All posts by BoonTee

How to Plan Your Office 365 Migration

This blog post comes courtesy of LepideMigrator for Exchange. These are excellent points to take note of.

The process of migrating to office 365 can be a daunting task. Like anything, you need to ensure you have a well thought out plan. The implications of a failed migration can be catastrophic. Here are a few things we found contribute towards ensuring your migration is successful.

1. Assess your existing IT Environment

The first thing you need to do is make sure you archive or delete any obsolete mailboxes and ensure that you get an understanding of the size and number of mailboxes that you wish to migrate. Ensure also that you understand which versions and configurations you have in the organization and know the network bandwidth required for connectivity.

2. Formulate Pre-Deployment Decisions

Next, you need to formulate pre-deployment decisions by finding answers to mission-critical questions like – what method you will follow to create new accounts, authenticate users, achieve synchronization with the old user accounts and how will you transition data and perform migration.

3. Put all your pre-deployment controls right

Before you move your critical business communication to the cloud, clean up all any dormant Active directory accounts that you have, set up the network, update the versions of client software and make all the content that you wish to migrate ready for transition.

To execute all the above pre-migration tasks, you can take help from 3rd party tools that possess a pre-migration analyzer to give you precise approximations.

4. Research Office 365 Subscription plans as per your requirements

Now, it’s time to do extensive research on which subscription plan suits your business requirements. After you figure out one, cross-check the domains that you need to make use of with your new subscription. In this step, you can also pre-plan for configuration of applications that you may require in future.

5. Pilot-Test the deployment and the whole migration process

For your upcoming migration, it is crucial to perform testing on the deployed configuration and check the whole migration process for loopholes.

6. Proceed with final rollout

Finally, it’s time to set up accounts and mailboxes on the new environment i.e. Office 365. Start adding your old users, new contacts and allocate suitable licenses with each of them. Also, move data (emails, mailboxes, calendar, files and other information) that you wish to migrate to your new system.

7. Transfer Domain Name System Settings to your new environment

After you’re done with complete configuration of Office 365, you need to validate the functionality by transferring your previous DNS setting and enabling them to point to Office 365.

8. Configure client systems and establish connections

Now, it’s time to configure client systems again as per the new environment and establish connections with Office 365 including applications like Outlook, Office, Outlook for MAC operating system and other mobile devices.

Conclusion

When you choose to migrate to the cloud, the biggest question is – are you doing it the right way? So, you can either pull off the above list as per your specific business needs or take help from our Office 365 solution – LepideMigrator for Exchange. Good day!

Windows 7 SP1, Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2008 R2, Windows Server 2012, and WIndows Server 2012R2 Update Rollup all in a single package

Today, MIcrosoft announced the availability of a single update rollup package for Windows 7 SP1 and Windows Server 2008 R2. Some details for the rollup are as follows:

  • All security and non-security fixes since the release up to April 2016.
  • One installation package.
  • Optional install – not offered via Windows Update.
  • Monthly rollups after April 2016.
  • Security bulletins will continue to link to a direct update.
  • For Windows 8.1, Windows Server 2012, and WIndows Server 2012 R2, there will be monthly rollup updates.

Thanks, Microsoft, for listening!

To get the rollups, you need Internet Explorer 6 or higher (not Edge – since this is not an update package for Windows 10). Get the updates here – http://catalog.update.microsoft.com/v7/site/Search.aspx?q=3125574

At this stage, other browsers are not supported, although Microsoft have hinted that the site will be updated in the next few months.

 

I’ve been awarded the 2016 Microsoft MVP Award

I received an email from Microsoft this morning, presenting me with the 2016 Microsoft MVP Award. This is the 7th time I have received this award. I’m glad that I have been able to make a difference in enhancing and enriching the IT experience for Small and Medium Businesses. Here is a snippet from the email.

MVP2016

Dear Boon Tee,

Congratulations! We are pleased to present you with the 2016 Microsoft® MVP Award! This award is given to exceptional technical community leaders who actively share their high quality, real world expertise with others. We appreciate your outstanding contributions in Cloud and Datacenter Management technical communities during the past year.

The Microsoft MVP Award provides us the unique opportunity to celebrate and honor your significant contributions and say “Thank you for your technical leadership.”

Patrick Malone
Director
Community & Advocacy Programs
Microsoft

 

Office 365 migrations

I just spent the weekend working performing some SBS to Office 365 migrations.

Here are some useful links that make the process a whole lot easier.

Export mailboxes to PST for Exchange 2010 (SBS 2011 Standard)

Export mailboxes to PST for Exchange 2007 (SBS 2008)

Import PST files to Office 365

Enabling Autodiscover for Outlook in SBS Exchange Environments

Getting Outlook 2007 and Outlook 2010 to work with Office 365

  • The following link lists the minimum requirements needed to quickly get your Outlook desktop client running with Office 365.
  • http://www.netdummy.net/office365-client-updates.html
  • With SBS 2011, it is necessary to remove the Service Connection Point (SCP)
    • Show SCP information: Get-ClientAccessServer | Select Name, AutoDiscoverServiceInternalUri
    • Remove SCP information: Set-ClientAccessServer -Identity “[Servername]” -AutoDiscoverServiceInternalUri $NULL

Importing LegacyDN information

Problems connecting Outlook to Office 365 

AND if you happen to still be using SBS 2003 (I certainly hope not!), you can use Exmerge or Outlook to output individual mailboxes to PST. Do it soon!

