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Moving an existing AgendaX installation to Office 365

Many of our customers are migrating their existing Exchange infrastructure to the cloud. Microsoft Office 365 is the most commonly used option.

But what needs to be done to an existing AgendaX installation that is configured to access the on-premise Exchange servers?

This largely depends on if you make the transition to Office 365 in one step (batch) or in several steps over the course of weeks / months. If the transition is done in one batch, you will only need to reconfigure your existing installation. If you have many mailboxes to migrate and this will take a while, we suggest to setup a second instance of AgendaX on the same server. This will allow for a smooth transition and will at any time show all user calendars (both on-premise and migrated mailboxes) in the AgendaX views.

Migration in one batch

You will need to uninstall MAPI/CDO (Exchange Server MAPI), if installed, and install an Outlook 32bit client (Outlook 2016 or later) on the AgendaX server. Also, the AgendaX mailbox needs to be migrated to Office 365 first, before you start migrating user mailboxes.

Also, make sure that a modern browser is installed on the AgendaX server, as this is needed to create an Outlook profile that connects to an Office 365 mailbox.

Then,

  • Log in on the AgendaX Server with the AgendaX user. This is VERY important because Outlook profiles are user specific.
  • Run Regedit and make sure that there is no value called MapiHttpDisabled under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Exchange or that its value is set to 0.
  • Add the following keys to the registry under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\SOFTWARE\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Common\Identity
    EnableADAL (DWORD) 1
    DisableAADWAM (DWORD) 1
    DisableADALatopWAMOverride (DWORD) 1

    and under HKEY_CURRENT_USER\Software\Microsoft\Office\16.0\Outlook\Cached Mode add a
    value called AllowAutoDiscoverForNonOutlook and set its value to DWORD 1.

  • Outlook 2016:
    • Make sure that KB3115279 for Office 2016 32bit (https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/download/details.aspx?id=53200)
      is installed.
    • Add the following parameter to AgentX.ini:
      [Config]
      ForceIExchangeManageStoreEx=1
  • Outlook 2019 / Office 365:
    • Add the following parameter to AgentX.ini:
      [Config]
      ForceIExchangeManageStoreEx=1
  • Then, create the Outlook profile and make sure that Exchange Cache mode is disabled in the Outlook profile. Enter the Outlook profile name (either in AgendaX Setup if you are setting up a new instance of AgendaX or in AgendaXCfg.exe if AgendaX is already installed under MSX Version / Outlook MAPI Client / Outlook Profile Name). The Standard- Name for the first Outlook- Profile that is configured is ‘Outlook’.
  • Start Outlook with that profile and make sure that the profile works. When you are prompted for a password, make sure to check the ‘Remember password’ checkbox.
  • Finally, close Outlook and restart the AgendaX Update Service

The permissions on Office 365 have to be set a bit differently than in an On Site Exchange environment. On Office 365, you will have to set permissions on folder level:

Please give the AgendaX user Reviewer rights on the top of the mailbox, and Editor rights on the Calendar folders.

The following Powershell script will do this for you. Replace “agendax” on the 4th and 5th line in the following script with the name of your O365 AgendaX account:

Connect-ExchangeOnline
foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-EXOMailbox -OrganizationalUnit abc -ResultSize Unlimited))
{
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
}
Disconnect-ExchangeOnline

"-OrganizationalUnit abc" limits the users to a specific OU (here "abc"). This can be omitted if you would like
to grant the permissions on every account in your organization.

If, instead, you would like to limit the users to users that have a specific SMTP- address, you can use the
following script:

Connect-ExchangeOnline
foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-Mailbox -ResultSize Unlimited | where-Object {($_.PrimarySMTPAddress -like "*@agendax.net")}))
{
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
}
Disconnect-ExchangeOnline

Or, if you would like to limit the users to members of a specific distribution list, you can use the following:

Connect-ExchangeOnline
foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-DistributionGroupMember -Identity "NameOfDistributionList" -ResultSize Unlimited))
{
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
}
Disconnect-ExchangeOnline

Please see also the following document: AgendaX Installation Guide V6.1

Migration over the course of several weeks / months

If the move to Office 365 takes some time and you migrate mailboxes with several batches, we suggest to install a second instance of AgendaX during the transition.

