Overview of the Exchange 2003 Resource Kit Tools

Let’s begin

I will not cover every tool from the Exchange 2003 tools -only my favourites and my most used programs.

The first thing to do is to download the tools from the following website.

The package is about 34 megabytes.

If you have any questions regarding the documentation for these tools, send your feedback to [email protected].

Here are my favourites:

Jetstress
Verify the performance and stability of your disk subsystem by simulating disk I/O load on an Exchange test server before putting your server into a production environment. I like this tool because it is possible to simulate the I/O load before you invest in disc subsystems.          

Load Simulator (LoadSim)
Simulate the performance load of MAPI clients with this benchmarking tool, which enables you to test how an Exchange 2003 server responds to e-mail message loads. This tool is great for calculating the server load on Exchange Servers before you invest in Hardware. Some vendors like HP/Compaq have their own utilities to simulate load on servers.

For more information read Amit Zinman’s article about Loadsim.


Figure 1: Loadsim2003

Exchange 2003 Management Pack Configuration Wizard
Configure test mailboxes, message tracking, and monitoring services in the Exchange 2000 and Exchange 2003 Management Packs with this graphical user interface. Management packs are enhancements to the MOM (Microsoft Operation Manager) Server. To give MOM the control above Servers, you must install a Management Pack. MOM is a server to centrally control the health of Microsoft Servers, centrally Log- and Event management and many more.    

Exchange Deployment Tools
The Exchange Deployment Tools give you a lot of helpful information about the deployment process of Exchange 2003 in existing Exchange 5.5 organizations or how to deploy Exchange 2003 in new organizations. The Deployment Tools use a step by step wizard to help the Administrator to successfully implement an Exchange Server. The Deployment tools consists of many command line options to collect information about the existing environment

For more information read the following article:


Figure 2: Exchange Server Deployment Tools

LegacyDN
LegacyDN changes an attribute of many Active Directory service objects. You can also use this tool to view or change legacyExchangeDN values. It is necessary to change the LegacyDN in different Exchange recovery scenarios. Microsoft recommends to use the LegacyDN tool only in test environments. Read more about the LegacyDN here.         

Address Rewrite
EXARCFG rewrites return e-mail addresses on outgoing messages sent from a non-Microsoft mail system to Exchange and destined to external or Internet addresses. What does this mean:

Assume a merger with a company. They have two Exchange organizations and you want to consolidate these organizations while you want all e-mail addresses to reflect the parent company’s name.          

EXARCFG has the same function as the Exchange 5.5 tool ReRouteViaStore.


Figure 3: EXARCFG

ArchiveSink
Archive Sink is a simple .VBS script which archives messages and log recipient details and other information about messages sent to or received by your server running Exchange. Need more sinks? – Then click here for a selection of event sinks from Sig Weber.


Figure 4: ArchiveSink

ASP.NET Mobile Controls Device Updates
Update the supported devices you can use with Microsoft Outlook Mobile Access on your Exchange server. You can find updates on http://www.asp.net. The actual Device Update version is 4.0 which comes with Exchange 2003 SP1. For more information about OMA read the following article: http://www.msexchange.org/tutorials/OMA_Exchange_Server_2003.html

Authoritative Restore
AUTHREST.EXE is used to force a restored directory database to replicate to your other servers after restoring from a backup by using this tool. AUTHREST increases the USN of all restored objects in that manner that the restore becomes authoritative about all other existing servers.        

Auto Accept Agent
Automatically process meeting requests for resource mailboxes. The agent checks the availability of the resource mailbox based on the resource schedule (not free/busy) and accepts or declines new or updated meeting requests.            

Badmail Deletion and Archiving
This tool deletes or archives the files in the Badmail directory of the Exchange Virtual Server. Without this tool you must manually cleanup the directory because there doesn’t exist an automated function to delete this directory.

DNSResolver
Troubleshoot e-mail delivery problems due to DNS issues by simulating the SMTP service internal code path and reading diagnostic messages. This tool is very helpful to find Exchange related DNS problems.   

E-Mail Journaling Advanced Configuration
The Envelope Journaling tool (exejcfg.exe) enables you to expand the standard journaling feature of Exchange 2003 to capture more message data. It is an enhancement to the Standard archiving Feature of Exchange 2003 which you can enable on the Server properties in the Exchange System Manager.

