How to modify the appearance and the functionality of Outlook Web Access by using the segmentation feature in Exchange 2003

How to modify the appearance and the functionality of Outlook

SUMMARY

To modify the features that are available in Microsoft Outlook Web Access, you can use the Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 segmentation feature. Segmentation can be performed on a per-server basis to change the functionality of Outlook Web Access for all the users who are hosted on that server. Segmentation can also be performed on a per-user basis to change the functionality of Outlook Web Access for a particular user. Per-server segmentation requires that you modify the Windows registry on the Exchange computer. Per-user segmentation requires that you modify an Active Directory attribute. This article contains a list of values that you can use to enable certain Outlook Web Access features. This article also contains some sample values that you can use. This article also explains how to troubleshoot an issue with Outlook Web Access features that occurs when you upgrade to Exchange Server 2003 from Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server.

INTRODUCTION

This article describes how to customize Microsoft Outlook Web Access (OWA) by using segmentation. The segmentation feature in Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 permits you to modify the appearance and the functionality of Microsoft Outlook Web Access.

Per-server segmentation

Per-server segmentation in Outlook Web Access determines the features that are available for all Outlook Web Access users who are hosted on a particular server that is running Microsoft Exchange Server 2003. To enable per-server segmentation, you must create and then configure the DefaultMailboxFolderSet registry value in the following registry subkey:

HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeWeb\OWA

To enable Outlook Web Access features, modify the value of the DefaultMailboxFolderSet registry entry on the Exchange server. This registry entry must be set on the back-end Exchange server if you use a front-end/back-end configuration. To modify the value of the DefaultMailboxFolderSet registry entry, follow these steps.

Warning If you use Registry Editor incorrectly, you may cause serious problems that may require you to reinstall your operating system. Microsoft cannot guarantee that you can solve problems that result from using Registry Editor incorrectly. Use Registry Editor at your own risk.

1.	Click Start, click Run, type regedit in the Open box, and then click OK.
2.	Locate and then click the following registry subkey: HKEY_LOCAL_MACHINE\SYSTEM\CurrentControlSet\Services\MSExchangeWeb\OWA
3.	On the Edit menu, point to New, and then click DWORD Value.
4.	In the New Value #1 box, type DefaultMailboxFolderSet, and then press ENTER.
5.	Right-click DefaultMailboxFolderSet, and then click Modify.
6.	Click Decimal, and then type the decimal value that corresponds to the Outlook Web Access feature or features that you want to enable. To enable all Outlook Web Access features, type 4294967295. The numeral 4294967295 is the same as the hexadecimal value FFFFFFFF. For a list of the values that are available, see the "Segmentation attributes" section of this article.
7.	Click OK, and then quit Registry Editor.

Per-user segmentation

Per-user segmentation in Outlook Web Access determines the features that are available for a particular Outlook Web Access user. Per-user segmentation settings override the per-server value that you configure on the Exchange 2003 server. To enable per-user segmentation, you must set the msExchMailboxFolderSet attribute for that user in the Active Directory directory service.

Microsoft Windows 2000 Server

To enable per-user segmentation on a Windows 2000-based domain controller, follow these steps.

Warning If you use the ADSI Edit snap-in, the LDP utility, or any other LDAP version 3 client, and you incorrectly modify the attributes of Active Directory objects, you can cause serious problems. These problems may require you to reinstall Microsoft Windows 2000 Server, Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server, Microsoft Exchange Server 2003, or both Windows and Exchange. Microsoft cannot guarantee that problems that occur if you incorrectly modify Active Directory object attributes can be solved. Modify these attributes at your own risk.

1.	Start the ADSI Edit tool. To do this, click Start, click Run, type adsiedit.msc in the Open box, and then click OK. Note ADSI Edit is included in Microsoft Windows Support Tools. To install Microsoft Windows Support Tools, double-click Setup.exe in the Support\Tools folder on the Windows 2000 CD.
2.	Connect to a domain controller if you are not already connected.
3.	Under the domain container, expand DC=example,DC=com, and then expand the container that contains the user account that you want to configure. For example, expand CN=Users.
4.	Right-click the container that corresponds to the user that you want to configure, and then click Properties.
5.	In the Select which properties to view list, click Both.
6.	In the Select a property to view list, click msExchMailboxFolderSet.
7.	In the Edit Attribute box, type the decimal value that corresponds to the Outlook Web Access features that you want to enable for this user. To enable all Outlook Web Access features, type 4294967295. For a list of the attribute values that are available, see the "Segmentation attributes" section of this article.
8.	Click Set, click OK, and then quit ADSI Edit.

Microsoft Windows Server 2003

To enable per-user segmentation on a Windows 2003-based domain controller, follow these steps.

