Provisioning and address book objects in Hybrid Exchange environments
Introduction
This page describes how provisioning and address book objects work in Hybrid Exchange environments, where both on-premise (or Hosted) Exchange and Microsoft 365 mailboxes are archived side by side. It covers which groups are visible for provisioning, how on-premise and cloud mailboxes are distinguished in the address book, how user logins are created, and what steps are needed when mailboxes are moved between environments.
Before running provisioning jobs, the following prerequisites must be met depending on your environment:
| Environment | Prerequisites |
|---|---|
| Hybrid on On-premise Exchange | 1. Mailboxes should be assigned to groups available on the On-premise Exchange. 2. Configure the Microsoft 365 login provider. |
| Hybrid on Hosted Exchange | 1. Configure the Microsoft Exchange login provider if needed (optional). This provider allows login with email address and password. 2. Configure the Microsoft 365 login provider. For cloud mailboxes, Microsoft 365 login will be created. |
Always configure login providers before running provisioning jobs to ensure user logins are created correctly for both on-premise and cloud mailboxes.
Provisioning in hybrid environments
Which groups are visible for provisioning?
In hybrid environments, the Email archive is processing only the groups that are available on the on-premise Exchange servers. These groups can contain both on-premise mailboxes and cloud mailboxes. It is recommended to set up an Exchange group (or groups) containing all mailboxes to be archived and provision only the group.
How logins are created?
In Email archive Provisioning settings (Email archive => Settings => Provisioning settings => User creation options), it is possible to configure what type of login will be associated with the users. For every on-premise and cloud mailbox, a Windows login is created. Microsoft 365 login is created for every Microsoft 365 mailbox, but can be additionally created for on-premise mailboxes.
Address book objects in hybrid environments
How to distinguish between On-premise and cloud mailboxes in Address book?
The column Server name shows the server that is hosting the mailbox. For cloud mailboxes, the server name will be Office365, on-premise mailboxes will show the name of the on-premise Exchange server.
What to do after a mailbox is moved from On-premise to cloud (also vice-versa)?
If the mailbox is still in the group after the move, only the Email archive Provisioning job needs to be started.
After a mailbox is moved from on-premise to cloud, the mailbox should remain a member of one of the groups configured for provisioning. The next provisioning job will actualize the mailbox information and switch the on-premise mailbox to cloud mailbox type. The same procedure applies when a mailbox is moved from cloud to on-premise.
Screenshots: Mailbox before moving to cloud
Screenshots: Mailbox after moving to cloud
Important: If an on-premise Exchange group is used in a job configuration, the job configuration needs to be updated after the group is moved to the cloud, since the group identifier changes and the job is still using the old identifier.
Steps to take:
- open job's configuration page
- remove the group from the list of Address book objects to process
- select the group and re-add it to the list
- save the job configuration
Reconfiguring after On-premise is turned off
How to reconfigure the system after On-premise is turned off?
If you decide to keep only your cloud system running and turn off the On-premise one, the following steps need to be done for your environment to work correctly:
- the Use hybrid Exchange environment checkbox in Email archive => Settings => System settings => Hybrid Exchange settings must get unchecked
- EWS settings under Email archive => Settings => System settings must be rewritten to point to the cloud system
- old server and groups need to be deleted from Email archive Provisioning job configuration and added newly