Outlook 2011 for Mac

Having played with Outlook 2011 and the rest Office for Mac I must say I am impressed over the 2008 editions. There is not the seamless feel between Windows and Mac I had hoped for.

I have already come across one slight niggle when setting up Outlook 2011 with Exchange Server, this has already caused a number of support cases. The User Name section suggests entering DOMAIN\SOMEONE, however depending on Exchange Server configuration this my need to be someone@emaildomain.com as it is with Cobweb.

I really like the delegation section, which is very simple and clear.

If you would like to test it with Exchange  Server contact Cobweb and we can help you out with a mailbox.

Easy Migration from Google Apps to Hosted Exchange

We use Migrationwiz.com almost exclusively for on-boarding (and when the need arises off-boarding) mailboxes to the Cobweb Hosted Exchange service. I have previously blogged about this, but it makes everything a lot simpler and overcomes a number of hurdles traditional on premise or PST migrations will encounter. Our customers have noticed and often comment on how smooth the whole process is.

A sticking point has been migrating from non-Exchange servers such as Google Apps where user credentials must be supplied for each mailbox. They have a fantastic password gathering service, which although secure has raised questions about sending users to a “new” web site requesting passwords. Well, this is no more thanks to a new addition on Migrationwiz.com enabling use of the Google Apps OAUTH domain key and secret to access mailbox data.

For more information on visit the Migrationwiz.com wiki, How do I migrate from Google using administrative credentials?

If you want someone to manage the migration for you and are looking for a Hosted Exchange provider head over to http://www.cobweb.com. If you fancy migrating yourself we all Cobweb Hosted Exchange settings are already loaded in to provider list on Migrationwiz.com.

Feel free to drop me a message if you need any other advice.

Entourage 2008 Autodiscover.xml and SSL Error

The Mac OS X operating system with Entourage 2008 messaging client may exhibit the following behaviour if the client Autodiscover lookup for https://domain.com/autodiscover/autodiscover.xml can be resolved, but is not an Exchange Server Autodiscover file.

Unable to establish a secure connection to domain.com because the correct root certificate is not installed

 

This seems to occur when the web server hosting https://domain.com/ has an untrusted or incorrect SSL certificate and the file https://domain.com/autodiscover/autodiscover.xml is accessible, but not in the correct format for Exchange Server Autodiscover.

 

The following solutions could be used to work around this:

· On the web server prevent resolution of https://domain.com/autodiscover/autodiscover.xml to a file.

· On the web server hosting https://domain.com/ install a valid SSL certificate from a public CA. Set a redirect on https://domain.com/autodiscover/autodiscover.xml to https://autodiscover.domain.com/autodiscover/autodiscover.xml hosted on the Exchange Server CAS role.

 

Where the above is not possible the following could be used:

· Set local hosts entry in the Mac OS X operating system for domain.com to resolve to 127.0.0.1 (Note: this will prevent browsing to http://domain.com  from the computer)