The first (existing) instance will read on-premise mailboxes and the second (new) instance will read migrated (O365) mailboxes.

During the transition, you will still see all calendars of both on-premise and migrated mailboxes in the AgendaX web application.

Installing a second AgendaX Setup on the AgendaX server to access the O365 mailboxes

  • Create a new AgendaX user on Office 365 (including mailbox)
  • Copy the AgendaX installation folder to a second location, e.g. AgendaXO365
  • Install the second service with the Multi service configuration tool AgendaX multi service configuration utility. The service account you enter will be the account used to run the AgendaX Update Service. This should ideally be the new AgendaX user on Office 365. If this is not possible, select a local user with Administrative privileges on the AgendaX Server.
  • Install Outlook 2016 (or later) 32bit on the AgendaX Server, if not already present
  • Make sure that a modern browser is installed on the AgendaX server, as this is needed to create an Outlook profile that connects to an Office 365 mailbox.
  • Log on with the new AgendaX user (or the local user you specified while installing the second service) to the AgendaX server
  • Set the appropriate registry keys for the Outlook version used and AgentX.ini settings (page 6 in the Installation Guide: AgendaX Installation Guide) or see above (Migration in one batch)
  • Create an Outlook profile with this user, accessing its mailbox on O365, and disable Exchange Cache Mode in the Outlook profile. If you are prompted for a username / password, check the ‘Remember Password’ option before entering the credentials. Note the name of the Outlook profile you created (default: Outlook)
  • Run the AgendaX Configuration in the AgendaX O365 installation (AgendaXCfg.exe), click MSX Version, select Office 365 and enter the name of the Outlook profile you created, logged-in with the O365 AgendaX user (or the local user).
  • Set the Mailbox folder permissions for the users already migrated to O365 with the following Powershell script. Replace “agendax” on the 4th and 5th line in the following script with the name of your O365 AgendaX account:
    Connect-ExchangeOnline
    foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-EXOMailbox -OrganizationalUnit abc -ResultSize Unlimited))
    {
    Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
    Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
    }
    Disconnect-ExchangeOnline
    
    "-OrganizationalUnit abc" limits the users to a specific OU (here "abc"). This can be omitted if you would like
    to grant the permissions on every account in your organization.
    
    If, instead, you would like to limit the users to users that have a specific SMTP- address, you can use the
    following script:
    
    Connect-ExchangeOnline
    foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-Mailbox -ResultSize Unlimited | where-Object {($_.PrimarySMTPAddress -like "*@agendax.net")}))
    {
    Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
    Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
    }
    Disconnect-ExchangeOnline
    
    Or, if you would like to limit the users to members of a specific distribution list, you can use the following:
    
    Connect-ExchangeOnline
    foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-DistributionGroupMember -Identity "NameOfDistributionList" -ResultSize Unlimited))
    {
    Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
    Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
    }
    Disconnect-ExchangeOnline
  • Stop the AgendaX Update service of the old AgendaX installation
  • Run the AgendaX Configuration of both the old and the new installation (AgendaXCfg.exe) and tick the “Multiple services write to this database” option and drop the database tables (only once) under Config / Drop tables.
  • Click “Update” in both AgendaX Configuations and “Yes” to restart the Services
  • Check the Windows Application Eventlog for possible warnings / errors. Each of the services will add warnings to the Application Event log for the mailboxes that are not on their system. This is normal. The on-premise Setup will create warnings for the O365 mailboxes and the O365 Setup will create warnings for the on-premise mailboxes. If you get warnings on the O365 installation about mailboxes that cannot be found in the global address book and these mailboxes have already been migrated to O365, you will have to re-select them from the address book in the AgendaX group definitions (AgendaXCfg.exe / Groups).
  • After both AgendaX Update Services have finished scanning through the mailboxes, you will see both on-premise and O365 mailbox calendars in the AgendaX web application.
  • While you are moving users from the on-premise Exchange servers to O365, you will need to re-run the above Powershell script to set permissions on the newly moved mailboxes.

Removing the old AgendaX Setup after all mailboxes are moved to O365

When all mailboxes are moved to O365, you can uninstall the old AgendaX setup by following the below steps. As the web-application of AgendaX is still running under your old AgendaX setup, you will first need to move this to the location of the new (O365) installation:

  • Run Internet Information Services (IIS) Manager, navigate to Sites / Default Web Site / AgendaX, click “Basic settings” and change the location of the “Physical path” to the folder of your new AgendaX O365 installation.

