Random thoughts of an Exchange PFE

Leaving Microsoft

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Fri, 28 Sep 2012 12:13:17 GMT

And since it’s not 1st April, you can rest assured it’s not a joke. Leaving Microsoft isn’t a decision you can make easily. Working for such a company is a privilege. Working with such an amazing talent everyday is something to die for. Working to produce...(read more)

Interesting 802.11n discovery

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Thu, 30 Aug 2012 16:12:53 GMT

Off the Exchange/Lync topic train but interesting enough this was for me to pass it on without writing about it. After a long period of laziness and ignorance of my home network, I finally got tired of buffering issues when I stream HD videos I took...(read more)

Accidental PowerShell 3 Get-Help discovery

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Fri, 20 Jul 2012 04:08:00 GMT

Get-Help has always been my favorite cmdlet. Anytime I am stuck, I was able to find lot more information about any given cmdlet when I need. Until today, my favorite feature was Get-Help's –online parameter. For the cmdlet that have specified...(read more)

If Retention Tags weren’t confusing…

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Fri, 08 Jun 2012 20:23:00 GMT

UPDATE: Please read updated guidance due to changes introduced in SP2 RU4 here: http://blogs.technet.com/b/exchange/archive/2012/08/14/calendar-and-tasks-retention-tag-support-in-exchange-2010-sp2-ru4.aspx . It specifically addresses Calendar items and...(read more)

Exchange Management Shell Error 500 - Internal Server Error

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Fri, 04 May 2012 05:05:27 GMT

I have come across this issue enough times that even if it is documented on TechNet it deserves mention here. When you launch Exchange Management Shell or try to connect to an Exchange 2010 Server remotely using PowerShell, you get error “500 – Internal...(read more)

Certificate revocation checked failed

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Mon, 30 Apr 2012 21:06:07 GMT

Recently I came across a CAS server that was rebuilt. Think of it as a new server you are introducing in your environment. Everything looked good except certificate that we imported. The certificate looked good when looking at validity, issuing...(read more)

RBAC and Principle of Least Privilege

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 22:05:00 GMT

Exchange 2010 introduced RBAC as a mechanism to manage access to administrative tasks at granular level which was not possible in previous versions of Exchange. While you may know how to use RBAC to create custom roles that maps to job functions in your...(read more)

Updated - Verify Exchange Server Schema Version

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Thu, 15 Dec 2011 15:30:00 GMT

This article was originally posted on my personal blog here . Since I don't actively maintain it anymore, I am publishing it here. When you run Exchange Setup to prepare schema, usually the very next question is, how do I verify schema was updated...(read more)

New pre-requisites for Exchange 2010 Service Pack 2 and CAS Role

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Tue, 06 Dec 2011 15:56:00 GMT

With release of Service Pack 2 for Exchange Server 2010, you gain few new features such as Cross-Site Silent Redirection for OWA , Address Book Policies , Mailbox Auto-Mapping and few other additions ( What’s new in Exchange 2010 SP2 ). With...(read more)

Script to configure static ports on Exchange Server 2010

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 20:45:35 GMT

There is nothing new about this. If you have been reading about Exchange Server 2010 or have it deployed with hardware load balancer, chances are, you have read how to configure static ports on Exchange Server 2010 on TechNet Social wiki for Exchange...(read more)

PowerShell script to edit remote registry

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Fri, 21 Oct 2011 19:24:01 GMT

Did you ever wanted to modify your registry or add a key/value pair to registry? Wished there was a script to help you do that? Even better, wished it can run remotely without PowerShell WinRM listener configured on target server? I had custom script...(read more)

Mythbusters–Exchange Server 2010 and PowerShell Remoting

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Tue, 27 Sep 2011 17:22:44 GMT

A misconception that WinRM listener needs to be configured in order to be able to connect to Exchange Server 2010 had popped up a couple times in my conversations recently so I decided to clear the confusion. Guest blogging for my friends at IT Pro Africa...(read more)

Remembering 9/11/2001

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Mon, 12 Sep 2011 04:48:03 GMT

