As we all know, Exchange Server 2007 is a lot different from previous versions of Exchange.

One of the changes that Microsoft made in creating Exchange Server 2007 was to get rid of the Recipient Update Service. In case you're not familiar with the Recipient Update Service, it was the mechanism responsible for stamping e-mail addresses onto Active Directory objects. As you may know, the Recipient Update Service didn't always behave as anticipated, and sometimes the result long delay before user accounts would be assigned an e-mail address.

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SolarWinds FREE Exchange Monitor continuously monitors Microsoft Exchange. Exchange Monitor Delivers real-time insight into Exchange services, mail queue sizes, and host server health. Ensure this mission-critical app never fails. Get the Free Download Here! In Exchange Server 2007, the Recipient Update Service has been replaced by a new synchronous process that assigns e-mail addresses to Active Directory accounts immediately via the EmailAddressPolicy command. Of course one of the side effects to this change is that the method for creating a new e-mail address policy has changed. The process is still simple, and straight forward, but it is quite a bit different from the process used in Exchange Server 2003.

Accepted Domains
Before you can create an e-mail address policy, you must first define at least one excepted domain. Accepted domains are generally domains for which the Exchange organization should be authoritative for. In some cases though, an accepted domain can be a domain in a different Active Directory forest within the organization, or an external domain. When you deploy the first hub transport server in your Exchange Server organization, Exchange configures the forest root domain as an accepted domain by default. This works fine if your internal and external domain names match, but it causes problems if you use separate domain names. For example, in my organization my production network uses an internal domain name of production.com. However, my external domain name is BrienPosey.com. By default, Exchange is aware of the production.com domain, but not of the BrienPosey.com domain name.

Creating a New Accepted Domain

Creating a new accepted domain is a simple, but essential process. To do so, open the Exchange Management Console and navigate through the console tree to Organization

Configuration | Hub Transport. Now, click the New Accepted Domain link, found in the consoles Actions pane. When you do, you will be taken to the screen shown in Figure A. As you can see, you must enter a name for the new domain, and the accepted domain name. Generally, these can be one in the same. You must also specify whether the new domain is an authoritative domain, an internal relay domain, or an external relay domain. When you are done, click the New button, and the new accepted domain will be added to the Accepted Domains tab, as shown in Figure B. FREE eBook: An IT Pro's Handbook - Windows Server 2008 R2 [PDF]

Figure A You must enter a display name and the name of the new accepted domain.

Figure B The new accepted domain appears on the Accepted Domains tab.

An Alternative Method for Defining an Accepted Domain

In case you are wondering, you can use the Exchange Management Shell to define an accepted domain. The command that you would use for doing so is:
New-AcceptedDomain Name brienposey.com DomainName brienposey.com DomainType Authoritative

As you can see, the New-AcceptedDomain command shown above uses the exact same parameters as the New Accepted Domain Wizard does. Simply use the Name and the DomainName parameters to supply the display name and the domain name respectively. Notice in the command above that the actual display name and display name are enclosed in quotation marks. In this particular case, I have set the domain type to Authoritative. However, I could have specified InternalRelay or ExternalRelay instead as a way of defining an internal or an external relay domain. As you can see, the New-AcceptedDomain command is one of the easier Exchange Management Shell commands to use. Even so, some people seem to have a mental block when it comes to performing actions from the command line. If you need additional help with the New-AcceptedDomain command, you can enter the following command into the Exchange Management Shell to get the commands full syntax:
Help New-AcceptedDomain

Conclusion

In this article, I have explained that defining an accepted domain is a prerequisite to creating an E-mail address policy. I have also walked you through the process of creating an accepted domain. In Part 2, I will conclude the series by showing you how to create an E-mail address policy. Got a question? Post it on our Exchange Server Forums! 180-Day Full Featured FREE Trial: Windows Server 2008 R2 with SP1 Related Articles

