Inside Entourage by Amir : Connectivity

How To Setup Exchange 2007 Account Automatically in Entourage 2008 Thru Autodiscover

amir — Sat, 31 Jan 2009 18:42:21 GMT

Entourage 2008 with SP1 can use Autodiscover Service available on Exchange 2007 Server to configure your Exchange account automatically. In this post I will talk about this new feature from Entourage user perspective. I have also recorded a screencast to actually show you how you can do it in Entourage 2008. Please keep in mind that this feature is not available in earlier versions of Entourage (2004 and earlier) & Exchange (2003 & earlier).

What’s Autodiscover Service?
Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 includes a new Microsoft Exchange service named the Autodiscover service. The Autodiscover service configures client computers for Exchange mailbox access that are running Microsoft Office Outlook 2007 or Microsoft Entourage 2008 for Mac. The Autodiscover service can also configure supported mobile devices (Windows Mobile or iPhone). The Autodiscover service provides access to Microsoft Exchange features for Outlook 2007 or Entourage 2008 clients that are connected to your Microsoft Exchange messaging environment. The Autodiscover service must be deployed and configured correctly for Outlook or Entourage clients to automatically connect to Microsoft Exchange features, such as the Availability service (used for Free/Busy info pull-up), OOF Assistant and Delegate management. Additionally, these Exchange features must be configured correctly to provide their respective functionality for Outlook & Entourage clients. You can go here for more info.

Now a couple of important points:

1. Entourage Version – Check to see which version of Entourage you are using. You should be using the latest released version (build), currently its 12.1.5 (081119). In order to check for that, launch Entourage, go to ‘Entourage’ menu on top left hand corner and then click on ‘About Entourage’, the top potion of resulting window should look like this:

If your version (build) does not match, you need to install all available updates for Office 2008 for Mac. You can do that by going to ‘Help’ menu and clicking on ‘Check for Updates’. ‘Microsoft AutoUpdate’ application will launch and you can then click on ‘Check for Updates’ button there to have it look for all available updates. It will check for released updates, will come back and report to you about them and you can then install them one by one. You can also download and install all updates from Mactopia.

2. Exchange Version – Check to see which version of Exchange Server is hosting your mailbox. You can do so by logging into your mailbox thru OWA or ‘Outlook Web Access’ (explained in screencast video). Generally organizations publish a website for this purpose, like Microsoft has published this website for its employees to log into their mailboxes thru OWA. You should have one as well, if you don’t know its address or URL, you should talk to your Exchange Server Administrator or IT Help Desk/Support in your organization.

The very first mention of Exchange Server version can be found on the main login page for OWA, it looks like this if it’s not published thru Microsoft ISA Firewall Server (see ‘Microsoft Exchange’ & ‘2007’ in the screenshot below):

Screencast video also talks about this in the beginning, where OWA has been published thru Microsoft ISA Firewall Server thus the login page looks a bit different. Let’s watch the screencast now.

Make sure you have Microsoft Silverlight installed on your machine.
This screencast video is recorded in HD (Resolution: 1280x720) with 16:9 Aspect Ratio.
Please watch it in ‘Full Screen’ mode for better experience.
To go 'Full Screen', just double click on the video.
To exit 'Full Screen' mode, double click on video again or press 'Esc' button on your keyboard.

Note: If you meet the requirements listed above and automatic Exchange account configuration still does not work for you, then it could be because your Exchange Server Administrator has not published Autodiscover Service properly. You should then contact your administrator to verify that. You can provide this link to get him started on that.

Continued Credentials Prompt in Entourage Connecting to Exchange Mailbox

amir — Tue, 12 Aug 2008 01:18:04 GMT

In this blog I wanted to talk about an issue which we have seen enough number of times working with our enterprise customers that it warrants a blog.

