Managing Exchange Folders and Item Counts

So in my last blog entry I talked about the PAL tool and how it can help you get a handle on your servers performance.  Today I’d like to discuss PFDAVAdmin.  This is a tool free tool that you run on your Exchange server (2000 or 2003) to get a look inside of all your mailboxes and folders to get things like the total number of items in a folder inside a mailbox.  Here are the details to do just this. 

1. Download the tool
2. Install the tool on the Exchange server
3. Connect to the server, global catalog server and select All Mailboxes
   
4. On the Tools menu select Export Properties
5. On this window put in a destination for the location you want the output file to be dropped (it will be in tab delimited format)
6. Select these three check boxes:
   
1. PR_CONTENT_COUNT
2. PR_DISPLAY_NAME
3. PR_FOLDER_PATHNAME
   
7. 
8. Hit Ok
9. Grab much needed caffeine while you wait.
10. The server will begin processing you you will get an output tab delimited file that you can load into excel and pretty up showing the users ID, folder name and number of items in the folder for each mailbox on the server.

This helped us identify those “offenders” that never delete or move anything. After we identified and cleaned up some of our users our exchange 623 and 1022 errors started getting less and less frequent.  The latest Microsoft support person (who speaks English as a first language….note it takes 4 weeks to get one btw) says that we still have a large number of items in our “search folders” that we need to deal with.  I can see the search folders in the tab delimited file but there are multiple ones to deal with. Some are Blackberry search folders, some are Cisco Unity Search folders, some are Finder search folders and others are something called MS-OLK-BGPooledSearchFolder search folders.   We were told Blackberry search folders could be  cleaned with the MFCMapi tool.  There’s also a reg fix which I believe is for the MS-OLK-BGPooledSearchFolder folders.  I haven’t run these fixes yet but I’ll let you know how it turns out.

These issues have reinforced something I’ve been saying for years. There are two evils in IT….printers and email.  You’ll never completely rid yourselves of issues with either one.

PAL – Performance Analysis of Logs

Wow…been a long time for an update eh?! Well most of this year I’ve been working on our Windows 7/Office 2010 rollout.  Also been working on a massive shift from one archive solution to another…but that’s another whole story…

After we upgraded one of our sites from Outlook 2003 to Outlook 2010 we coincidentally had huge issues with Exchange 2003.  We started getting 623 errors in event logs followed by 1022 errors which ended up raping, pillaging and plundering our Exchange information stores. So after weeks of the Microsoft Advanced Diagnostics team, which seems to be based out of somewhere in India, said our issues were caused by too many mailboxes with message counts greater than 5000 in folders. No shit..really?!  Still working on this issue so I’ll let you know how it turns out.

So back to PAL. During my research into Exchange performance I found the PAL tool at codeplex.com.  PAL is a tool that will look at your perfmon counter logs and tell you what’s up with your server.  Unlike, the Baseline Analyzer tools, it reacts to running conditions on your servers and lets you know what seems to be running “out of bounds”.  Turns out a bunch of subject matter experts at Microsoft got together and set some rules in the PAL tool to alarm/alert just like a traditional expert system would. Very cool stuff.


So here’s the quick and dirty on getting started with PAL:

1. Download PAL from here
2. Install PAL
3. Run PAL and go to the Threshold File Tab
4. Pick the type of analysis you want to run…Start with System Overview…it will get you started (Threshold File Title)
5. Now click on “Export to Perfmon Template File”
6. Now if it’s a 2003/XP system save the filetype as .htm, if it’s 2008/Win7 save the filetype as .xml.
7. Copy the template to the system to be monitored
8. Run perfmon
9. (Note: The rest of this is steps for 2008/Win7..if you are on 2003/xp figure it out for yourself. ;P)
10. Go to Data Collector Set
11. Right click on “User Defined”
12. New Collector Set
13. Pick a name and select “from template”
14. Browse for the template
15. Hit Finish
16. Right click on the collector and start it
17. Run it for awhile and stop it
18. Take the results file back to your PAL workstation and start from the first tab.
19. On counter tab, select the resultant file
20. On Threshold file Tab reselect the one you started with
21. On Questions Tab, answer the 4 questions about the system you were monitoring
22. Output Options Tab, leave it at auto for now
23. File Output Tab, leave defaults
24. Queue Tab, leave defaults
25. Execute Tab, select Execute and hit finish
26. Wait…it takes awhile to process
27. Enjoy your html output file and analysis of what was up with your server

One last thing to note…scroll through your Threshold File Titles…there’s a lot to choose from.  You can run some very specific tests.  These all relate to specific counters to “watch” in perfmon so it’s a great learning tool just looking at what’s important to watch.
Enjoy.