If you have made any configuration changes on the AgendaX Administration page (in the AgendaX web application) since you installed the O365 installation of AgendaX, or if you have made changes to the collapsible group menu in the multmenu.txt file, copy config.inc and multmenu.txt (both are located in the AGENDA subfolder of your AgendaX installation folder) from the old Setup to the O365 setup.

To uninstall the old AgendaX Setup, follow the steps below:

  • Stop the AgendaX Update Service of the old installation
  • Close any instances of MMC (Microsoft Management Console), e.g. Services, Event Viewer
  • Open a command prompt and change to the AgendaX installation folder of your old AgendaX installation, e.g. CD C:\Inetpub\AgendaX
  • Enter the following command:
    AgendaXSrv.exe -u (this will uninstall the AgendaX Update Service)
  • Delete the old AgendaX installation folder

The final step is to tell the AgendaX Update service that no longer other services are using the same database. Run the AgendaX Configuration (AgendaXCfg.exe) in your new O365 setup folder and untick the “Multiple services write to this database” option and drop the database tables under Config / Drop tables, then click “Update” and “Yes” to restart the service.


Customer feedback on AgendaX

The Technology Manager, of one of the UK's leading technical computer companies, with significant experience in implementing high-performance IT, data management and business applications, comments on AgendaX:

"Efficient allocation of resources is the key to maintaining the best possible service for our customers. This means that we are heavily dependent on calendar functions such as booking team meetings, consulting and training.

Before migrating to Microsoft Exchange, our company had a web-based calendar service that was easy for individuals to manage, but made it difficult to view the "movements" of the entire company. The overview of all web calendars was missing.

After we searched Google under "Outlook Group Calendar", we quickly found the "AgendaX" team calendar and downloaded it as a trial. As users, we just wanted to work quickly with the new tool and AgendaX did surprisingly well. Meanwhile, AgendaX has become an important part of our company. We find AgendaX stable, reliable, easy to manage and easy to get under control.

This group calendar is efficient and keeps its promises."


Statement from Adelphi Group

«

10 years ago I was looking for a calendaring solution and I found AgendaX.
10 years after I was looking for another calendaring solution, spent 2 days on searching, and I still couldn't find anything which came close to AgendaX.

»

Mo Haq | Global IT Consultant
Adelphi Group, an Omnicom Group Inc Company


AgendaX makes Paris happy

Paris, February 2, 2020, my name is Anne, and I'm an executive secretary. On that date I did not know that a single tool named "AgendaX" would change and facilitate the organization of the whole company, for which I've worked for 12 years. This beautiful morning the head of the IT department came to see me to ask me to do a planning on Excel for the management of meetings and resources for employees.

Three weeks later, despite the effort and the good presentation of my schedule, it was impossible for me to know who was where and especially to inform the colleagues where their colleagues were, so I said to myself that I needed a more efficient and sophisticated tool for good time and ressource management.

So I searched on Google for "group calendar" and bingo, I came across a company named Drollinger Technologies LLC, specializing in group calendars with Exchange. I felt happiness and relief that day.

Once on their website, I realized that this is exactly what our company needed, the AgendaX software, a calendar that shows you at a glance who is where and who will soon be available. Moreover, the software allows the synchronization of the Outlook calendar data of the co-workers, so there is no need to manage two calendars separately, which makes this software particularly useful and indispensable to our good organization management.

A few minutes later, I went to see the head of the IT department to tell him about this popular and fabulous software that I made my day.

After having discussed at length with the head of the IT department, convinced himself that this software could facilitate the organisation and management of the whole company, he offered me to contact Drollinger Technologies LLC to ask them for a quote for their AgendaX software.

Now, since our company uses AgendaX, we have never had such an easy, simple and precise organization, I can at any time inform employees within seconds, where their colleagues are, I can book meeting rooms, the resources they need, etc. Everybody in our company can now at any time consult a set of daily, weekly, monthly and even annual overviews.


