

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