Warning If you use the ADSI Edit snap-in, the LDP utility, or any other LDAP version 3 client, and you incorrectly modify the attributes of Active Directory objects, you can cause serious problems. These problems may require you to reinstall Microsoft Windows 2000 Server, Microsoft Windows Server 2003, Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server, Microsoft Exchange Server 2003, or both Windows and Exchange. Microsoft cannot guarantee that problems that occur if you incorrectly modify Active Directory object attributes can be solved. Modify these attributes at your own risk.

1.	Start the ADSI Edit tool. To do this, click Start, click Run, type adsiedit.msc in the Open box, and then click OK. Note ADSI Edit is included in Microsoft Windows Support Tools. To install Microsoft Windows Support Tools, double-click Suptools.msi in the Support\Tools folder on the Windows Server 2003 CD.
2.	Connect to a domain controller if you are not already connected.
3.	Under the domain container, expand DC=example,DC=com, and then expand the container that contains the user account that you want to configure. For example, expand CN=Users.
4.	Right-click the container that corresponds to the user that you want to configure, and then click Properties.
5.	In the Attributes list, click msExchMailboxFolderSet, and then click Edit.
6.	In the Value box, type the decimal value that corresponds to the Outlook Web Access features that you want to enable for this user. To enable all Outlook Web Access features, type 4294967295. For a list of the available attribute values, see the "Segmentation attributes" section of this article.
7.	Click OK, click OK, and then quit ADSI Edit.

Segmentation attributes

The following table lists the value that you must use to enable each Outlook Web Access feature. To enable many features, you must total the values. You must then enter the total in the msExchMailboxFolderSet attribute for per-user segmentation or in the DefaultMailboxFolderSet registry entry for per-server segmentation.

Outlook Web Access feature	Decimal value	Hexadecimal value
Messaging	1	1
Calendar	2	2
Contacts	4	4
Tasks	8	8
Journal	16	10
Sticky notes	32	20
Public folders	64	40
Reminders	128	80
New mail notification	256	100
Rich client	512	200
Spelling checker	1024	400
S/MIME	2048	800
Search folders	4096	1000
Signature	8192	2000
Rules	16384	4000
Themes	32768	8000
Junk e-mail	65536	10000
All features	4294967295	FFFFFFFF

The following table illustrates several sample entries that you can use to enable certain Outlook Web Access features. The nine settings that are listed in this table do not represent the total number of feature combinations that you can create. In this table, Example 1 and Example 2 enable the same features in Outlook Web Access.

Per-server segmentation or per-user segmentation sample values

Outlook Web Access feature	Decimal value to enable feature	Example 1	Example 2	Example 3	Example 4	Example 5	Example 6	Example 7	Example 8	Example 9	Hexadecimal value to enable feature
Messaging	1	on		on	on	on	on	on	on	on	1
Calendar	2	on		on		on	on	on	on	on	2
Contacts	4	on		on		on	on	on	on	on	4
Tasks	8	on		on	on	on	on		on	on	8
Journal	16	on		on	on	on	on		on	on	10
Sticky notes	32	on		on	on	on	on		on	on	20
Public folders	64	on		on	on	on		on	on	on	40
Reminders	128	on		on		on	on	on	on	on	80
New mail notification	256	on		on	on	on	on	on	on	on	100
Rich client	512	on		on	on		on	on	on	on	200
Spelling checker	1024	on			on		on		on	on	400
S/MIME	2048	on			on		on		on	on	800
Search folders	4096	on			on		on		on	on	1000
Signature	8192	on			on		on		on	on	2000
Rules	16384	on			on		on		on	on	4000
Themes	32768	on			on		on		on		8000
Junk e-mail	65536	on			on	on	on				10000
All Features	4294967295		on								FFFFFFFF
Totals		131071	4294967295	1023	130937	66047	131007	967	65535	32767

Notes

•	The values in the Totals row are the values that you must enter in the DefaultMailboxFolderSet registry entry or in the msExchMailboxFolderSet user attribute to enable that particular set of Outlook Web Access features.
•	The messaging feature is always enabled even if you do not explicitly enable it.
•	Some Outlook Web Access features such as the reminder functionality and the new mail notification functionality are dependant on other features. Additionally, some features require that the Outlook Web Access rich-user interface be enabled.

Troubleshooting

Some Outlook Web Access features may not be available after you upgrade to Exchange Server 2003 from Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server. This issue occurs after you configure per-user segmentation and then upgrade to Exchange Server 2003. In Exchange 2000 Server, the decimal value that enables all Outlook Web Access features is 1023, or hexadecimal value 0x3FF. In Exchange Server 2003, the decimal value that enables all Outlook Web Access features is 4294967295. The hexadecimal value that enables all features is FFFFFFFF. Therefore, if you assigned the decimal value 1023 to the msExchMailboxFolderSet in Active Directory, you must modify that value when you install Exchange Server 2003.

