CITES DS Exchange Services

On February 12, 2008, Microsoft released an important patch (11.4.0) for Entourage 2004 users connected to Exchange servers. We recommend that all Entourage 2004 users apply this patch to prevent potential issues, including possible deletion of email. For more information and to download the patch, visit:

http://www.microsoft.com/mac/downloads.mspx?pid=Mactopia_Office2004&fid=36B00C58-192D-488C-A069-730C69F0B6B0#viewer.

On December 20, 2007, CITES Departmental Services applied Exchange 2007 Service Pack 1 to the Campus Exchange  Service (see http://status.cites.uiuc.edu/status.cgi?ENTRY=STAT002858&CAT=CLOSED). The application procedure completed on schedule and successfully installed the service pack (for more information on the service pack changes, see http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb676323.aspx).  The scheduled maintenance time was announced on CITES Status, and Exchange availability was minimally affected during the update process. Full availability of the Exchange system was restored by the end of the scheduled maintenance period.

While the update completed successfully, the DS team identified access issues with Exchange public folders, particularly with anonymous access to calendars maintained within public folders. Full access to Exchange Public folders was restored in the early hours of December 21, with the final fix to stabilize anonymous, non-SSL access to public folders occurring at approximately 4:30pm on December 21.

The necessary changes to restore full public folder access did cause a disruption in access for a portion of Mac Entourage users during the holiday period. The DS team became aware of this issue through e-mail messages and posted messages to CCSP. These access issues were traced to the use of non-SSL access from Entourage using the WebDav protocol to connect to the Exchange servers. Because of the holiday periodic and low frequency of access, the diagnosis and remediation process took longer than normal. Changes to access policy to allow some forms of non-SSL authentication re-enabled the affected Mac Entourage users on December 28. The DS Team has been tracking connections, since that time, and will continue to monitor access for any remaining issues. We greatly appreciate the help and communication we received from departmental IT staff in both assisting users and narrowing down the cause.

Departmental Services strongly recommends that all Entourage clients are configured to use SSL when connecting to the Exchange services. Unsecured connections are not supported as part of the overall service and are highly discouraged for reasons of security and information privacy.
For more information, questions, or assistance, please contact the CITES Help Desk (http://www.cites.uiuc.edu/help, or 244-7000).  Mac Entourage users are also encouraged to consult with their local IT Support Professional for assistance in configuring connections to the CITES Exchange Service.

On Thursday, December 20 from 6PM until 10PM, Exchange 2007 may be inaccessible at times, due to installation of Exchange 2007 Service Pack 1 (SP1).

During this maintenance interval, client connections could be intermittent.

Following installation, there will be visible changes to end users using Outlook Web Access. To see a complete SP1 feature set, visit http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb676323.aspx.

See CITES status for updates (http://status.cites.uiuc.edu/).

On October 31, 2007, during the 10 p.m. maintenance interval, the following updates were applied to the Exchange servers:

• Exchange 2007 Update Rollup 5
• .NET 2.0 64 bit memory utilization hotfix KB942084
• Hardware update patches

If you have questions or issues regarding these updates, please contact the Exchange team at exchange@uiuc.edu.

On October 16, 2007, during the 10 p.m. maintenance interval, the October Microsoft security and critical patches were applied to the Exchange servers.

If you have questions or issues regarding these updates, please contact the Exchange team at exchange@uiuc.edu.

New Exchange 2007 OWA URL: https://exchange.cites.uiuc.edu

On July 11, 2007, during the 10 p.m. maintenance interval, the following updates were applied to the Exchange servers:

• July Microsoft security patches
• Two IMAP performance patches

If you have questions or issues regarding these updates, please contact the Exchange team at exchange@uiuc.edu.

On Tuesday, May 8 at 10pm, the Exchange service may be briefly interrupted for application of critical security patches necessary to maintain the security of the system against reported vulnerabilities. The interruption should only last approximately 5-10 minutes, during which clients may be disconnected.

If you have questions or issues regarding these updates, please contact the Exchange team at exchange@uiuc.edu.

