E2k3 SP1 Site Consolidation: So you think you're ready to remove your 5.5 Site...

Exchange Site Consolidation using Exchange 2003 SP1

Adam's Mindspace — Mon, 07 Jun 2004 12:23:00 GMT

re: E2k3 SP1 Site Consolidation: So you think you're ready to remove your 5.5 Site...

Ned Gnichtel — Sat, 26 Jun 2004 22:11:00 GMT

Thanks Evan for all the useful info, however there are a few other items with regard to mixed mode cross admin group/site object moves:

Before performing any cross-site/admin group moves, check your ADC CA configuration. For example, in a large multi-site, multi-domain (single Forest) environment, it is possible during co-existence to have a single two-way ADC users CA per-site/domain that is primary for both exchange and AD (in other words, the sites recipients container is mapped to a container in the associated domain and vice-versa). This works fine in a traditional configuration whereby Exchange 5.5 objects (recipients, etc.) are being managed by the ADC within a single site and associated domain.

The problem that occurs is that during a cross-site move to a central site, the new appropriate ADC two-way "primary from windows" CA for the AD domain (that hosts the AD object) to the central site may not have been configured and the original CA for AD to local site replication is not reconfigured to be "primary from exchange" only. As a result the new object instance is never replicated to the central site. If these actions are not taken then the object cleanup (and "un-hiding") of the object never happens in the original site and everything comes grinding to a halt.

Now this may seem like an obvious step to miss, but in a large Exchange mixed mode environment with dozens (or more) of CA's this is an easy step to miss. Additionally, none of the exdeploy or cross-site tools check this prerequisite; they simply see that the AD and 5.5 are in sync and therefore allow cross-site moves to occur. There is also no error handling anywhere to indicate a problem or replication failure.

So before performing any cross-site moves, it is critical to double check your ADC CA topology and verify that you have the appropriate CA's from the Active Directory to the central site to allow the ADC to replicate the new instance of the object.

Thanks for the blogging...

Ned

Ned Gnichtel
Principal Consultant
Directory Services and Messaging
www.mtm.com

Moving public folder hierarchy for site consolidation

Evan's WebLog — Fri, 16 Jul 2004 06:27:00 GMT

re: E2k3 SP1 Site Consolidation: So you think you're ready to remove your 5.5 Site...

adam fazio — Thu, 05 Aug 2004 00:38:00 GMT

hey there - good info thanks. I am a bit confused about moving directory objects between sites (DLs, CRs). Why is this needed? The ADC has already replicated the objects to AD...

Also, I posted this in alother blog but never got a response:

a question about site consolidation: I have a couple 5.5 single-server sites in my org. Is it best to use the cross-site move method described in your webcast, or can I simply install the 2003 server in the single-server site, move all objects, then once in native mode move the server to the appropriate Admin Group?

also, about SP1, can you now move 2003 mailboxes across Admin Groups in mixed mode?

Thanks!

Do I really need to run the Exchange/Outlook Profile Redirector (ExProfRe)?

Evan's WebLog — Tue, 24 Aug 2004 19:40:00 GMT

So what if the

Evan's WebLog — Mon, 06 Sep 2004 01:31:00 GMT

So what if the

Evan's WebLog — Tue, 08 Feb 2005 15:59:00 GMT

Do I really need to run the Exchange/Outlook Profile Redirector (ExProfRe)?

Evan's WebLog — Tue, 08 Feb 2005 15:59:00 GMT

Moving public folder hierarchy for site consolidation

Evan's WebLog — Tue, 08 Feb 2005 16:01:00 GMT