Microsoft this week added an option to its Exchange Server\u00a0Deployment Assistant tool to configure hybrid deployments using Exchange Server\u00a02016.<\/p>\n
The Deployment Assistant is a browser based tool that poses\u00a0questions for IT pros and delivers a checklist of configuration steps to take.\u00a0The tool previously provided guidance for hybrid deployments with Exchange Server\u00a02010 and Exchange Server 2013. Now it supports Exchange Server 2016 hybrid\u00a0deployments, too.<\/p>\n
Microsoft’s software development practices are now\u00a0“cloud first,” but organizations still like to control their own servers\u00a0and so Microsoft has made a big deal of enabling hybrid support for them. A\u00a0“hybrid” deployment consists of Exchange Servers hosted in an\u00a0organization’s computing environment (known as “customer premises”\u00a0datacenters) while also tapping the Exchange Online service or other Office 365\u00a0service as hosted from Microsoft’s datacenters.<\/p>\n
The updated Deployment Assistant now provides deployment advice\u00a0for the following scenarios, according to Microsoft’s\u00a0announcement this week<\/a>:<\/p>\n Best Practices<\/span> “In order for you to have a seamless experience and be\u00a0supported, you need your whole environment to be up-to-date, not just a\u00a0specific server or two,” Microsoft’s Exchange Team explained in a “Hybrid\u00a0deployment best practices” blog post<\/a>. It has lots of other helpful advice.<\/p>\n The Deployment Assistant typically gets used twice by\u00a0organizations, according to the Exchange Team. It’s first used to introduce a\u00a0new Exchange Server product into an existing Exchange computing environment.\u00a0Next, the tool gets used to describe the steps to create the hybrid network.<\/p>\n Microsoft is promising that Exchange Server 2016 simplifies hybrid\u00a0deployments somewhat. For instance, “you will no longer have to move your\u00a0URLs to the newest version of Exchange,” Microsoft’s blog post explained.<\/p>\n Exchange Server 2016 Hybrid Perks<\/span> It has other hybrid support benefits, according to a Microsoft\u00a0TechNet library article updated in late January. Those benefits include:<\/p>\n These perks are described in this “Exchange\u00a0Server Hybrid Deployments<\/a>” TechNet article.<\/p>\n It appears that Azure Active Directory (AD) will be needed\u00a0to enable federation trust in hybrid configurations, which enables single\u00a0sign-on access for end users. However, the TechNet article states that “a\u00a0federation trust with the Azure AD authentication system for your\u00a0Office 365 tenant is automatically configured when you activate your\u00a0Office 365 service account.” Azure AD does have a free plan, per Microsoft’s\u00a0pricing page<\/a>, so perhaps it’s accounted for.<\/p>\n Microsoft lists the hybrid deployment requirements for\u00a0Exchange Server at this\u00a0TechNet page<\/a>. Using Exchange Server 2007 in hybrid scenarios with Office\u00a0365 services is an unsupported approach, according to that article. However, Exchange\u00a0Server 2010, 2013 and 2016 products are supported for hybrid deployments.<\/p>\n\n
\nMicrosoft makes certain assumptions about the use of its Deployment\u00a0Assistant tool. An organization’s local Exchange Server environment has to have\u00a0been properly deployed. New server upgrades have to be performed by\u00a0establishing coexistence with the older servers first, and the proper number of\u00a0new servers needs to have been deployed. Also, the servers need to have the\u00a0latest cumulative updates before an organization goes the hybrid route.<\/p>\n
\nMicrosoft released its Exchange Server 2016 product back\u00a0in October. While the new product is an Exchange Server 2013 facelift of\u00a0sorts, it was built based on Microsoft’s Exchange Online service. Exchange\u00a0Server 2016 has improved backend search and e-discovery capabilities, plus\u00a0improved Outlook client support, among other features.<\/p>\n\n