On April 18 and April 19, during the 10 p.m. maintenance interval, the following security updates were applied to the Exchange servers:

• Back-end Exchange Cluster updated to Windows 2003 SP2
• Front-end Exchange Cluster updated to Windows 2003 SP2
  

If you have questions or issues regarding these updates, please contact the Exchange team at exchange@uiuc.edu.

Beginning March 7, 2007, CITES Exchange Services will offer a new mobile option for Exchange subscribers—the Blackberry Enterprise Service (BES) for Exchange.

For a one-time, client-license fee of $60, Exchange subscribers with Blackberry devices will have access to a seamlessly integrated, wireless extension of their Exchange accounts, with benefits including:

• No need for Desktop Redirector
  Email is relayed directly between Blackberry devices and the Exchange Server.
• Continuous Connectivity
  Complete, two-way wireless synchronization of emails, calendars, contacts, notes, and tasks
• Enhanced People Find
  Wireless access to campus Exchange Global Access List (GAL)

Am I eligible to use the service?
To subscribe to the CITES Blackberry Enterprise Service you must have the following:

1. CITES Exchange Services account (See CITES Exchange Services Overview for details)
2. Blackberry device that supports BES integration
3. University Banner account number for charging the BES client license

How do I subscribe?
Send a University Banner account number and your NetID to the Exchange Team. Within one business day, your BES account will be activated and your enterprise activation password will be emailed to you.

For more information, review the BES Service Level Agreement or email the Exchange Team..

The following information provides details about current Daylight Savings Time changes that affect CITES Exchange Services.

Background
In July 2005, Congress passed the U.S. Energy Policy Act, extending Daylight Saving Time (DST) - starting in 2007 - by approximately four weeks. As a result, DST will start three weeks earlier than previously observed on March 11, 2007, and end one week later on November 4, 2007.  

Problem
The extension of Daylight Savings Time may cause Microsoft Outlook calendar items to report incorrect time for meetings scheduled between March 11, 2007, to April 1, 2007, and from October 28, 2007, to November 4, 2007.

Microsoft released an OS patch on 12/12/2006 to fix DST issues on desktops and servers; however, items created before an OS is patched with the DST fix will be one hour late, during the extended DST periods.  

Resolution
The Exchange Services team recommends applying the OS DST patch to all devices to prevent any further meetings from being created with incorrect times.  
      
To correct items created before an OS is patched Microsoft has released a Time Zone Data Update tool. This tool moves calendar items back one hour during the extended DST periods. The drawback of this tool is that all calendar items during the extended DST periods are moved by default. If you have both correct and incorrect calendar items during these periods and you use the tool, it’s necessary to uncheck the correct calendar items in the tool so the proper time isn’t changed. Because the tool is not fail-safe, Microsoft also recommends manually editing the incorrect calendar items.

To lessen confusion and ease transition, the Exchange Services team recommends that all Exchange subscribers review meetings scheduled during the extended DST periods and manually verify times for those meetings.

Unaffected items
Calendar items that do not occur during the extended DST periods are correct and need no change. Calendar items that occur during the extended DST periods and were created with a patched OS are correct and need no change.

For further information, visit http://support.microsoft.com/kb/931667/en-us.   

If you have questions, please contact the Exchange team at exchange@uiuc.edu.   

In the late evening of January 25 during test time, the following security updates were applied to the Exchange servers:

• Antigen settings adjustment to allow messages containing particular illegal MIME headers through
• Operating system patch application
• Exchange Server DST change patch (http://support.microsoft.com/kb/926666)

If you have questions or issues regarding these updates, please contact the Exchange team at exchange@uiuc.edu.

Emergency work on the Exchange servers will commence at 8pm tonight.  This will cause a service outage lasting less then 5 minutes. 

The CITES Exchange Services Web site (http://exchange-accounts.ad.uiuc.edu) has been updated to reflect current content and practices.

Please contact exchange@uiuc.edu with any questions.

Mail in the CITES Exchange system is screened by a virus scanner (Microsoft Antigen), before being delivered to an Exchange mailbox.

Beginning October 18, 2006, if mail contains a prohibited attachment, Antigen replaces the attachment with a text notice. Previously, Antigen deleted mail with a prohibited attachment when it originated from outside the CITES Exchange system. 

Please send any questions or comments to exchange@uiuc.edu.