In the just announced service release, you'll find a mention of the following powershell commands.
Q: What do these do?
These can be used together or sepearlty to help manage a migration or adminster your accounts.
Typically, you would run Get-MSOnlineSubcrtption to return a a GUID associated with the type of liscneses available. This determines what kinds of services can be activated for users, then you use that GUID do Enable-MSOnlineUser. If you assign an Exchange Online lisence the user will have a mailbox assigned. At the same time, one of the parameters allows you to set the password for the user. In addition, you can set the password later for any user with the Set-MSOnlineUserPassword script.
Q: Why are these needed?
When you use directory synch to create users, users need to be activated before they can use mail or other services. This script provides an automated way of activating users and is faster than usin the admin console. Since it's a script, you can add code to intelligently scope the activation.
In addition, when activating uses, you can set the password to a known or generated value and add code to have the user emailed about the activation.
Finally, the set password script allows a BPOS admin to change a users password from powershell rather than having to login to the admin center. Very handy.
Q: When can I use them?
The scripts willl be implemented in a new version of the Migration Tool which is scheduled to be shipped when the deoplyments are completed. This should be by the end of October at the latest.
Q: Where can I get details on the syntax and use
When the migration tool is released, the scripts will have built in help that shows the syntax. We are planning on some demos and the like to be released soon. As a tip, you might want to check the Microsoft Online documentation as that could be udpated any time with details on the scripts.http://www.microsoft.com/resources/Technet/en-us/MSOnline/bpos/html/1843e98e-1c13-409d-8d56-c67f0cb87f5e.htm
Also, I might add that you can expect more powershell fun in the future.