LCS/OCS Coexistence and Migration (series?): Allow/Block list not in MMC

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  • I think given all that will come from our presentation on the topic that a series will likely result. The right place to start on this subject is the Migrating to Office Communications Server 2007 document.  I would like to call out that the supported manner of administrating your clients is to use the same MMC version for the product and so what you see below is just my individual testing which you may find other items I have overlooked. I welcome your comments.

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  • My colleague Mark asked me a question about modifying the allow/block list for users on Office Communications Server 2007. I knew the unfortunate answer before he finished typing - it was removed from the UI of the new MMC but was accessible via WMI. There were scripts in the software resource kit and at the time of this writing the newly released Resource Kit book states it has over 150 sample scripts, maybe there is one in there?

  • Mark's question could not have come at a better time because I am delivering a technical session with my teammate Steve on LCS/OCS Coexistence and Migration in the middle of February. I just happened to have my LCS deployment completely running and was starting the OCS configuration when I happened to create my 2007 user using the LCS 2005 SP1 mmc and so I went about the testing you find below.

  • The account Toml was created using the Live Communications Server 2005 Service Pack 1 MMC on the Domain Controller. Using this MMC allows me to home the user on the Office Communications Server 2007 server but not enable the enhanced presence value. A user in this state can sign-in with OC 2005 but not OC 2007. Using the LCS 2005 Sp1 MMC I was able to leverage the View/Edit functionality for the contact list. Specifically I blocked oc2005@contoso.com as it provides a very good visible experience.

  • A screen shot of my sign-in with Office Communicator 2005 with a find for the user oc2005@contoso.com

  • This proves that I can achieve my goal, or at least part of it. Will this behavior remain intact after enabling enhanced presence with the Office Communications Server MMC and use the Office Communicator 2007 client?

  • NOTE: remember that when a user has the enhanced presence bit enabled they can still log in with OC 2005, CWA 1.0 or CoMo 1.0 client UNTIL a newer OC 2007, CWA 2.0 or CoMo 2.0 client logs in. For lack of a better term the new client "sets" the account into enhanced presence state or mode where as before it was in a capable state.

  • So I have switched to enhanced presence and logged in with OC 2007 and my experience is as I expect it to be.

  • This is great for the customer who is going to migrate to OCS 2007 but what about the customer who will be in a long period of coexistence or who relies on this feature and not a scripting solution. So the next test is to see if I can still use the LCS 2005 SP1 mmc and populate the allow/block list after the user has logged in with OC 2007 with enhanced presence.

  • So at this point I reach a failure of some sort, I can not see additions or changes to the allow/block list. So I create a new user, testme@contoso.com and I populate the allow/block with 4 accounts blocked to be sure I can read more than 1. I can. Now I enable the user for enhanced presence and sign-out, add a fifth entry and sign-in. This works so now I have to test signing in with OC 2007 to confirm all 5 work as expected and then sign-out add a sixth block and sign-in again. FAILURE.

  • So we have a quick workaround that would work for customers who have yet to deploy the OC 2007 client and enhanced presence to their end users. Once you enable enhanced presence and deploy OC 2007 you have to come up with a new workaround. This means I need to do more work on the containers and I recall that when I was reviewing the Resource Kit there was mention of the containers (it was not the area I was requested to provide feedback on) so I will have to update this after the middle of February as the training mentioned will be in Seattle and that is when I get my copy of the book.