Issue
When connecting to an Exchange mailbox Entourage user sees the following error repeatedly. User enters correct credentials (username, password & domain) but same error comes back again thus effectively entering a never ending loop. We have seen this on all currently supported versions of Exchange & Entourage. This error can also come up when:

a. User tries to permanently delete or move a large number of messages from his Exchange mailbox

b. User tries to send/receive new mail after deleting or moving a large number of messages from his Exchange mailbox

Cause
When Entourage tries to permanently delete messages from a folder in Exchange mailbox, Exchange Server utilizes the TEMP (temporary) folder for that operation. If Entourage user does not have required permissions on that TEMP folder, server issues a '401, Access Denied' error. Moving messages in Entourage involves permanent deletion from source folder, thus it results in the same issue.

Resolution
There are two parts of it.

1. Locating TEMP & TMP Folders

a. Non-Clustered Servers
First determine which TEMP folder is set as default on Exchange Mailbox Server on the back-end, cos that's where the delete operation actually takes place. The default location of TEMP folder is set under the following registry key:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\System\CurrrentControlSet\Control\Session Manager\Environment
REG_EXPAND_SZ: TEMP
Value: <PATH>\TEMP

By default, the TEMP folder is located at: '%SystemRoot%\TEMP' which is usually 'C:\WINDOWS\TEMP'

Another place to check this is: Bring up 'Control Panel' on Exchange Server, go to System : Advanced : Environment Variables : System Variables (see the screenshot below)

Same check applies for TMP folder, if there is one located on your drive. The above registry key should have an entry for TMP folder as well.

b. Clustered Servers
On clustered servers, the following registry keys are used to specify the locations of TEMP & TMP folders (Ref.).

HKEY_USERS\<Cluster service account SID>\Environment\TEMP

HKEY_USERS\<Cluster service account SID>\Environment\TMP

2. Verifying Permissions
Now let's verify the permissions assigned on TEMP folder. The 'Authenticated Users' group (Entourage user belongs to this group) should have the following special permissions:

Traverse Folder / Execute File
Create Files / Write Data
Create Folders / Append Data

In order to check these permissions, locate the TEMP folder and then right click on it to take 'Properties', go to 'Security' tab, highlight 'Authenticated Users', under 'Permissions for Authenticated Users' section, click on 'Advanced' button (see the screenshot below)

You will then see the 'Advanced Security Settings for TEMP' folder window (see the screenshot below)

Highlight the entry for 'Authenticated Users' in the above window and then click on 'Edit' button to view/edit the permissions. The screenshot below displays the required permission assigned properly.

Same check applies for TMP folder, if there is one located on your drive.

Redirected TEMP/TMP Folder
If the TEMP/TMP folder has been redirected to D (or any other) drive on the Exchange Server, it is suggested to specify the above permissions at the following three levels:

1. Drive level, especially at the root of drive if you notice that 'Authenticated Users' group is simply missing

2. TEMP/TMP folder

3. Any sub-folders inside TEMP folder which may have numerical (like 1, 2, etc.) names as such folders have been seen on clustered servers

Important
You will need to restart IIS (Internet Information Server) on all those servers where you made these changes in permissions, i.e. mailbox servers on the back-end and front-end servers as well to which Entourage users are connecting for mailbox access.

More Info
If your Entourage users are running into this issue then IIS Log on Exchange Server (front-end and/or back-end) & TCPFlow Log on Entourage Client will show the following:

a. 'BDELETE' request from client

b. '401' error response from server

IIS Trace Sample

2008-08-10 07:05:33 W3SVC1 192.168.137.121 BDELETE /exchange/john/Deleted+Items/ - 80 CONTOSO\JOHN 192.168.120.110 Entourage/12.11.0+(PPC+Mac+OS+X+10.4.9) 401 5 0

2008-08-10 07:05:35 W3SVC1 192.168.137.121 BDELETE /exchange/john/Deleted+Items/ - 80 CONTOSO\JOHN 192.168.120.110 Entourage/12.11.0+(PPC+Mac+OS+X+10.4.9) 401 1 0

TCPFlow Trace Sample

192.168.120.110.54103-192.168.137.121.00080:
BDELETE /exchange/john/Deleted%20Items/ HTTP/1.1

192.168.137.121.00080-192.168.120.110.54103:
HTTP/1.1 401 Unauthorized