Outlook and Active Directory

[Bobo]

We are setting up an exchange server for a school, normally with situations like this we have gone web based email or the schools are so small we configure each user individually.

 

We use mandatory profiles where we can but at the new school there are near on 1000 users and we do not plan to go into each profile and set up outlook for each individual user. I know outlook data is normally individually stored in application data so would that mean we could not automate it?

 

I have never seen it, but I cannot believe it is impossible, but is there a way to almost integrate outlook fat client to active directory so any new user that logs in's outlook will automatically be configured to their username without it changing their profile, or if it must, only change it once? Surely this can be done through a GPO or something?!?!?

[Jamman960]

what you need is a prf, the following link should help:

 

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/ork2003/HA011402581033.aspx

[Diello]

Yes - you need to create a PRF file that contains the Exchange settings, then reference that using the appropriate Outlook ADM.

 

http://office.microsoft.com/en-gb/help/HA011403051033.aspx

[Bobo]

(just to let a colleague not stress too much)

 

Does this automatically integrate without having to change any profile settings? If so I will give you a massive internet kiss somehow....

[Dos_Box]

Why not just simply use OWA for all users (apart from staff)?

[Diello]

No profile change - just GPO. Outlook will use default AppData folder to store config etc.

[Bobo]

Why not just simply use OWA for all users (apart from staff)?

 

If life were only that simple, the school is very adament they want fat client.... you do make sense though.

 

 

No profile change - just GPO. Outlook will use default AppData folder to store config etc.

 

So the profiles will need to be romaing as opposed to mandatory for the first log in then so they can change the appdata folder, correct?

[Bobo]

Sorry, the question I meant to ask in the last post was..... do the settings come into effect at login, so mandatory profiles are therefore not possible?

[PEO]

Looks like a big job

[Bobo]

Looks like a big job

 

 

Indeed, having to learn this and get it set up in the next week, all good fun, learning on the job is the best way to learn imo. Just hoping there is a way to keep mandatory profiles and use these PRFs, reading into the article now to try and work it out but not able to be hands on as the exahange server is not yet ready so it is all a little confusing. That's what makes this forum so useful.

[SYNACK]

Sorry, the question I meant to ask in the last post was..... do the settings come into effect at login, so mandatory profiles are therefore not possible?

 

I'm not 100% sure about the interaction with mandatory profiles but I know that this setting takes effect when outlook is first started and has no accounts set up. It will then search the AD for a mailbox under the current %username% and add that. It should still work under mandatory profiles but it will have to remap each the first time a user opens exchange after each logon.

 

As all of our clients have the same setup I used the Office MST builder to set up office to point to a PRF file right in the installer. If I was doing it again I would use group policy though as it caches the server name in the PRF file so if you change it the clients will still try to map unconfigured users to the old server.

[Dos_Box]

So what you bosses want is that Outlook will set itself up, drag down a users email and set them up every time they log onto a new machine?!!

The network overheads will be awful. And the local Outlook store will bloat out the user profiles!!

[DMcCoy]

Sorry, the question I meant to ask in the last post was..... do the settings come into effect at login, so mandatory profiles are therefore not possible?

 

You have a couple of options with the prf.

 

You can script it so that outlook opens when users login and applies the prf, but it gets configured automatically. Or you can change the mandatory profile registry to point to the prf (there are instuctions about reg keys from Ms for this). That way outlook doesn't open when they login, but will confiure when they open it. It takes a few seconds but works with mandatory profiles fine.

 

I've just moved from the login script option to the registy option. My cmd file was like this:

 

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\OFFICE11\Outlook.exe" /importprf "\\zeus\NETLOGON\Scripts\Outlook.prf"
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\Outlook.exe" /importprf "\\zeus\NETLOGON\Scripts\Outlook.prf"

 

Some issues, user matching won't work if there is more than one result and it will ask - For example, when I use it my username is david - It brings up a list of Davids with mailboxes. For all other members of staff they login with their sims teacher code (3 initials) so they are all unique in AD meaning no prompt is shown.

[DMcCoy]

So what you bosses want is that Outlook will set itself up, drag down a users email and set them up every time they log onto a new machine?!!

The network overheads will be awful. And the local Outlook store will bloat out the user profiles!!

 

Not with an exchange server with offline store turned off.

[Bobo]

You have a couple of options with the prf.