Chromebook CR-48

Guess who got a Chromebook today?!  So far I really like it. I’m trying to get my stuff all “in the cloud” but it’s taking awhile to figure out the best way to move everything.

The great things about the notebook are:

• it’s size – Nice and thin…could be lighter but not bad at all.  Perfect size for a “workable” machine.  They didn’t try an be an iPad clone and I appreciate that.
• physical appearance – It’s one sexy beast.  Love the simplified keyboard and the fact that all the buttons look the same.
• simplicity – This is more a comment about the OS, but it’s dead simple to use and figure out.
• guest mode – Nice touch. I like that I can give it to anyone and they can mess with my stuff.
• easy of use – Goes hand in hand with simplicity, but it’s worth commenting that they really went the extra mile to make it simple to use.
• potential – This device is the future.  That’s clear to me now.
• battery life – nuff said.  8+ hours and still cranking along

The things I’ve found that need improvement are:

• remote connections – Gotta give me vnc, ssh and rdp. You just have too.  It’s not workable as a tool for me unless I can remotely control a “real” machine. 
• Java, Javascript or something – Come on, this thing would be a powerhouse with a little client side intelligence.
• Wireless signup with Verizon – I still haven’t been able to figure out how to sign up.  Guys…there money lying on the table…go get it.
• More Apps – App store for chrome looks anemic
• Mouse pad – works ok, but right click action with 2 fingers is difficult to pull off.
• Google cloud printing is good, but needs improvement.  Need to find a way to set up a “shared” printer in a reception area so that guests can print easily to it over the web. That’s not easy with Google cloud printing.
• Flash support – Just gotta have it.

 

So after my first 48 hours with it…that’s my view.

iperf

iperf is a tool for testing the throughput of a network pipe. It came in handy today as I was testing out the throughput of our WAN lines.  We have T3’s at each site and one site in particular always “seemed” slow when transferring files but I didn’t know why.  I installed iperf on linux (yum install iperf) and set one side as a server.

iperf –s

Then on another box on the other side of the wire I installed iperf and ran it as a client":

iperf –c x.x.x.x –d  (Where x.x.x.x is the ip address of the box running as a server.)

The I got the following result:

C:\>iperf -c x.x.x.x -d
------------------------------------------------------------
Server listening on TCP port 5001
TCP window size: 8.00 KByte (default)
------------------------------------------------------------
------------------------------------------------------------
Client connecting to x.x.x.x, TCP port 5001
TCP window size: 8.00 KByte (default)
------------------------------------------------------------
[1840] local y.y.y.y port 1552 connected with x.x.x.x port 5001
[1816] local y.y.y.y port 5001 connected with x.x.x.x port 46524
[ ID] Interval       Transfer     Bandwidth
[1816]  0.0-10.0 sec   439 MBytes   8.5 Mbits/sec
[1840]  0.0-10.0 sec   321 MBytes   6.7 Mbits/sec

This is a full duplex T3 line so I expect something higher than 8.5 and 6.7.  After some inspection I noticed that switchport on the backbone switch was set for Auto-10 instead of just Auto.  That was restricting it to Ethernet speeds. I changed it to Auto and it picked right back up (~30Mbits/sec).  I did this while other traffic was on the wire so it couldn’t entirely fill the pipe by itself.

Cool tool!

CentOS NIC Settings (Speed & Duplex)

We ran into an issue with the speed and duplex settings on one of our CentOS boxes during a recent upgrade of our infrastructure to HP ProCurve 8112zl switches.  Because I futz with this about once a year I figured I’d write it down so I could look up up next time…

Step 1: Determine what NIC is in your CentOS box so you can see it’s capabilities.

