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February 13th, 2009 11:00
Remove Exchange Alias from AD?
Ok, this might take a bit to explain so I apologize in advance. I believe what is necessary is to edit AD with ADSI Edit but want to make sure.
It appears that the customer upgraded to 6.2 SP4 and was using Exchange Module v1 and did not read the release notes prior to upgrading. This of course broke Exchange Replication.
Upon further investigation of the customer site I found the following:
On the Target server, there was no Exchange Module installed but there was an alias created however it was "grayed" out.
On the Source Server the Module was installed and the alias was active.
Here is the dilemma ......
We can deactive the Alias on the Source successfully. The alias name is no where to be found in DNS. So this should mean that the Outlook clients should resolve back to the actual Exchange server name. They do not. They resolve to the Alias name. When you manually try to resolve to the Exchange Server name and click Check Name it resolves right back to the alias. When you do not do a check name and just proceed, the mailbox store is not available to the client.
We have waited at least 30 minutes for replication,(plus performed a manual replication) flushed all DNS cache within DNS and on the clients to no avail.
This leads me to believe that the Alias name is in AD somewhere. I need to be able to get the clients to resolve back to actual Exchange Server before I can upgrade both Exchange Servers to 6.2 SP4 and Exchange Module v2.
So, I have a couple of ideas and wanted to bounce them off of the community.
1. ) Can I install the Exchange Module v1 back on the target again just for the purpose of trying to get a clean shutdown of the Alias on it and uninstall?
2.) When trying to uninstall the Exchange Module for the Source, the uninstall kept locking up. Should I perform a manual uninstall of this and if I do, will that help remove the Alias from AD.
3.) Just use ADSI Edit to remove the alias from AD and a Manual Uninstall of the Source server.
The target server is not going to be the same one as the original install, this server will be a completely new build of Exchange using the /disasterrecovery switch so the bottom line is to get 6.2 and the Exchange module off the source and the alias out of AD.
Any ideas or pointers to get going in the correct direction would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks,
Jerry
It appears that the customer upgraded to 6.2 SP4 and was using Exchange Module v1 and did not read the release notes prior to upgrading. This of course broke Exchange Replication.
Upon further investigation of the customer site I found the following:
On the Target server, there was no Exchange Module installed but there was an alias created however it was "grayed" out.
On the Source Server the Module was installed and the alias was active.
Here is the dilemma ......
We can deactive the Alias on the Source successfully. The alias name is no where to be found in DNS. So this should mean that the Outlook clients should resolve back to the actual Exchange server name. They do not. They resolve to the Alias name. When you manually try to resolve to the Exchange Server name and click Check Name it resolves right back to the alias. When you do not do a check name and just proceed, the mailbox store is not available to the client.
We have waited at least 30 minutes for replication,(plus performed a manual replication) flushed all DNS cache within DNS and on the clients to no avail.
This leads me to believe that the Alias name is in AD somewhere. I need to be able to get the clients to resolve back to actual Exchange Server before I can upgrade both Exchange Servers to 6.2 SP4 and Exchange Module v2.
So, I have a couple of ideas and wanted to bounce them off of the community.
1. ) Can I install the Exchange Module v1 back on the target again just for the purpose of trying to get a clean shutdown of the Alias on it and uninstall?
2.) When trying to uninstall the Exchange Module for the Source, the uninstall kept locking up. Should I perform a manual uninstall of this and if I do, will that help remove the Alias from AD.
3.) Just use ADSI Edit to remove the alias from AD and a Manual Uninstall of the Source server.
The target server is not going to be the same one as the original install, this server will be a completely new build of Exchange using the /disasterrecovery switch so the bottom line is to get 6.2 and the Exchange module off the source and the alias out of AD.
Any ideas or pointers to get going in the correct direction would be greatly appreciated!
Thanks,
Jerry
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dramjass
151 Posts
0
February 13th, 2009 11:00
Since the customer you have had v1 of the RepliStor Exchange module, this means that their Active Directory was changed in order to accommodate for it.
You will need to use adsiedit.msc in order to go to the Exchange object in Configuration container in AD. When you go to the Porperties of the object, there is a paramter called attribute called "networkAddress". If you review the values, you will see the "ncacn_ip_tcp" entry still contains the virtual account name (Not the hostname of the machine, which Exchange was installed upon. This is the same one seen via Exchange System Mngr). This value was changed when the v1 module was activated and is how the module used to work.
Therefore, you will need to do the following:
- Deactivate the Alias.
- Modify the ncacn_ip_tcp value in AD.
- Remove the RepliStor Exchange module.
- Start Exchange and validate connectivity via an Outlook client. At this point, you are essentially back to the way you before ReplIStor entered the picture.
- If you are implementing the v2 of the the module, proceed with the steps used to install it as it is documented.
NOTE: There are several other objects changed as a result of the Alias such as homeMDB, homeMTA, & msExchHomeServerName. After you Deactivate the Alias, check a few users in the Domain partition via adsiedit.msc to ensure the Exchange server name in use is the original. Deactivating the Alias is supposed to change these particualr parameters back to the original. If it does not, you would potentially have to change these values for all users.
Keep in mind that when modifying Active Directory, you are taking speacial care. A backup should be taken before proceeding to ensure you have protected the environment in the event you inadvertently make a mistake. If you have any doubts about the above, I recommend you open a support case with EMC to assist with this work.
To answer your questions:
1. An installation at this point could be more destructive.
2. You may have to manually uninstall the module. Ensure you have Deactivated the Alias and have validated the AD changes before proceding.
3. Do not remove adsiedit.msc to remove the Exchange instance from AD as this was created by the Exchange install itself. Doing this work could cause a lot of damage and your Exchange instance would be corrupted.
Let me know if the above is consistent with the issues you are seeing in your environment and if you have any other questions after reviewing.
Duncan
jerry.reddick
51 Posts
0
February 16th, 2009 08:00
Thank you very much for your response. Your answer is what I suspected must be done from reading several Powerlink articles prior to posting. Thank you for pointing out the ramifications of the other ways I asked about as well.
I am going to use this article as the method of manually uninstalling 6.2. https://solutions.emc.com/emcsolutionview.asp?id=esg59512 Please let me know if you suggest a different one.
Thanks again!
Jerry
dramjass
151 Posts
0
February 16th, 2009 08:00
Duncan
jerry.reddick
51 Posts
0
February 27th, 2009 09:00
To make sure I am looking in the correct place in ADSIEdit.
Configuration[domain name] >CN=Configuration>CN=Services>CN=Microsoft Exchange ?
Is this the correct Key? Are the attributes you mentioned, "networkAddress" only created when Replistor is installed? I am headed to customer site this evening and looking at our Exchange AD Attributes currently and do not see those attributes you mentioned anywhere.
Jerry
dramjass
151 Posts
0
February 27th, 2009 10:00
This value is created by the Exchange installation. The RepliStor Exchange module v1 updates this field as mentioned earlier in this string.
jerry.reddick
51 Posts
0
February 27th, 2009 12:00
Full path is...
CN=Configuration>CN=Services>CN=Microsoft Exchange>CN= (Name Given in Exchange Server Manager)>CN=Administrative Groups>CN=(Container from Exchange Server Manager Servers are in)>CN=Servers>CN=Server Name
Thanks!