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APPLIES TO

•	Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Enterprise Edition
•	Microsoft Exchange Server 2003 Standard Edition

Atlas and error handling

As you may already know, you must place an <atlas:ScriptManager> control within your Atlas enabled page. To handle an error situation, you can add an error template to the script manager control as shown in the following example:

<atlas:ScriptManager ID="ScriptManager1" runat="server" EnablePartialRendering="True" >
<ErrorTemplate>
Woops!
<br />
Error is:
<asp:Label ID="errorMessageLabel" runat="server" Text="Label"></asp:Label>
<asp:Button ID="okButton" runat="server" Text="Clear Error" />
</ErrorTemplate>
</atlas:ScriptManager>

Now, when an exception is generated on the server through one of the async methods, the error template you have defined will display. You'll notice a label and button with an id of 'errorMessageLabel' and 'okButton' respectively. These id names are specific names and Atlas will hook up special behaviour to these controls. For the 'errorMessageLabel' control, the text of the exception will be placed here for you. For the 'okButton', clicking this will cause the error/exception display to be cleared from your browser screen.

The id names are effectively special names that Atlas recognises and attributes special behaviour to. You can see this in the generated page output. Doing a view source on a page that contains the ScriptManager control above yields the following XML script:

<button targetElement="okButton">
<click>
<invokeMethod target="_PageRequestManager" method="clearError" />
</click>
</button>
<label targetElement="errorMessageLabel">
<bindings>
<binding dataContext="_PageRequestManager" dataPath="pageErrorMessage" property="text" />
</bindings>
</label>

Here you can see the 'okButton' calling the 'clearError ' method of the _PageRequestManager object, and also binding the 'errorMessageLabel' control to the 'pageErrorMessage' property of the _PageRequestManager object.

Now I dont know if this is new to the January CTP or not, but I thought it was interesting none the less.

ASP.NET AJAX.. May release

Different toolkits for Ajax were released by various software giants in the last few months.

If you want to see how Ajax can make your website cool, then look at http://ajax.asp.net/ajaxtoolkit/

But what is the future of ASP.NET????? Ever thought of it?

May 2007, a latest cross breed of Ajax and ASP.NET came out in the coding studio…. ASP.NET AJAX.. This May release had given more importance to Media , CSS selectors, navigation history support and accessing Astoria web data services…


Note : if you feel following as Greek and Latin, there are two options.
First one is simple, if you are reading this mail in outlook just type Ctrl + D. that’s it.. This mail will go to trash in a fraction of second.
Second One is little tedious. Keep this mail in your archives. One day you will understand it. Because you have read this mail once. J




So… what is there in May 2007 release??? See this screenshot.


You wont believe, amazing video quality and media player skins… Who knows tomorrow we can see a full length from a web page, and that too without downloading anything.. ( I agree that youtube is there doing that, but youtube is using Flash player to display. If you have ever used flashplayer for website, you will find the difficulty in coding for flash player from an asp.net IDE. You will end up doing coding in Actionscript of Flash.)

This video was 25MB and the sound quality is superb. Remember all these are played from a web browser.

Like DVD, we can select the chapters of the video..



Another feature is XAML Control ( check that it is not Xml control). Wht is this stuff???


XAML
Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML) is a markup language for declarative application programming. Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) implements a Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML) loader and provides Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML) language support for Windows Presentation Foundation (WPF) types such that you can create the majority of your application UI in Extensible Application Markup Language (XAML) markup.


In short XAML simplifies creating a UI for the .NET framework 3.0 programming model. A real potential treat to Flash players and Java UIs. This is extremely powerful. You can create your GUI with codes tags like in XML.

History and bookmarking. A new feature in the ASP.NET Futures (May 2007) release enables you to manage history points in your application. These history points are triggered at specific events in your application. When you use this feature in your application, users can click the browser's Back and Forward buttons to navigate logically through your application instead of browsing to other pages.

The History server control. This control lets you manage application history and use the Navigate event in the server and client.

The client Sys.Application object. This object lets you set history points. It also raises the pageNavigate event in the browser.



And the Third feature for May 2007, is accessing Astoria Web Data Services with ASP.NET AJAX

"Astoria" Web data services make it easy to expose data from databases to Web clients. An "Astoria" data service is a new type of Window Communication Framework (WCF) Web service. You can create this Web service in just a few steps using Visual Studio template item wizards.

Creating an "Astoria" Web data service enables you to expose specified tables in a database for direct access over HTTP — that is, as a REST-based API. This enables you to create a single entry point that permits query operations over the specified tables. You can optionally add filtering, sorting, and paging (through query parameters) without writing any server code. In addition, you can optionally enable update, insert, and delete operations, still without server code.



All kinds of criticism are welcomed.

another 25 hours of work..

What else to say.. work in software field will never work out as we plans.. :-) a universal law... when you start working, a lot of unplanned work comes out...