Get the Answers

As always, you need to discuss certain decisions (e.g., the process for installing and administering management tools for both Windows 2000 and Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server, who's responsible for daily operations such as backups, how best to provide antivirus protection for files and email) with your company's Win2K administrators. When you begin a plan for deploying Exchange 2000, however, you also need to talk to your Win2K administrators about the following questions:

• Is Active Directory (AD) replication configured properly and working correctly?
• Is File Replication Service (FRS) working across the Win2K forest?
• Is the Active Directory Connector (ADC) necessary to synchronize address information between AD and existing Exchange Server 5.5 servers? What connection agreements (CAs) are required, and which target organizational units (OUs) should you use? Who will apply the ADC schema updates?
• Who will run /forestprep, and on which system? Who will verify that the resulting schema changes have replicated correctly?
• When will the first Exchange 2000 server be introduced into the forest, and who will install the system? Which accounts or groups will be allocated the Exchange Full Administrator role?
• How many Exchange 5.5 organizations exist, and how will those servers be migrated into the AD forest?
• How many Global Catalogs (GCs) are deployed, and where?
• Which Win2K sites are the Exchange servers to be installed into?
• Is DNS configured and working correctly? Can it support email routing ?
• Are all available Exchange 2000 security patches installed correctly?
• Is Microsoft IIS secured properly?

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