 

You can script it so that outlook opens when users login and applies the prf, but it gets configured automatically. Or you can change the mandatory profile registry to point to the prf (there are instuctions about reg keys from Ms for this). That way outlook doesn't open when they login, but will confiure when they open it. It takes a few seconds but works with mandatory profiles fine.

 

I've just moved from the login script option to the registy option. My cmd file was like this:

 

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\OFFICE11\Outlook.exe" /importprf "\\zeus\NETLOGON\Scripts\Outlook.prf"
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\Outlook.exe" /importprf "\\zeus\NETLOGON\Scripts\Outlook.prf"

 

Some issues, user matching won't work if there is more than one result and it will ask - For example, when I use it my username is david - It brings up a list of Davids with mailboxes. For all other members of staff they login with their sims teacher code (3 initials) so they are all unique in AD meaning no prompt is shown.

 

 

That seems like just what we want, a few seconds is dealable and will help dramatically, do you know off hand where the MS article is?

 

EDIT: When you do that login script, does outlook literally open, or does it open minimized and so does not hinder any other useage?

Edited March 27, 2008 by Bobo
Adding to post

[Michael]

I'd have to agree with Dos_Box, but if they want to use MS Outlook or Express then fair enough.

 

I use OWA 2003 for my business mail and it's really good

[DMcCoy]

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/ork2003/HA011402581033.aspx

 

Has some of the info. You want to use %UserName% for the username for it to search based on the logged in users details. Hopefully that will work ok.

 

If you are using 2007 I also have a policy that makes the rss feed and windows search box go away - these get reset when applying the prf and the existing microsoft policies don't turn it off properly.

 

Outlook really does open with the script. The registry one is ok if you are creating a mandatory profile as you only need to do it once.

[Bobo]

http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/ork2003/HA011402581033.aspx

 

Has some of the info. You want to use %UserName% for the username for it to search based on the logged in users details. Hopefully that will work ok.

 

If you are using 2007 I also have a policy that makes the rss feed and windows search box go away - these get reset when applying the prf and the existing microsoft policies don't turn it off properly.

 

Outlook really does open with the script. The registry one is ok if you are creating a mandatory profile as you only need to do it once.

 

Thanks beyond belief, that is of much use you would not believe, as I'm learning this from scratch and my exchange knowledge is limited as it is, anything you know may be of problem please let me know.... thank you big time

[browsw]

You have a couple of options with the prf.

 

You can script it so that outlook opens when users login and applies the prf, but it gets configured automatically. Or you can change the mandatory profile registry to point to the prf (there are instuctions about reg keys from Ms for this). That way outlook doesn't open when they login, but will confiure when they open it. It takes a few seconds but works with mandatory profiles fine.

 

I've just moved from the login script option to the registy option. My cmd file was like this:

 

"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\OFFICE11\Outlook.exe" /importprf "\\zeus\NETLOGON\Scripts\Outlook.prf"
"C:\Program Files\Microsoft Office\Office12\Outlook.exe" /importprf "\\zeus\NETLOGON\Scripts\Outlook.prf"

 

Some issues, user matching won't work if there is more than one result and it will ask - For example, when I use it my username is david - It brings up a list of Davids with mailboxes. For all other members of staff they login with their sims teacher code (3 initials) so they are all unique in AD meaning no prompt is shown.

 

We use the same ideas as DMcCoy except we set the ImportPRF value in the registry (in the mandatory profile) to achieve the same thing - we don't seem to have any delay in start up this way.

 

From MS Site:

Delete the following registry key values:

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook\Setup\First-Run

HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook\Setup\FirstRun

In the HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\11.0\Outlook\Setup subkey, set the value of ImportPRF to a string value that specifies the name and path of the PRF file. For example, set ImportPRF to \\server1\share\outlook.prf.

 

We get around the user matching issue by putting "%username%@yourdomain.com" for the username in the PRF file. That way everyone gets on without trouble.

 

I have attached two example PRFs for you exchset.prf (which prompts for password on Outlook startup for added security) and exchset_ts.prf (which does not prompt, we use this on TS profile). All you need to do is change the two instanced of "MailboxName=%UserName%@domain.com" and "HomeServer=exchange.domain.com" to suit your setup.

 

Hope this helps

exchset.prf.txt

exchset_ts.prf.txt

[Bobo]

I can't tell you all how much you have helped, will be looking into those files thoroughly today, much appreciated.