The Exchange Server 2007 (formerly Exchange 12) Team is pleased to announce that a more recent Beta build is available for download, called DF4 (Dogfood 4). Here is a list of many of the updates:
Store:
In the Store area, we are adding several feature, these include:
- Management and deployment of client and server for RPC/HTTP
- Customizable and rich text format System Messages (such as the overall message & NDRs)
- Management of Mailbox Locale
- Messages sent via Outlook in cached mode will be uploaded only once
- The ability to monitor and limit the resource consumption of individual users
Admin
路 All Work Centers (Recipient, Server, Organization, Toolbox) are complete..
路 All GUI is done for each role (mailbox, client access, edge, bridgehead, and unified messaging)
路 Start Page walks you through steps it may take to finish deploying advanced features on a server and step-by-step walk through configuration of complex features
路 Polished Console Look - New Vista style icons throughout console and cool wizard skin
路 Cmdlet Exposure in GUI - Management shell (monad) task details are shown at wizard completion
Cmdlet Infrastructure
路 Get/Set Permissions - the ability to set AD ACLs and MAPI Client perms with cmdlets
路 Shell enhancements 鈥?ability to support wildcards, improve identity / pipelining, support input from import-clixml, improved error reporting and what-if support for AD based cmdlets
路 Event Logging support 鈥?allows each actions performed to be logged to an NT eventlog
路 More granular delegation model 鈥?out of the box support for 4 *canned* roles (Exchange Org, Recipient, Server and View-Only) along with support for custom delegation via 鈥渟cripted鈥?solution leveraging E12 USG model and get/set permissions cmdlets
Directory
路 Encryption of AD traffic 鈥?all traffic between AD driver and the AD will be encrypted.
路 Preferred GC/DC for management 鈥?ability to specify a particular GC or DC when performing an operation
路 New Web Distribution Mechanism for OAB 鈥?allows us to run in a PF Free environment + leverage O12 usage of BITS to download the OAB
路 Added schema to enable support for a Hierarchical Address Book and Yomi Details templates
路 Schema Optimizations 鈥?upgrade from Ti to E12 will be faster, new install will be optimized and better progress will be provided (more granular schema files)
Migration
路 Administrative message removal 鈥?support for filtering messages in the move-mailbox task (e.g. Joe sent out the salary spreadsheet to the entire org, we have to get that out of people鈥檚 mailboxes before they see it!)
路 Move Content to a folder 鈥?ability to move messages to one folder within a mailbox
路 RSG support - support E12 RSG as source for move-mailbox
路 O12 Delegation support in X-Org moves 鈥?allows admin to move a delegate or a manager or both between organizations 鈥?assumes a two way trust
Setup
路 The ability to add/remove roles via add/remove programs, also includes, Role Picker, Guidance, Start Page, and Maintenance mode.
路 Updated AD preparation 鈥?/preparedlegacypermissions , /PrepareAD, /PrepareDomain
路 Delegated setup 鈥?ability to have a lower level (non Exchange Org Admin) to install certain Exchange servers
路 Unified Setup Log file 鈥?one log file that contains all relative setup execution steps which will make it easier to troubleshoot setup problems
Monitoring:
- 64-bit Support for MOM
- MOM Reporting Server for all Reports
- Availability Reports: UM, ActiveSync, and Availability Summary
- Message Hygiene Reports: Content, Connection, Recipient, Sender, and Attachment Filters, and Protocol Analysis
- Disk Performance Report
- Mailbox Count Report
Calendaring:
路 Calendar diagnosability: server-side logging plus in-depth analysis of calendars to find and fix any consistency issues
路 Notify organizer when a recipient forwards a meeting.
路 Modifying the 鈥淐alendar Options鈥?page in OWA to enable control of our server-side calendar attendant.
- Enabling customizable response messages and control of resource booking through an OWA options page.
Email Lifecycle Policies:
- Replicating a user鈥檚 folder hierarchy under in their clean-up folders so they can better review what is heading for expiration
- ELC logging for compliance reporting.
HA/DR:
In the HA/DR area, we are adding a critical set of features to fill out our E12 HA, Replication and DR solutions. These include:
- Automatic Initial Seeding of the replica: completely automatic configuration
- Incremental Reseeding when the 2 copies diverge: after a failure, instead of recopying of data back to the primary, only a small fraction of the data needs to be recopied
- Transport Dumpster Queue to recoup data loss on lossy-failovers: taking advantage of the persisted transport queues to recovery mail still caught in the last log file when the JET DB Log drive fails.
- Web Quorum from MSCS: eliminating the need for a 3rd server to act as a voter with our CCR servers.
- Content Indexing support in CCR configuration
- Redundant Network Path support on log copy
The Edge
Active Message Protection - The next generation of antispam technologies.
路 Intelligent Message Filter with signatures to improve accuracy.
路 IPRS - Ability to learn locally from sender behavior and block connections from misbehaving senders.
路 Edge Rules - deploy rules to reject mail storms /floods / worms at the edge.