Error Code Lookup
ERR.EXE is a simple command line tool to display the different Error codes in Windows systems. All values will be looked up in the Exchange Servers internal Error code table.

Exchange Domain Rename Fixup
Repair Exchange attributes in Active Directory directory service after using the Microsoft Windows Server 2003 domain rename tool. All Exchange servers in the renamed forest must be running Exchange 2003 SP1. I don’t recommend renaming larger productive Exchange environments with this tool because of complexity and possible problems after migration.       

You can find more information here:


Figure 5: XDR-fixup

ExchDump
Gather Exchange configuration information from various sources used in troubleshooting support issues with this command line tool.


Figure 6: EXCHDUMP

Exchange Server Best Practices Analyzer Tool
The Exchange Server Best Practice Analyzer Tool scans you Exchange Organization for Exchange Servers and inspects the Servers against a “database” with Microsoft configuration options, Tips, well known security implications and much more. A must have tool.

You can read more about the tool here.

GUIDGen
Use the GUID Generator to generate globally unique identifiers, or GUIDs, that you can use to identify your ActiveX classes, objects, and interfaces. As an example you can use GUIDGEN to recreate the site folder in Exchange 2003 when you have problems with Exchange 2003 and Outlook 2003 cached mode.

Microsoft Baseline Security Analyzer
Scans for missing security updates on Exchange Server 5.5 and later. Microsoft has deployed a new version 1.21 especially for Windows XP SP2. You can download the newest version here.

Information Store Viewer (MDBVU32)
Browse storage, address book, and other Messaging Application Programming Interface (MAPI) providers by executing MAPI calls specified by a user. This tool is very helpful to get information about your private Exchange store but it can also be used to collect information for .PST- and .OST files.


Figure 7: Information Store Viewer

MTA Check
Look for message transfer agent (MTA) database consistency and perform some repairs. The Microsoft Exchange MTA Stacks must be stopped before you run MTACHECK. With the help of MTACHECK it is possible to delete the MTA queues when there are problems associated with it.


Figure 8: MTACHECK

Outlook Web Access Web Administration
Administer Microsoft Outlook Web Access with this Web-based tool. I love this tool because you can enable many hidden features with this Web-based tool.    

For more information read the following article.


Figure 9: OWAADMIN

SMTP Internet Protocol Restriction and Accept/Deny List Configuration
Use this VB Script to programmatically set Internet Protocol (IP) restrictions on an SMTP virtual server.  

Exchange Profile Update
Update Outlook profiles after moving mailboxes across Exchange organizations or administrative groups. EXPROFE is part of the Exchange Site Consolidation tools of Exchange Server 2003 SP1          

For more information read the following article.


Figure 10: Outlook Profile Updater

Mailbox Merge Wizard (ExMerge)
Extract data from mailboxes on one Exchange server and then merge that data into mailboxes on another Exchange server with the help of this tool. I love this tool because it is possible to script and schedule EXMERGE. A great feature is the ability to filter Messages in .PST files before you import the data into mailboxes.        

For more information see the following article.


Figure 11: EXMERGE

Inter-Organization Replication
Replicate public folder and free and busy information between Exchange organizations.

For more information read the following article.


Figure 12: InterOrg Replication Tool

Add Root Certificate
Add a custom root certificate onto your Microsoft Windows Mobile–based Pocket PC. This tool is very helpful when you want to create a secure connection (SSL) to your Exchange Server (Outlook Mobile Access) and you want to import a custom root certificate.        

Exchange Intelligent Message Filter
IMF is Microsoft’s answer against SPAM, sometimes called UCE.

For more information read the following article.


Figure 13: Intelligent Message Filter

Conclusion

I love the Exchange 2003 All in one Tools. With the help of these tools it makes the life of an Exchange Administrator a little bit easier. I recommend regularly looking for updates on the Microsoft Exchange website.

Related Links

All-in-One Exchange 2003 Tools
http://www.microsoft.com/downloads/details.aspx?FamilyId=E0F616C6-8FA4-4768-A3ED-CC09AEF7B60A&displaylang=en

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