Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) for Exchange Mailbox Agent

You can view additional information about the Exchange Mailbox Agent in the following Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ).

Archive

Why are the messages that were moved from the PST file to an existing folder in the user mailbox, not archived?

If messages older than the received time of the messages that are processed by the earlier archive jobs, are moved to an existing folder of a mailbox from a PST, the incremental jobs will not protect these messages as their time stamp would be earlier than the first archived message. This is due to the design of the incremental archive job using reference time. Inorder to archive the full mailbox, you must add the regkey "bConvertMBJobToFull", which when set to "True" displays the option to "Convert to Full" in the Archive option tab of the archive job.

Can I only backup my mailbox data and not archive or stub any emails?

If you just want to protect your mailbox (just backup and no stubbing/moving of emails), then you can assign only the Exchange Archiving Policy to the mailbox and run archive jobs.

Should I add anything to the inclusion folder?

Only selected folders are archived in an inclusion folder set. Archiving operation is an email backup operation, and ideally, all emails should be protected. Therefore, nothing must be added to the inclusion folder.

How do I protect user mailboxes that are placed on In-Place Hold or Litigation Hold?

You must create a separate archiving policy for mailboxes that are placed on In-Place Hold or Litigation Hold, and then under Recoverable Items, select the subfolders that you want to archive.

• Deletions: This subfolder contains all items deleted from the Deleted Items folder.

• Versions: If In-Place Hold, Litigation Hold, or an Office 365 retention policy is enabled, this subfolder contains the original copy of the item and also if the item is modified multiple times, a copy of the item before modification is saved.

• Purges: If either Litigation Hold or single item recovery is enabled, this subfolder contains all items that are hard deleted.

• DiscoveryHolds: If In-Place Hold is enabled or if an Office 365 retention policy is assigned to the mailbox, this subfolder contains all items that meet the hold query parameters and are hard deleted.

Does a failed archiving job occupy space on the media?

A failed job is automatically marked for pruning and the space is reclaimed.

What happens when some mailboxes fail to get archived and some are successful in the same archiving job?

For a job which has few completed and few failed mailboxes, the backup reference time for the completed mailboxes is moved, so that the next archiving job backs up only incremental data for the completed mailboxes and all the data for the failed mailboxes. Also, the next job first backs up mailboxes that were not backed up in the previous job.

Auto Discover Association

How does policy assignment work in case of mailboxes that are members of multiple groups?

The policy associated with the last group that the user is discovered in is the policy that is applied. The order in which user groups are also discovered is firstly by numerical value, secondly by capital letters and then by lower case.

For example, if you had 4 groups in all, they would appear as follows:

1. 12345-Group

2. ADMINISTRATORS-GROUP

3. ZOO-GROUP

4. Account operators group

Also, if the user is a member of all users group as well as AD group, the policy of the AD group is applied. AD group takes precedence over All users group.

Content Indexing

Do I need to run content indexing for all users?

No. You can enable the full search feature, including email body searches, for a specific set of users, and then run content indexing only for those users.

Can I change the index server?

Yes. However, you should schedule some down time when you change the index server. After you change the index server, index reconstruction begins immediately on a new index server. During reconstruction, the following operations will not work: browse, cleanup jobs, content indexing jobs, and recalls from all endpoints.

Does the archive job content index the headers of the emails but not the body of the emails?

Yes, the archive job content indexes the headers of the emails but not the body of the emails. The content indexing job indexes the body of the emails.

ContentStore Mail Server (SMTP)

Can we use ContentStore mailbox for group wise email archiving?

Any mail server, which can relay mails would work with Commvault ContentStore mail server(SMTP Gateway).

Cleanup

I want to use quota rules in the clean up policy. What is the best setting to ensure its efficiency?

Along with the quota rules, set the cleanup policy criteria for messages older than 0 years/months/days and larger than 0 KB.

Will a cleanup job stub the emails that are not archived yet?

No, a cleanup job will not stub emails that are not archived yet.

Configuration

Should we use nested group for discovering mailboxes?

Exchange policies may be changed more frequently for users who are a part of multiple groups of nested AD groups and the Backup Admin may not have access to AD to control this. AD Groups without nesting ensures more consistency between Exchange Mailbox and their mapped policies.

What is recommended if the Exchange Mailbox Agent index server has reached its capacity?

It is recommended that you create a new Exchange Mailbox client and point the new index server to this client. For more information, see Creating an Exchange Mailbox Client for the ContentStore Mailbox After the Index Sever Limit is Reached or Creating an Exchange Mailbox Client for the Journal Mailbox After the Index Sever Limit is Reached.

Can Outlook 2013 be installed on the same machine as Exchange Server 2013?