While it is easy for us grown ups to get used to all the chatter on radio and television and not pay enough attention to anything that isn’t of utmost importance to our personal lives or goals, my 5 yr. old today reminded me of why a 5 yr. old is better...(read more)

Maximum Recipients per Message and exceptions

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Thu, 25 Aug 2011 22:20:51 GMT

I just posted this article at our PFE site Mr. Proactive . Here’s the excerpt of the article: While this is fairly documented on TechNet, it sometimes takes a bit to find and memory usually fails us when the question of precedence comes up. I figured...(read more)

Microsoft Exchange 2010 PowerShell Cookbook Review

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Mon, 22 Aug 2011 20:49:00 GMT

Disclaimer: I am not paid to write about this book and the review written here is my own view. I was recently contacted by Packt Publishing about their recently published book “ Microsoft Exchange 2010 PowerShell Cookbook ”. I have voluntarily reviewed...(read more)

Script to report bad Apples!

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Thu, 18 Aug 2011 21:30:24 GMT

You may have seen Microsoft Support article “ Current issues with Microsoft Exchange ActiveSync and Third Party Devices ”. It documents multitude of problems with third party devices using ActiveSync. the list includes everyone’s favorite fruit devices...(read more)

Script to disable IPv6 Components

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Fri, 05 Aug 2011 06:55:46 GMT

While most documentation you may come across states to not disable IPv6 components on Windows 7 or Windows 2008 servers, you may have instances where disabling IPv6 components may become necessary. If you have to disable IPv6 components, the procedure...(read more)

Why does catch not catch?

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Wed, 13 Jul 2011 20:50:29 GMT

I ran into an interesting discussion with my customer today. He was writing a code block that looked like the following: Try { Get-MailboxServer Bogus } Catch { "Mailbox server doesn't exist" } Looking at the code, it’s very simple. Run a command...(read more)

Is your Windows machine ready for World IPv6 Day?

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Wed, 01 Jun 2011 21:11:39 GMT

We are just a week away from World IPv6 day. On June 8, 2011, a host of technology companies with participate. By participating, they will enable their websites to be accesible using both IPv4 and IPv6. What does that mean to you? Probably nothing if...(read more)

Exchange Team Blog Mobile and PowerShell Error Handling

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Mon, 23 May 2011 22:04:33 GMT

I admit the two topics don’t have anything in common except both has something to do with me. That’s why they are both being talked about in same post! So If you haven’t caught up on this yet, I created a Windows Phone App for the Exchange Team Blog ...(read more)

How are y’all?

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Mon, 23 May 2011 21:34:12 GMT

Yes it has been few very interestingly busy weeks. Unusual for amount of travel I have been doing. Being dedicated PFE, I am not required to travel this much. But since it’s all for a good cause, I can’t complain. It was an interesting trip because besides...(read more)

Couldn't find public folder on Exchange 2010 server?

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Thu, 05 May 2011 20:38:25 GMT

Head over to my Mr. Proactive post here: http://blogs.technet.com/b/mr_proactive/archive/2011/05/05/these-are-not-the-public-folders-you-are-looking-for.aspx...(read more)

How to revert changes made by Enable-PSRemoting?

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Thu, 28 Apr 2011 04:50:00 GMT

Have you ever been in a situation where you have PowerShell Remoting enabled and you need to put the configuration back the way it was before Enable-PSRemoting was run? While it might seem that just running Disable-PSRemoting should suffice, it turns...(read more)

Every good thing must come to an end…

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Mon, 25 Apr 2011 04:38:48 GMT

And before you get a shock from the title, let me clarify, all I am talking about is PowerShell Scripting Games 2011 . I had a privilege of being one of the judges this year and I know I haven’t done it enough justice. I was planning to be a lot more...(read more)

All Exchange 2010 network communications in a diagram

Bhargav Shukla [MSFT] — Tue, 05 Apr 2011 20:29:15 GMT

Today, Michel de Rooij posted an update to his Exchange 2010 SP1 Network ports diagram. You can find it here . This is a great resource if you ever need to refer to network flow between different roles and well as different clients to server communications...(read more)