Changing Contact's File As field

With the use of PDAs, Smart Phones and Blackberries, its not unusual for contacts to be filed using different File As formats. While some of us can overlook differences in the how the contacts are filed, especially when it means changing thousands of contacts one at a time, Outlook's "type down" feature works best when there is consistency in the File As field.

Use VBA to quickly change the file as format on existing contacts. I won't post the code here because antivirus filters are likely to identify the newsletter as suspect, but you can find it at Change Contact's File As format. The code works only on the default contacts folder; if you need to run it on other folders, you'll have to move contacts in and out of the default folder to use it.

You should make sure the default setting for File As is set to your preferred format. This won't help with existing contacts but it will apply to any new contacts you create. To do this, go to Tools, Options, Contact Options. The Default Full Name order lets Outlook know the format you typically use when typing names. If you type Mary Smith and Outlook thinks Mary is the last name, the full name order doesn't match your entry style. The File As order is sets the default file as format that Outlook uses. All new contacts will use this format, but you can choose a different File as format when you create a contact

The Basics Of Exchange Virtualization

by Michael B. Smith, MCSE/Exchange MVP

In a move that surprised no one, on August 19th, Microsoft announced support for Exchange Server 2007 when running under Hyper-V on Windows Server 2008. Go team!

Further, in a move that surprised almost everyone, Microsoft also announced their Windows Server Virtualization Validation Program (SVVP) in which they will work with other vendors to certify those virtualization solutions for hosting Microsoft applications and servers. As I write this article on September 3, VMware announced today that they had been certified in the SVVP. Even more, go team!

These rather dramatic changes allow for Exchange Server 2007 service pack 1, every server role excepting Unified Messaging, to be run in a virtual server instance. There are some caveats behind this, which we will discuss shortly.

However, in a somewhat surprising turn of events, Exchange Server 2003 is NOT supported for Hyper-V or VMware. Exchange Server 2003 is supported for virtualization - but only with Virtual Server 2005 R2 (or any later release of Virtual Server). Exchange Server 2003 must also have service pack 2 (or later) installed to be supported in a virtualized environment, and they may not be installed in a Windows fail-over cluster.

Running Exchange Server 2003 in Virtual Server has some significant limitations. These include the fact that Virtual Server only supports a single processor, so only a single core of a single processor is available for the virtualized copy of Exchange Server. Also, you must use the VHD file format for storing the Exchange store and log files, which results in an additional level of indirection (and therefore inefficiency) in disk input-output operations. iSCSI is not a supported option. You should test carefully before deploying Exchange Server 2003 in production in a virtualized environment.

Returning to Exchange Server 2007, the set of requirements are relaxed significantly, but still represent restrictions over a hardware based installation:
… Storage must be VHD less than 2 TB, iSCSI, or pass-through disk
…Dynamically expanding disks and differencing disks are not supported
…You can use CCR or SCC as a high-availability (HA) solution between virtual instances, but the physical virtual servers may not be clustered
…Exchange is not compatible with hypervisor-based HA solutions (Quick Motion from Hyper-V or Live Migration from VMware, etc.) when Exchange is part of a clustered set of virtual instances
…Snapshots of an Exchange guest are not supported for backup
…Etc.

The major comments from the Exchange Product Team are, unsurprisingly, warnings about performance. Virtualized environments will always (probably!) perform less well than native hardware environments. When you are virtualizing an application, such as Exchange, which requires significant memory, processor, and disk resources - you absolutely need to ensure that adequate resources are dedicated to the virtual instance.
In general, it is not recommended to place multiple high-resource-requirement virtualized application environments on a single physical server, unless the performance under load has been validated and found acceptable.

Even with the restrictions, the fact that Microsoft will now officially support Exchange Server in a virtualized environment, including VMware’s virtualized environment, is a huge step forward to the Microsoft messaging ecosystem. It may be something for you to evaluate for your environment.

Resources:
Microsoft Support Policies and Recommendations for Exchange Servers in Hardware Virtualization Environments
http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc794548%28EXCHG.80%29.aspx 
Server Virtualization Validation Program
http://windowsservercatalog.com/svvp.aspx?svvppage=svvp.htm 
Support policy for Microsoft software running in non-Microsoft hardware virtualization software
http://support.microsoft.com/?kbid=897615 

Changing the Business Card layout

An often asked question about Outlook 2007's Business card layout is how to change it for all contacts. While you can't change existing contacts, except by supplying a lot of effort and editing each card, you can change the default which is used for new contacts by creating a custom contact form and setting it as the default Contacts form for new Contacts.

To do this, open a Contact form in Design mode (Tools, Forms, Design a form) and change the business card layout as desired then publish the form.

To use it, right click on the Contact folder, choose Properties and set you the custom form as the default form for the folder. The business card on all newly created contacts will use the new layout.

You can't change the form used by existing contacts, well, you can change the form, but the new business card layout won't be used.

Exchange Quick Tip: Verify Exchange Server mode

In Exchange 2000/2003 you can verify the installation is in native or mixed mode by looking in the Exchange System Manager. Right click on the Exchange organization name and choose Properties. The mode is listed on the General tab. You can change from Mixed to Native mode here.

Exchange 2007 only supports native mode.

Exchange Quick Tip: View headers in OWA 2007

Did you know you can view internet message headers in OWA 2007 by opening the message and clicking the Message Details button? This will display the message header in a text box (even smaller than the one used in Outlook). This only works with OWA Premium. 

Outlook Quick Tip: Do Not Deliver Before

When you use the Do not deliver before option on outgoing email, the default time for deferred delivery is 5 PM 'today'. This is not configurable. Even changing the workday end time won't change the default from 5 PM.

Rather than using the dropdown to select the time, use the time shortcuts like 945a. You can use natural language or date shortcuts in the date field as well.

Outlook Quick Tip: Flag for Follow-up Reminder Times

Flag for follow-up reminder times are often a source of confusion. When the flag is set for today, the reminder will always default to one hour before the end of your workday but a flag set for tomorrow, this week or next week will default to the start of the workday, as selected in Tools, Options, Calendar Options.

The default reminder time for actual Tasks is set in Tools, Options and applies only to Tasks, not flagged messages.