#lspci | grep Ethernet

This should give you something like (excuse the wrap):

0a:00.0 Ethernet controller: Realtek Semiconductor Co., Ltd. RTL8111/8168B PCI Express Gigabit Ethernet controller (rev 02)

Step 2:  Check how the nic is currently set:

#ethtool eth0:

This should give you something like:

Settings for eth0::
        Supported ports: [ TP ]
        Supported link modes:   10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full
                                100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full
                                1000baseT/Half 1000baseT/Full
        Supports auto-negotiation: Yes
        Advertised link modes:  10baseT/Half 10baseT/Full
                                100baseT/Half 100baseT/Full
                                1000baseT/Half 1000baseT/Full
        Advertised auto-negotiation: Yes
        Speed: 1000Mb/s
        Duplex: Full
        Port: Twisted Pair
        PHYAD: 1
        Transceiver: internal
        Auto-negotiation: on
        Supports Wake-on: g
        Wake-on: g
        Current message level: 0x000000ff (255)
        Link detected: yes

 

Step 3:  Force the speed to say, 100Full (just for grins):

Edit /etc/sysconfig/networking-scripts/ifcfg-eth0
Add the line:

ETHTOOL_OPTS="speed 100 duplex full autoneg off"

The bounce the network service:

#service network restart

That’s it.  Also be sure to check the config on the switch so it matches.  And remember… always be consistent on both sides of the setup. If the server is auto, set the switch to auto. If the server is 100Full, force the switch port to 100Full.

Another Legal iPad App

This one looks pretty good too. It’s called Exhibit A. What I like about this app is that it’s not a linear presentation like PowerPoint or Keynote. It lets you pick a slide easily and present in what ever order works for you. 

 

Even More Legal iPad Apps

After my last post, I found another bunch of good stuff.

 

Fastcase (free) is a legal research tool. 

 

LawStack (free) is basically a mini legal library.  It contains:

• US Constitution
• Federal Rules of Federal of Civil Procedure
• Federal Rules of Appellate Procedure
• Federal Rules of Evidence
• Federal Rules of Bankruptcy Procedure
• Federal Rules of Criminal Procedure
• More stuff that’s downloadable inside the app

PocketJustice (Free) is an app that include voting alignments and biographical sketches for all 100 justices at the US Supreme Court.  It also has 100 constitutional law cases.

 

Black’s Law Dictionary, 9th Edition. ($54.99)

 

 

The Essential Law Dictionary ($9.99)....yet another legal dictionary.

 

Nolo’s Plain English Law Dictionary.  (Free) Yep…another one.

 

Legal News Reader ($0.99)  A Legal specific news reader pulling from multiple sources (CNN, HUD, Law.com, LexisNexis, etc…)

 

ABA Journal (Free) the American Bar Association’s iPad app for legal news.

Court Days ($0.99) A date calculator assisting to calculate the number of court or calendar days before or after a given date.

 

US Code (Free) is an app that has the entire US Code for all federal statues available for viewing on your iPad.

Enjoy…

iPad apps for the Attorney

So I got an iPad last year. As skeptical as I am about gadgets…I gotta tell ya I love it!  My role in our Firm is to evaluate new technology so that the good stuff eventually ends up in the hands of our Attorney’s.  Once you get past the eye candy, what can an iPad really do for an Attorney?  Well, so far I’ve only found a few legal specific apps.  Here they are:

 

iJuror is a juror selection tool.  It keeps track of people during the jury selection process allowing you to keep track of their details and what you did/didn’t like about them.

iCle, made by the same people that make iJuror helps an Attorney keep track of their CLE credits.  This is a very basic app and seems more like a simple note taking replacement.

 

JuryTracker looks interesting. It replaces the sticky notes Attorney’s often user to keep track of Juror information at trial.  You can easily keep track of generic case data, each juror’s details like their chair position in court, their mood, etc.  There is even a timer built in to keep track of the time used in court by the Plaintiff and the Defendant.  Definitely worth a look…

 

TrialPad looks like it’s going to be really useful.  It’s a case preparation and presentation tool which looks to compete with tools like Trial Director and Sanction.  It certainly doesn’t have as much functionality at this point, but it will be interesting to see what happens as this tool matures.

Those are the main tools I’ve found so far for the legal profession.  There are tons of other tools on the fringe like PDF editors, document review tools and financial tools but I wanted to focus specifically on legal tools.  If you’ve found any others please hit me up in the comments and let me know.

PDQ Deploy

I ran into a cool tool today for installing software on a remote box.  It’s called PDQ Deploy and it’s from the fellas over at Admin Arsenal.  We use Prism Deploy for our Firm, but I can see using this tool in a pinch for even faster deployments. Prism Deploy clients (which require and agents) are set to “check in” every 5 minutes for new stuff.  With this tool I can truly push software to machines on demand and not worry about the client having the agent.