Managing Stores and Storage Groups

Once created and properly configured, both storage groups and stores require proper management to keep everything running smoothly. Much of this management is covered elsewhere in this book:

• Backing up and restoring (Chapter 14)

• Managing public folders and replication (Chapter 6, ‚“Using Public Folders ‚½)

• Managing individual users and their mailboxes (Chapter 6)

• Tracking messages and monitoring the status of message flow (Chapter 10)

• Configuring client access to the store data (Chapter 7, ‚“Configuring Client Access ‚½)

Viewing Logon Information

In the store container itself, a number of objects provide some management and monitoring ability over the store. The Logons container, shown in Figure 9.8, shows information regarding who has logged on to the mailbox store. Among other things, this information includes the username, the logon time, the logoff time, and the type of client used to connect.

Figure 9.8: Viewing logon information for a store

Aside from these major administrative functions, other administrative tidbits regarding stores and storage groups are covered in the next few sections.

Viewing and Managing Mailbox Information

The Mailboxes container for a store, shown in Figure 9.9, shows all of the mailboxes configured in the store. Along with the actual mailbox name , you can see who last logged on to the mailbox, how much space the mailbox takes up on the server, how many actual items are in the mailbox, and the last logon/logoff times for the mailbox.

Figure 9.9: Viewing mailbox information for a store

You cannot manage these mailboxes the same way you could in previous versions of Exchange. In fact, there are not even property pages to open . Almost all mailbox administration is performed using the Active Directory Users and Computers tool and the techniques described in Chapter 5.

However, there are two things that you can do to a mailbox from within System Manager. The first is to delete it, though this is called purging within the context of System Manager. To do this, right-click the mailbox and select Purge from the context menu.

Note ‚  

Once a mailbox is purged, it cannot be recovered.

Mailboxes can also be deleted from within Active Directory Users and Computers, although mailboxes deleted in this manner are not really deleted; they are simply disconnected from the user . This leads us to the second function that you can perform on mailboxes in System Manager, which is to reconnect a disconnected mailbox. Do this by right-clicking the mailbox and selecting Reconnect from the context menu.

Note ‚  

This business with purging, deleting, disconnecting, and reconnecting brings up not only an interesting interface design point but something to be careful with on the exam. Why didn ‚ t Microsoft simply choose to call it deleting a mailbox in System Manager and disconnecting a mailbox in Active Directory Users and Computers? After all, purging a mailbox makes it sound like you are removing all the messages inside the mailbox. Whatever the reasons, this kind of confusing language and inconsistency can trip you up in real life and on the exam. On the exam, pay particular attention to the context of questions. For example, if an exam questions asks whether you can recover a deleted mailbox, paying close attention may clue you in to whether they really mean a deleted (purged) mailbox or a disconnected (deleted) mailbox.

Mounting and Dismounting Stores

One of the great advantages of having multiple stores is that individual stores can be taken down for maintenance without affecting other stores on the server. Taking a store offline is referred to as dismounting , and bringing it back online is referred to as mounting . To mount or dismount a store, simply right-click the store and choose the appropriate option from the context menu.

Deleting Mailbox Stores

To delete a mailbox store, just right-click it and choose Delete from the context menu. Before you can do this, however, you must either delete or move all mailboxes within that store. System Manager will not let you delete a store that contains mailboxes. In addition, if the store being deleted has any messages currently queued for outbound delivery, you will be informed that these messages will be lost if you proceed. If you choose to delete the store anyway, you will be asked to select a new store to be used for any messages in the inbound queue.

Deleting Public Folder Stores

Deleting public stores is a little more complicated than deleting mailbox stores. To begin with, the actual command is the same; right-click the store and choose the Delete command. However, there are several restrictions governing the process:

• The store cannot be the only store that contains a public folder tree.

• The store must not be the default public store for any mailbox stores or users.

• Before you can remove a public store that contains system folders, you must select a new public store for those folders.

• If the public store holds the only available replica of a public folder, you will be warned that all data in that folder will be lost.

  Note ‚  

  When you delete a store, Exchange will not delete the actual database files for you. You will need to manually do this in order to reclaim that disk space.

Deleting a Storage Group

You can delete any storage group by right-clicking it and choosing Delete from the context menu. However, the storage group must not have any stores associated with it. This means you must first remove all stores in the storage group before you can delete the group itself.

Using Stores and Storage Groups

Many different theories abound on how you should configure your Exchange organization ‚ s storage groups and stores. We ‚ ll examine some cold hard facts here and then let you make the determination that provides the best solution for your organization ‚ s needs.

A storage group, no matter how many stores are in it, uses only one set of transaction logs. This is a good thing until you need to configure circular logging for any reason. Circular logging is configured at the storage group level and thus applies equally to all stores inside that storage group. This can become a large problem should that storage group happen to contain critical e-mail stores. In reality, is there such a thing anymore as a noncritical e-mail store? For your stores on which you wish to configure circular logging ‚ think public folder stores, especially those housing Internet newsgroups ‚ you should consider creating a storage group just to hold them. Public folders were discussed at length previously in Chapter 6.

When it comes to performing backups of the Exchange organization, you should be aware that backups can be configured only at the storage group level. Thus, you have the option to back up only an entire storage group and its stores, not individual stores within the storage group. However, when performing a restoration, you can opt to restore only specific stores within the storage group. The fact that storage groups are backed up as a whole can have an impact on the length of time required to perform your backups, especially when performing full (normal) backups . We will examine the topic of Exchange backup and restoration more in Chapter 14.

The combination of storage groups and stores that you ultimately configure will depend on the needs of your network.