Defining an Exchange 2007 E-Mail Address Policy, Part 2 Configure Exchange 2007 to Receive E-Mail for other Domains Configuring Exchange 2007 to Send E-mail to External domains Change the Primary Email Address in Exchange 2007

Defining an Exchange 2007 E-Mail Address Policy, Part 2

by Brien Posey - January 8, 2009 Printer Friendly Version

If you have done much work with Exchange Server 2003 or Exchange 2000 Server, then you are probably familiar with the concept of recipient policies. Recipient policies still exist in Exchange Server 2007, but they have been broken into two different components; accepted domains (which I covered in Defining an Exchange 2007 E-Mail Address Policy, Part 1), and E-Mail address policies (Which Im about to cover). E-mail address policies are the policies that allow you to define an Active Directory users E-mail address.
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Download Your FREE PDF Copy Here Creating an E-Mail Address Policy
Now that we have defined our accepted domains, we can create a new E-mail address policy. To do so, navigate through the console tree to Organization Configuration | Hub Transport. Next, click the New E-Mail Address Policy link, found in the Actions pane. When you do, Exchange will launch the New E-Mail Address Policy Wizard. The Wizards initial screen will prompt you to enter a name for the policy that you are creating, and to choose the types of recipients that you want to apply the policy to. I recommend leaving the All Recipient Types setting enabled in most cases. You can see what this screen looks like in Figure A.

Figure A Enter a name for the policy that you are creating, and leave the All Recipient Types option selected. Click Next, and you will be taken to a screen thats similar to the one thats shown in Figure B. Even though you have already told the wizard that you want to apply the policy to all recipient types, this screen allows you to narrow things down and apply the policy only to specific recipients, based on the recipients various attributes. For example, you could use the options on this screen to configure the policy so that it only applies to recipients who reside in a certain state. Of course you could also just leave these conditions blank, and the policy will apply to everyone. When you have made your selections and populated any necessary attribute fields, click Next.

Figure B You can set conditions on the new E-Mail address policy. The next step in the configuration process is to actually define the E-mail addresses that will be assigned to the users to whom the new E-Mail Address Policy applies. Begin the process by clicking the Add button. When you do, the wizard will display the SMTP EMail Addressesdialog box, shown in Figure C. FREE Download: Microsoft Cloud Services Overview Brochure [PDF]

Figure C This is the screen where you actually define the recipients E-mail address format. As you can see in the figure, this is the screen where you can actually define the E-mail address format. To define an E-mail address policy, you must begin by verifying that the E-Mail Address Local Part check box is selected. Once you have done that, choose the option that fits the format that you want to use for the E-mail address. For example, you can base the address on the users alias, the users first initial and last name, first name and last initial, or any of the other available choices. The lower portion of the screen gives you the option of either manually specifying a fully qualified domain name (FQDN) or of selecting an accepted domain. Since we have already gone through the trouble of defining an accepted domain, choose the Select Accepted Domain for E-Mail Address option, and then click Browse and select the address that you defined earlier. Click OK, and the address format that you have chosen to use is added to the wizards current screen. If you need to make a change to the address format that you have chosen, you can select the address and click the Edit button. Assuming that everything appears to be OK though, click the Next button, and you will be taken to a screen that asks you when you want to apply the new policy. This is a very welcome change from Exchange Server 2003, because Exchange 2003 relied on the Recipient Update Service, which didnt always work right. When it did work, it sometimes took a really long time to make a policy change effective. In Exchange 2007, the wizards current screen allows you to make the policy change effective immediately, or to schedule the policy change. When you are satisfied with the choices that you have made, click Next, followed by New to create the new E-Mail address policy.

Conclusion
Although creating an E-mail address policy isnt very complicated, the procedure for doing so is quite a bit different from how things were done in previous versions of Exchange. In this article, I have shown you how to work through the new interface to define an E-mail address policy. Got a question? Post it on our Exchange Server Forums!