AgendaX supports multiple time zones

For companies with multiple locations in different time zones, planning a group meeting is not easy.
The respective local time must first be laboriously calculated in order to convene a telephone conference, for example.
AgendaX scans Exchange servers across multiple time zones and displays all appointments in the user's local time zone as a team calendar.
Even when employees are travelling, team appointments can easily be consulted without time calculation to see if colleagues are working in the office or are at meetings.
Users can easily configure their current local time in the group calendar using their personal settings.


AgendaX has made resource management in our clinic much easier

The planning of the laboratories, X-ray rooms and various medical equipment in our clinic used to be managed using Excel tables. Before you could reserve the desired room, you first had to make a request to the administrator. The same was true for the reservation of medical equipment. The planning tables were only visible to the administrator.

With AgendaX a targeted allocation of resources in groups (departments / teams / devices) according to freely selectable criteria is possible. Each user has up to 9 personal groups at his disposal to map his teams. This was an enormous relief for all departments: The Exchange administrator no longer had to be called in to form teams / groups.

The rich selection of overviews and the simple navigation with simple group views up to detailed annual, monthly, weekly or daily views now offer all employees the information they need at a glance:

When is which employee, room or device available?


Language independent permission settings for AgendaX on Exchange Server 2013, 2016, 2019, Office 365

Permissions that need to be set for the AgendaX account on Exchange Server 2013, 2016, 2019, and Office 365 are Outlook folder level permissions.
Since folder names in Outlook differ depending on the language used when the mailbox is first opened with Outlook, you'd have to know which employee uses which language to assign permissions to the correct folders. In addition to that, you'd have to know what the folders are called in these languages.

If you have mailboxes in multiple languages in your company, you can easily set the required permissions for the AgendaX account using the following script, which works for all languages.

Please make sure you replace "agendax" on the 3rd line with the name of your AgendaX account:

Connect-ExchangeOnline
foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-EXOMailbox -OrganizationalUnit abc -ResultSize Unlimited))
{
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
}
Disconnect-ExchangeOnline

"-OrganizationalUnit abc" limits the users to a specific OU (here "abc"). This can be omitted if you would like
to grant the permissions on every account in your organization.

If, instead, you would like to limit the users to users that have a specific SMTP- address, you can use the
following script:

Connect-ExchangeOnline
foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-Mailbox -ResultSize Unlimited | where-Object {($_.PrimarySMTPAddress -like "*@agendax.net")}))
{
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
}
Disconnect-ExchangeOnline

Or, if you would like to limit the users to members of a specific distribution list, you can use the following:

Connect-ExchangeOnline
foreach ($Mailbox in (Get-DistributionGroupMember -Identity "NameOfDistributionList" -ResultSize Unlimited))
{
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name)" -AccessRights Reviewer -User agendax
Add-MailboxFolderPermission -identity "$($Mailbox.Name):\Calendar" -AccessRights Editor -User agendax
}
Disconnect-ExchangeOnline

Just copy and paste the above script into Powershell. It will assign Reviewer rights on the top of the mailbox and Inbox, as well as Editor rights on the Calendar folder.

If you don't want to assign these rights on every mailbox in your organization, but would rather limit this to an organizational unit for example, you can modify the Get-Mailbox statement on the 1st line by adding -OrganizationalUnit with the name of the organizational unit you wish to assign permissions in.


A Group Calendar that Boosts Efficiency

The Service is a UK government funded service for all young people aged 13 to 19 (up to 25 for those with a learning difficulty or disability). It provides information, advice and guidance as young people make the transition from full-time education to further education, training and employment.

The Personal Advisers at the service are a vital resource, offering help and Support on the many issues young people may be faced with such as health, housing, money, education, training and employment.

The diversity of issues handled, combined with the degree of accessibility on offer (including telephone conversations and personal meetings at a wide range of locations) meant that the Service needed an efficient way to ensure comprehensive coverage of the availability and whereabouts of staff.

Although staff at the Service make extensive use of Outlook calendaring to manage their diaries, it was difficult to see who was free to take a particular call, identify when or where it might be best to contact a colleague, or establish when someone next had a gap in their diary in order to arrange meetings.

The ICT Manager at the Service explained, “Reception staff, co-workers and Team Managers would need to look at each individual’s Outlook calendars in turn, which was really time consuming. We needed a better way.”

A recommendation from a colleague pointed the ICT Manager in the direction of AgendaX.

