SEMblog

This is for reference really.
The events below are the sequence for a successful Backup of an Exchange database on Exchange 2007. It should apply no matter what backup application you are using, as long as it is Exchange aware.

When the jobs starts, this is logged:

 Event Type:      Information
 Event Source:      ESE
 Event Category:      Logging/Recovery
 Event ID:      210
 Date:            17/04/2009
 Time:            05:13:25
 User:            N/A
 Computer:      SERVER3
 Description:
 MSExchangeIS (3680) First Storage Group: A full backup is starting.

Immediately telling you which database is going to be backed up (you would see one for each database).

 Event Type:      Information
 Event Source:      ESE
 Event Category:      Logging/Recovery
 Event ID:      220
 Date:            17/04/2009
 Time:            05:13:25
 User:            N/A
 Computer:      SERVER3
 Description:
 MSExchangeIS (3680) First Storage Group: Beginning the backup of the file E:\Exchange Databases\First Storage Group\Mailbox Database.edb (size 3206 Mb).

When the backup is complete you get this reference:

 Event Type:      Information
 Event Source:      ESE
 Event Category:      Logging/Recovery
 Event ID:      221
 Date:            17/04/2009
 Time:            05:15:18
 User:            N/A
 Computer:      SERVER3
 Description:
 MSExchangeIS (3680) First Storage Group: Ending the backup of the file E:\Exchange Databases\First Storage Group\Mailbox Database.edb.

With the database backed up, the logs begin. The Exchange backup will include the logs that were generated while the backup was running. This store is quite small, so only a few log files are required:

 Event Type:      Information
 Event Source:      ESE
 Event Category:      Logging/Recovery
 Event ID:      223
 Date:            17/04/2009
 Time:            05:15:18
 User:            N/A
 Computer:      SERVER3
 Description:
 MSExchangeIS (3680) First Storage Group: Starting the backup of log files (range D:\Exchange Transaction Logs\First Storage Group\E0000005127.log - D:\Exchange Transaction Logs\First Storage Group\E0000005136.log). 

If the Backup was successful, then the complete message is logged:

 Event Type:      Information
 Event Source:      ESE
 Event Category:      Logging/Recovery
 Event ID:      213
 Date:            17/04/2009
 Time:            05:15:56
 User:            N/A
 Computer:      SERVER3
 Description:
 MSExchangeIS (3680) First Storage Group: The backup procedure has been successfully completed.

Finally, the committed transaction logs are flushed. You will notice that the last log being flushed is the one immediately before the log backed up earlier in the sequence.

 Event Type:      Information
 Event Source:      ESE BACKUP
 Event Category:      General
 Event ID:      916
 Date:            17/04/2009
 Time:            05:18:16
 User:            N/A
 Computer:      SERVER3
 Description:

Information Store (3680) Deleting log files D:\Exchange Transaction Logs\First Storage Group\E00000050E1.log to D:\Exchange Transaction Logs\First Storage Group\E0000005126.log.

The backup is successfully completed.

As you may be aware, my consultancy company is Amset IT Solutions Ltd. If you hire me, then this who you pay your bills to. As from 1st April 2009, that company name is no more. I changed it to Sembee Ltd.

There are a number of reasons why I changed it, the main one being to more closely link the company to me in an attempt to increase business. I also wanted a shorter more general name for business purposes.

It will take some time for the change to be reflected in everything I do, for example the branding on amset.info is still amset, but sembee.info points to the same place.

That was also the reason why the blog URL changed to blog.sembee.co.uk, as I wanted to use www.sembee.co.uk for the company address.

Otherwise everything else remains the same.

Blackberry - not a subject I usually touch on, but as I am using a BES variant with my Exchange system I thought I would post this little snippet.

Recently exchanged by very old 7230 Blackberry for a new Curve 8310. I found that my previously published applications of Google Maps and Google search were not appearing on the device.

A look through the event long on the server gave me this error:

Event Type: Warning
Event Source: BlackBerry Policy Service
Event Category: None
Event ID: 20000
Date:  29/03/2009
Time:  21:15:32
User:  N/A
Computer: BES-SERVER
Description:
Device info for hardwareID 0x8d000f03 could not be found.

No idea what that meant, and I couldn't find anything clear on Google either.
However looking through older posts on some forums from when the 8700 series was released, I was pointed to a file called device.xml, which can be found in this location: "C:\Program Files\Common Files\Research In Motion\AppLoader"

Apparently if your device doesn't appear in the list, then you will get the above error.

I am using Blackberry Professional Edition, which is currently on 4.1.4, whereas the current version of Blackberry Enterprise Server is 4.1.6 (or very close, at the time of writing). The device.xml file was quite out of date and the ID number in the error message did not appear in the file. I needed to update the file!

You can get an updated device.xml by installing the latest Desktop Software from Blackberry somewhere. (4.7 at the time of writing) I have seen references to the desktop software being installed on the server, but I already had it on my laptop for playing around with the device. It will be found in the same location on both the server and the workstation. I went from a file that was only 8kb in size to a 16kb file.

I simply copied the file from my laptop in to the same location on my Blackberry server re-ran the "loader /index" command and then restarted the Blackberry Policy service. The application pushed out to the device shortly afterwards.

This is a posting for anyone reading this blog using a feed reader.  

I am going to be making some changes to the blog in the next couple of weeks, and this could affect the RSS feed.

If your feed address is "feeds.sembee.co.uk/sembee" then you can stop reading now and go somewhere else, as that feed will not be affected.  

If you are using a feed that starts with the address of www.sembee.co.uk then you will need to change it to the Feedburner feed to ensure that you continue to receive the feed from this blog: http://feeds.sembee.co.uk/sembee 

When you are setting up your server for SMTP delivery, one of the key things that is looked at is how the server is setup with regards to DNS and how the server announces itself. The latter can be referred to as the SMTP banner or EHLO/HELO.

As such, a number of sites, such as dnsreport.com have popped up which will run tests against your server to ensure that its setup is correct. However with Exchange 2007 you will get inaccurate results.

What Are They Testing?

In short, what these sites do is connect to port 25 on your server and see how the server announces itself. However this is basically incoming email traffic, whereas what you are interested in is outbound email.

What has Changed?

With Exchange 2003 and older, the same SMTP banner was used for both incoming and outgoing email. With Exchange 2007 that has changed. The FQDN values are set separately on the Send and Receive Connectors.
Furthermore, the values you can set for the FQDN on the receive connector is limited in Exchange 2007 SP1 to either blank, the NETBIOS name or the Server's real FQDN. You cannot set them to anything else, such as your public FQDN. If you do try, you will get an error message.
Microsoft actually go as far as to say that you shouldn't change the value at all.

What can you do?

There is little that you can do. Online testing sites cannot test the outbound message appearance because that would mean you would have to initiate the traffic flow.
Simply ensure that  the FQDN set on the SEND Connector for port 25 traffic is set correctly - host.example.com - where host.example.com is the host name that resolves to your Exchange server.

References and Further reading

Receive Connectors: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/aa996395.aspx
DNS Configuration for Exchange: http://www.amset.info/exchange/dnsconfig.asp