Microsoft recommends not to be install Microsoft Outlook on Exchange servers. Install the Exchange agent on a proxy server rather than directly on the Exchange servers for Exchange Mailbox Agent.

What is recommended when Outlook Add-In recalls over all the mailboxes are failing after the mailbox migration process to Office 365?

We recommend that you set the recall server link and then run an archive job from the new Office 365 client.

What are the limitations that must be considered when changing the Exchange User Mailbox client environment type?

There are no limitations.You can change to any configuration type based upon your requirements without creating a new pseudo client.

How do I move the location of a shared job results directory?

You must disable all backup and cleanup schedule and complete the following steps:

1. Copy job results folder to the new location.

2. Share the job results folder and grant full share access to the local system client.

   Note

   • For Exchange Online client, local system service account must have full share access to job results share folder.

   • For Exchange on-premises client, all on-premises service account must have full share access to job results share folder.

3. From the CommCell Console, right click the Exchange Client > Properties > Advanced > Job Results Directory and update the new job results share path.

Hardware

Can I use the same proxy for backing up multiple virtual clients, if yes, what are the factors that must be considered?

Yes.One backup stream consumes around 300MB, so as long as you have enough RAM, you can assign the same proxy that can be used for backing up multiple virtual clients.

Permissions

Why do we need an Exchange Administrator role for Office 365 Service account?

Exchange Administrator role is needed to connect via Powershell and to assign permissions.

What is the alternate way to assign permissions to the service account, if the exchange administrator does not add the service account to the Organization Management group?

You can also assign permissions to the service account by running the following script from the Exchange PowerShell.

param(

[string] $ServiceAccount,

)

$orgnDetails=get-organizationconfig

$distgName=$orgnDetails.DistinguishedName

add-adpermission -identity $distgName -user $ServiceAccount -AccessRights ReadProperty, GenericExecute -ExtendedRights "Receive-As" -InheritanceType All -erroraction:continue

add-adpermission -identity $distgName -user $ServiceAccount -AccessRights ReadProperty, GenericExecute -ExtendedRights "View Information Store Status" -InheritanceType All -erroraction:continue

add-adpermission -identity $distgName -user $ServiceAccount -AccessRights ReadProperty, GenericExecute -ExtendedRights "ms-Exch-Store-Create-Named-Properties" -InheritanceType All -erroraction:continue

add-adpermission -identity $distgName -user $ServiceAccount -AccessRights ReadProperty, GenericExecute -ExtendedRights "ms-Exch-Store-admin" -InheritanceType All -erroraction:continue

Can I create new service accounts, which have lower permission for Office 365?

Yes. However, the check readiness application will not work in the service accounts with lower permission (without the Administrator role).

To create new service accounts, you can run the following command from Office 365 Powershell:

New-RoleGroup -ROLENAME-Roles "ApplicationImpersonation","view-only Recipients" - members ServiceAccount

What are the steps after adding multiple new service accounts?

You must configure permissions so that users can access the shared job results directory and add the service account in the local admin group for the access node.

Retention

Can I change the retention policy for any combination of user, ADGroup, and Database?

Yes. However, the emails marked for deletion will not be recovered for the index server.

Can I retain emails from individual mailboxes with different retention period?

Yes, you can do this by assigning different retention policies at the mailbox level.

Does the Exchange Mailbox Agent use retention rules that are defined in the storage policy?

No, the Exchange Mailbox Agent uses the retention rules that are defined in the Exchange Retention Policy.

How does Exchange mailbox retention work?

By default, items are expired every 24 hours. Once expired, they cannot be restored.

Does the Exchange Mailbox Agent support synthetic full backup?

The Exchange Mailbox Agent uses incremental forever backup strategy and synthetic full backups are not supported.

Does the Exchange Mailbox Agent support different retention types across storage policy copies?

No, different retention types across storage policy copies is not a real use case for a Forever Incremental Email Archival Solution.

Index Sync

Which log files are required for the Index Sync operation?

You must look for the following log files on the access nodes:

1. ADMailboxMonitor.log

2. CVExIdxSyncCoordinator.log

3. CVIndexSync.log

Are messages deleted from the backup storage in the Index Sync operation?

The messages are only masked in the Index Sync operation. You can access them from the Web Console and the Command Center when you select Show Deleted Items in the browse window. By default, Compliance Search shows the masked items. Messages that meet the retention criteria defined in the retention policy are deleted from the backup storage.

What happens to the PST ingested data in an Index Sync operation?

PST ingested data is skipped from the Index Sync process.

What happens to the deleted mailboxes in an Index Sync operation?

Deleted mailboxes have a 30 day grace period before they are masked. The data can still be accessed from the Web Console and the Command Center when you select Show Deleted Items in the browse window.