ZCB 6.5 BETA Programm experiences

[deepblue]

Hi all,

I am participating in the ZCB 6.5 BETA Programm that provides support for BES 5.0 and BES Express 5.0. I was able to setup a testenvironment today. Our testsetup is:

Zimbraserver: ZCS 6.0.5 NE on Redhat, x86_64
BES Server: VM with 2GB RAM, 50GB HD, Windows 2003 R2 (I know, its not offically supported) Standard, 32bit
ZCB: ZimbraConnecotrBES-6.5_BETA_2381_6.5.5376.7.msi
BES: BES Express 5.0.2

To make a long story short: it works :-)

I could successfully activate my BB on the first try. Mail, Calendar and Contact sync works in both directions. GAL search works. Within the next days we will put some users on the testserver to see how the server performs under some load.

The installation is tricky (not to say a nightmare). Follow the installation guideline closely. For some reason, the BES 5 needs an AD (to authenticate the admin user). But later you can/should switch to the build in "Blackberry Authentication Service" which seems to be kind of local authentication Database.

Very good work Zimbra!

Regards
Thomas

[dave_kempe]

Yeah I setup an AD as well on a test KVM box, and got it all installing, but the BES express console can never see the userlist. I am not that familiar with BES - is it meant to be able to see the Zimbra GAL? I figured if it could do that, it was working.

[deepblue]

Originally Posted by dave_kempe

I am not that familiar with BES - is it meant to be able to see the Zimbra GAL? I figured if it could do that, it was working.

Hi Dave,

the BES should have access to the Zimbra GAL. So, when you are about to add a user on the BES, you type in the firstname or lastname of the user and the account should be looked up correctly from the GAL.

Regards
Thomas

[drwho]

Hi

I've got as far as Installing ZCB on W2003 standard 32bit (not R2)

using: ZimbraConnectorBES-6.5_BETA_2381_6.5.5376.7.msi

This fails with:

Installation Incomplete
The installer was interrupted before ZCS connector for BES SMB could be installed

[I am following "Zimbra Connector for BlackBerry Enterprise Server Administrator’s Guide ZCB 6.5 BETA 3" which required ZCS to be installed before BES. I not elsewhere this is the other way round...]

Any thoughts please?

[drwho]

Answering my own question for the benefit of others:

Following leads elsewhere, it appears that there is a problem with the CDI installation which places CDI.dll in

C:\Program Files\Common Files\System\MSMAPI\2057

- where the ZCB installer can't find it.

I copied everything from that directory to

C:\WINDOWS\system32

- The installer now works OK

[drwho]

Hi

Can anyone help with troubleshooting this?

Activation process:

1) add user. User is found in the GAL OK. Set activation pw.

2) Activate from BB (ps - I am not entering server address)

3) ETP.DAT appears in users mailbox

BB shows "Contacting server..." until it times out

ETP.DAT remains in mailbox


Thanks...

[deepblue]

Originally Posted by drwho

Hi

Can anyone help with troubleshooting this?

Activation process:

1) add user. User is found in the GAL OK. Set activation pw.

2) Activate from BB (ps - I am not entering server address)

3) ETP.DAT appears in users mailbox

BB shows "Contacting server..." until it times out

ETP.DAT remains in mailbox

Thanks...

Hmm... As long as the ETP.DAT remains in the mailbox, the activation will not proceed. Make sure, that you dont "touch" the ETP.DAT mail (should be marked unread and remain in the inbox of the users mailbox).

Have a look in the audit.log and mailboxd.log if the besadmin user regularly scans the users mailbox. If the ETP.DAT mail is still not fetched by the besadmin user, I sometimes had success by rebooting the BES directly after the ETP.DAT File arrived in the users mailbox.

Don't give up the activation process to early. It could take some time to fetch the ETP.DAT mail by the besadmin user.

Regards
Thomas

[drwho]

Originally Posted by deepblue

Have a look in the audit.log and mailboxd.log if the besadmin user regularly scans the users mailbox.

Hi Thomas

I have indexing turned off (which I read somewhere is a requirement) - can you point me where to find those files...

I have tried rebooting.

This is very frustrating - there should be a troubleshooting methodology for something like this, but I can't find one...

Thanks for your help.

[deepblue]

Originally Posted by drwho

Hi Thomas

I have indexing turned off (which I read somewhere is a requirement) - can you point me where to find those files...

I have tried rebooting.

This is very frustrating - there should be a troubleshooting methodology for something like this, but I can't find one...

Thanks for your help.

Hi drwho,

turn off indexing is a very good idea. audit.log and mailboxd.log is on the Zimbra Server at /opt/zimbra/log. grep for the besadmin user you created on the Zimbra server...

Troubleshooting BES is not easy. The most problems that can occur are BES / Blackberry related, not Zimbra - but that is my impression, your mileage may vary.

Regards
Thomas

[drwho]

Hi Thomas

I don't have mailboxd.log, but this is in mailbox.log every 10 minutes (also occasional galsync):

2010-09-07 12:21:20,183 INFO [btpool0-109://192.168.1.160/service/soap/CheckLicenseRequest] [name=mybesadmin@mydomain.co.uk;mid=38;ip=192.168.1 .178;ua=ZimbraConnectorForBES/6.5.5376.7;] soap - CheckLicenseRequest
2010-09-07 12:21:20,206 INFO [btpool0-109://192.168.1.160:7071/service/admin/soap//GetInfoRequest] [name=mybesadmin@mydomain.co.uk;mid=38;ip=192.168.1 .178;ua=ZimbraConnectorForBES/6.5.5376.7;] soap - GetInfoRequest


audit.log has this activity every 10 minutes:

2010-09-07 12:21:20,127 INFO [btpool0-109://192.168.1.160:7071/service/admin/soap//AuthRequest] [name=mybesadmin@mydomain.co.uk;ip=192.168.1.178;ua =ZimbraConnectorForBES/6.5.5376.7;] security - cmd=AdminAuth; account=mybesadmin@mydomain.co.uk;
2010-09-07 12:21:20,127 INFO [btpool0-109://192.168.1.160:7071/service/admin/soap//AuthRequest] [name=mybesadmin@mydomain.co.uk;ip=192.168.1.178;ua =ZimbraConnectorForBES/6.5.5376.7;] security - cmd=Auth; account=mybesadmin@mydomain.co.uk; protocol=soap;
2010-09-07 12:21:20,185 INFO [btpool0-109://192.168.1.160/service/soap/CheckLicenseRequest] [name=mybesadmin@mydomain.co.uk;mid=38;ip=192.168.1 .178;ua=ZimbraConnectorForBES/6.5.5376.7;] security - cmd=CheckLicense; acctId=928d16fa-48de-4454-b258-e76be335386f; feature=mapi;

[besadmin and domain changed in above for security]

My first thought is that if connections are only every 10 minutes, the BB activation request could timeout while waiting for besadmin to process the activation email...