Microsoft Online Services Team Blog : Manage Users

Updated Tools for Bulk User Activation Now Available

paulenglis — Mon, 26 Oct 2009 23:49:00 GMT

The updated Microsoft Online Services Transporter Tools (aka Microsoft Online Services Migration Tools), announced in the October Service Update, is now available via the Microsoft Download Center.

The updated Transporter Tool supports PowerShell commandlets for bulk activation of users for Microsoft Online Services. The new supported commandlets include:

· Enable-MSOnlineUser

· Get-MSOnlineSubscription

· Set-MSOnlineUserPassword

What State Are Your User Accounts In?

JimGlynn — Fri, 09 Oct 2009 06:25:00 GMT

The most common user account states are enabled and disabled, which are pretty straight forward. However, if your company is using the Microsoft Online Services Directory Synchronization tool, your user accounts can also be activated and deactivated. The combination of all of these states can be confusing, so let's look at what each state means.

The four states are:

· Enabled

· Disabled

· Deactivated

· Activated

Enabled and Disabled

If your company is using Active Directory, you'll be happy to know that enabled and disabled accounts work just like they do in Active Directory. You have the option to enable a user account when you create it. Users can log on with an enabled account and they are prevented from logging on if their account is disabled.

You may want to disable an account when someone goes on vacation, or if you want to temporarily lock an account for any reason. Disabled accounts continue to exist and use one or more licenses; they're just locked. Enabling the account unlocks it and returns it to service.

Deactivated

If you're not using the Directory Synchronization tool, you won't have deactivated user accounts. Deactivated accounts are visible in the Microsoft Online Services Administration Center. The good news is that they don't use any licenses, so they're free. Think of them as shadow accounts waiting for you to assign services to them.

Deactivated user accounts are created by the Directory Synchronization tool when it synchronizes all user accounts, contacts, and mail-enabled groups from your company's on-premises Active Directory directory service to Microsoft Online Services. Synchronizing accounts to Microsoft Online Services is a fast, easy way to create user accounts. However, if you have a large company, you may not want to assign services to all of your users at the same time, so synchronized accounts are in a deactivated state until you activate them by assigning services to them.

Activated

Activated user accounts are accounts that have been assigned one or more services. Each activated account uses one or more licenses. If you create a user account in the Administration Center, the account is automatically activated when you create it and assign a service to it.

You can activate deactivated user accounts by selecting one or more accounts in the Administration Center and clicking Activate User Accounts. This lets the service know that this is now a "real" user account that will start using licenses. The rest of the activation process works just like creating a new user account.

Disabling and Deleting User Accounts

Stephanie Shenk — Mon, 17 Aug 2009 23:27:00 GMT

When organizations subscribe to Microsoft Online Services, they purchase licenses for their users. As users leave the organization and new people join, administrators have several options for accommodating these personnel changes, including disabling user accounts, reassigning user licenses, and purchasing additional user licenses.

Disabling User Accounts
If a person leaves an organization, administrators can easily disable that user’s account. Disabling a user account prevents user access to e-mail and Microsoft SharePoint Online data, but retains the user’s data. Disabling a user account also keeps the user license associated with that account. This is the best option to utilize when a person leaves an organization temporarily.

For information about how to disable and enable user accounts, see Enable or Disable a User Account in Microsoft Online Services Help.

Deleting User Accounts
If a person leaves an organization, administrators can also delete a user’s account. Deleting a user account frees the user license, allowing the license to be assigned to a different user. This is the best option to utilize when a person leaves an organization permanently.

Important: When you delete a user account, you permanently delete all information associated with the user's account: for example, the user's profile data and e-mail messages. The best practice is to back-up user data before deleting the user account. If you delete a user account by mistake and need to recover that user account and data, contact Microsoft Online Services Technical Support

For information about how to delete a user account, see Delete a User Account in Microsoft Online Services Help.

Purchasing Additional User Licenses
If an organization is growing and needs additional user licenses, additional licenses can be purchased at the Microsoft Online Services Customer Portal or through a Microsoft Online Services partner.

Cannot Create a User in the Microsoft Online Services Administration Center

erikgun — Fri, 19 Sep 2008 21:48:00 GMT

There are currently two situations that may prevent you from creating a user account in the Microsoft Online Administration Center:

· You cannot access your company’s Live Meeting Conference Center.

· You are creating a user account with the same e-mail address as the one used to register with Microsoft Online Services.

Live Meeting Is Not Available

User account creation currently requires access to your company’s Live Meeting Conference Center. If the Conference Center is offline for maintenance or can’t be reached for some other reason, user account creation will fail. In this situation, please wait several hours before trying again to create the user account. This dependency will be removed before Microsoft Online Services is released.

User Account E-Mail Address Cannot Be Reused

Microsoft Online Services currently does not support creating a user account with exactly the same e-mail address as the one used to register with Microsoft Online Services. For example, if you use Jim@contoso.com when you register with the Microsoft Online Services Customer Portal and you try to create a new user account with the same e-mail address, creation of this user account will fail. If this occurs, contact Microsoft Online Services Technical Support. They will be able to help you create this user account. This issue will be resolved before Microsoft Online Services is released.