WARNING. Watch out for those email attachments.

It’s time to remind everyone again. Malware, Crypto Viruses and all kinds of nasties are still out there, and pose a bigger threat than ever.

Check out this latest ransomware variant – https://blog.knowbe4.com/its-here.-new-ransomware-hidden-in-infected-word-files

And from TrendMicro – http://blog.trendmicro.com/trendlabs-security-intelligence/recent-crypto-ransomware-attacks-a-global-threat/

And Sophos: The current state of ransomware – https://blogs.sophos.com/tag/ransomware/

Here’s a reminder from way back in 2012 on how to detect and identify these viruses when they pop up in your mailbox.

  1. DO NOT OPEN ZIP ATTACHMENTS.
  2. DO NOT OPEN ATTACHMENTS. Right click and save them to a temporary location on your computer, and check it out before opening it.
  3. DO NOT CLICK ON LINKS IN EMAILS. Hover your mouse over the link and be absolutely sure it is a legitimate link before you click on it.
  4. REVIEW THIS BLOG POST. Again. http://blog.powerbiz.net.au/security/how-to-detect-and-deal-with-malicious-email-viruses/

 

Windows 10 Update History

Microsoft have finally put up a webpage to document what has been changed in each build of Windows 10 when the operating system is released.

Since the initial release of Windows 10, two updates have occurred. The details of each update have been documented here – http://windows.microsoft.com/en-us/windows-10/update-history-windows-10

Outlook 2010 runs in Safe Mode after KB3114409

 

Microsoft released a bad patch on 9 December 2015, which caused Outlook 2010 to run only in Safe Mode. The fix for this is to uninstall the patch. Microsoft has already pulled this patch and is likely to release it again at a later time. I would suggest waiting at least a week before reinstalling this patch.

To fix this issue, perform the following steps to uninstall the bad patch.

  1. Close Outlook and All Microsoft Office Programs
  2. Open Control Panel
  3. Click on Programs. (Alternatively, you can search for View installed updates in the search bar at the top right corner of the Control Panel)

     

  4. Click on View Installed Updates

     

  5. Scroll down to the Microsoft Office 2010 section, and look for Update for Microsoft Outlook 2010 (KB3114409) 32-Bit Edition (or 64-Bit Edition).

     

     

     

  6. Click Uninstall

     

     

  7. Click the Uninstall button

     

  8. The patch will be uninstalled

     

  9. When the patch is uninstalled, click OK and close the Control Panel

 

 

Windows 10 Default Printer keeps changing

A “new” feature in the latest cumulative update for WIndows 10 automatically sets the default printer to the last used printer. This setting is turned on by default. This means that every time you use a printer, this printer becomes the default printer for the system.

While this might be a nice feature to have, it can potentially cause a waste of paper and some potentially “difficult” situations when documents are unwittingly printed to the wrong printer. ie, that receipt for the surprise birthday gift, or the 100 page draft document that was supposed to be printed to the paper optimiser print driver.

Fortunately, we can turn off this setting.

  1. Open up Printers & Scanners. Tip: Click on the Start Menu, and type “Printers & Scanners” in the search box.
  2. In the Printers & Scanners settings page, turn off the setting “Let Windows manage my default printer“.

PrintersAndScanners

Windows 10 support on Windows Server Essentials and Small Business Server

The Essentials Server team have released a blog post to highlight which client versions are supported on currently supported Windows Server Essentials and Small Business Server 2011. The blog post can be read here – http://blogs.technet.com/b/sbs/archive/2015/07/23/client-connector-availability-with-windows-home-server-small-business-server-and-windows-server-essentials-for-supported-client-os.aspx

Basically, if you need to connect a Windows 10 client to Windows Server Essentials 2012 R2, which is probably the most common scenario, you will need to perform a manual client connector installation. A fix for the server is scheduled to be released on 17 November 2015.

Another common scenario would be the joining of the client connector for a Windows 10 client to Small Business Server 2011. In this case, 2 lines need to be added to the XML file on the server, which is located at C:\Program Files\Windows Small Business Server\Bin\WebApp\ClientDeployment\packageFiles\supportedOS.xml. Add the following 2 lines.

<OS Architecture="9" RequiredProductType="1" RequiredSuite="" ExcludedSuite="512" SPMinor="" SPMajor="" Build="10240" Minor="0" Major="10" Name="Windows 10, AMD64" id="9"/>
<OS Architecture="0" RequiredProductType="1" RequiredSuite="" ExcludedSuite="512" SPMinor="" SPMajor="" Build="10240" Minor="0" Major="10" Name="Windows 10, x86" id="10"/>