Message Layer Security (MLS)
An internet scale key exchange and message encryption technology designed to allow adhoc messaging security. Messages delivered via MLS can be authenticated to the senders internet domain, and are kept confidential from sending domain to recipient domain. These messages will be shown in Outlook 12 (in B2TR) and OWA (later build TBD) with special security icons similar to client S/MIME.
Edge Subscriptions
ActiveDirectory configuration data is securely replicated out to edge servers to reduce the pain of managing recipient filtering, safe senders, edge-bridgehead routing and remote domain policies.
The Bridgehead
Accepted and Remote Domain Policies
路 Configure security requirements and delivery restrictions for communications with specific domains
路 Supports TLS, MLS, Basic Auth+TLS and External security mechanism
Compliance Features
路 Message Classifications 鈥?Admin can deploy rules and message classifications to deploy custom message policies. OLK12 users can associate a class with a message at compose time.
路 Organizational (Bridgehead) Rules - deploy rules to restrict messaging based on sender / recipient / content.
路 Journaling - retain copies of messages sent to / from users or members of groups
RMS integration
路 Prelicensing 鈥?Rights Managed messages have a license attached to allow roaming access to content without a public facing RMS server.
Web Services
路 Client-scheduled ("pull") notifications & server-scheduled ("push") notifications
路 Contacts
路 Tasks
路 Recurring PIM items (calendar items and tasks)
路 Full MAPI property support
路 Improved development experience
路 MOM integration
路 Read receipt handling
路 Improved server to server authentication delegation
路 Grouped searches
路 Search and search folders
路 Item and query language support
路 Attachment support
路 HTML and plain-text append
POP and IMAP
路 IMAP search
路 POP and IMAP Calendar URI inclusion
Unified Messaging
路 Speech recognition for Email
路 Speech recognition for Voicemail
路 Speech recognition for Contacts
路 Resolving callers against contacts
路 IP PBX inter-op
路 Multi-language setup
路 Improved prompt provisioning for the Automated Attendant
路 Completion of performance counters and events
路 Runtime system diagnostics
路 GSM codec support
路 TLS support
Sync
What鈥檚 new for the Information Worker with E12 and Crossbow
HTML Email 鈥?HTML message formatting is preserved when reading, replying-to, or forwarding email (Note this feature does not require Crossbow).
Email Flagging 鈥?Set flags, mark flagged items complete or clear flagged items from the mobile device. Items flagged on the device will appear in the ToDo bar in Outlook 12.
Search 鈥?Search your mailbox for any items not on your device. Read, download attachments, reply-to, or forward any item within your search results.
Sharepoint / UNC Document Access 鈥?/SPAN> Click on a link in email that points to a file in a Sharepoint Document Library or UNC share and download that item. In E12 Beta 2 we will be working with the Windows Mobile team to deliver a full-featured browse experience, enabling you to click on a link to a folder or item within email, type in a URL, or select from a list of favorites that mirrors your OWA favorites when browsing Sharepoint Doc Libraries or UNC shares.
Faster Fetch 鈥?Quickly download the rest of large items that were truncated when initially synchronized to the device
Out of Office 鈥?Turn OOF off/on and edit your OOF message from your mobile device
Improved Calendaring on the Device - View attendee status for meetings you鈥檝e organized. Forward, reply-to, & reply-all-to appointments in your calendar on the mobile device. Crossbow will also implement the calendar workflow changes for improved meeting reliability (i.e. changes to key properties like location must generate a meeting update).
IRM Prelicensing - Greatly improved user experience (works offline, low latency to read content) for rights protected content synchronized to the device. (Uses Edge feature coming in Beta 2)
IT Pro
For our IT Professional we are focusing on three major themes:
- Keep the data on the device secure
- Make it easy to provision devices over-the-air
- Keep it easy (read "cheap") to support
In Beta 2 we are focusing on:
路 Additional Device Security Settings 鈥?Support for more robust password settings, device encryption, plus the ability to control SharePoint/UNC Document access, Camera, and SMS.
路 Sync administration built into ESM 鈥?IT Pros can create new mobile sync polices, assign users to policies, remote wipe and remove devices all from ESM.
路 Exchange ActiveSync Reports - Out-of-the-box reporting to show per user and per server Sync activity. CSV output is easily importable into SQL reporting solution.
路 Password Recovery 鈥?Enable devices to send up a temporary recovery password to unlock a device.
路 Synthetic ActiveSync Transactions 鈥?Provide the IT Pro the ability to monitor the health of their Exchange ActiveSync deployment through with this monad task.
路 MOM Support 鈥?Monitor overall health of Exchange ActiveSync through MOM integration.
OWA
For OWA Premium:
路 Junk Mail and Anti-Phishing
路 Change Password
路 Print
路 Working Hours interop with Outlook
路 Explicit Logon
路 Report forms (read receipt, ndrs, no *send again*)
路 Flags and Categories, including Advanced Search UI
路 Help UI
路 Redirection and Proxying between CAS servers
路 Quotas, Policy, Compliance
路 Read Search Folders created by other clients
路 Spellchecking
路 Tasks Views and Forms
路 Web Parts for SPS interop
For OWA Light (formerly known as OWA Basic):
路 Folder Management