 

Enhancing Outlook Calendar

AgendaX extracts Outlook calendar information stored by Microsoft Exchange Server and makes it available on the company intranet as a series of web pages that can be tailored to reflect corporate style templates.

Users benefit from a consolidated update of their co-workers whereabouts via daily, weekly and monthly ‘planner-style’ views.
All 250 members of staff at the Service now use AgendaX. According to  the ICT Manager “Now anyone, not just reception staff, can see immediately who is at any of the many remote sites from which our service is delivered, who is attending meetings, and who is on leave or sick. This has been real boon to our efficiency and has improved our level of service to clients. A particular benefit has been that AgendaX provides a very useful guide as to which staff is simply in the office, for Health and Safety purposes.”

How It Works

AgendaX works in conjunction with Outlook, automatically publishing the free/busy times from all users’ calendars as a series of customizable web pages that can be accessed via the corporate intranet. A ‘Who is where?’ view gives an instant snapshot of where everyone is together with their contact details. Weekly, monthly, quarterly and even yearly views show a consolidated ‘wall planner’ style overview of meetings, holidays, days off sick etc. Users can drill down on detail as required, and create their own groups of co-workers to view at once.

Managing Non-Human Resources!

As well as showing the availability of people, AgendaX can be used to depict the availability of other corporate resources such as conference rooms and presentation equipment. At one site of the Service, it is used to control allocation of the limited number of available parking spaces!

Many organizations use AgendaX to support their business operations and maximize their investment in both their Exchange environment and their human resources.

Working With AgendaX

“We selected AgendaX following a short evaluation period. Installing it was relatively easy but we did need to pay careful attention to the manual, especially as we wanted to maximize our understanding of the various enhancements available beyond basic sharing of calendars, such as changing default layouts and color schemes. We genuinely have found the support very helpful and we look forward to tailoring AgendaX further for our organization” concludes the ICT Manager.

 

Key Benefits

AgendaX provides a simple, concise way of seeing the whole company’s whereabouts in a single view.

This brings many benefits to organizations, including:

  • Save time by booking and scheduling meetings in a group calendar with an overview of availability.
  • You can create and maintain calendar groups.
  • Manage and create a set of calendars that you want to display together.
  • You can create a calendar group to see the combined schedules at a glance
  • Allows employees to be quickly located at any point in time.
  • Helps use expensive resources, such as meeting rooms, more efficiently.
  • Leverages the organization’s investment in Outlook.
  • Aids team working and resource allocation to improve customer service.

AgendaX Services

AgendaX offers organizations a highly customizable service that works seamlessly with Exchange Outlook Calendar to provide an advanced, web based team calendaring service.

Features include:

  • Multiple views, including point in time, weekly, monthly, bimonthly and the entire year.
  • Customizable to reflect corporate identity & business needs.
  • User-defined groups - no need for administrators to define ad-hoc groups.
  • Ability to text-search all calendar entries.
  • Displays required Outlook properties (Mileage, Billing etc.) including user-defined Outlook fields.
  • Optionally displays phone, fax, mobile, department, picture, photo etc. for each user.
  • Ability to suppress meetings marked as ‘private’.
  • Allows meetings to be requested via the web without Outlook, with the option to restrict bookings to free time only, make location a required field, etc.
  • Provides a consolidated view across several Exchange servers and locations.

Statement from Institue for Safe Medication Practices, Huntingdon Valley, PA

«

We are very happy with AgendaX. It is working very well for us and we use it as a normal part of company scheduling. It is very easy to use and setup, though I am having issues with it now after beginning a migration Exchange mailboxes to a new mailstore on another Exchange server. However, I‘m sure I‘ll get the kinks out. We are indeed very pleased with the product and as the network admin I must say that I am also very pleased with how easy it is to manage it.

»

William R. Cunningham | Systems Administrator
Institue for Safe Medication Practices, Huntingdon Valley, PA


Statement from Peterson Air Force base

«

We tried multiple solutions to share calendar information between many users. Due to our requirement for a calendar to be accessible across multiple domains we were unable to find an adequate solution until we evaluated AgendaX.
We required secure access to multiple calendars with a flexible user interface. AgendaX proved to be very flexible, customizable and the most secure solution for our needs.

»

Brandon E. Lloyd | Web Administrator / Developer (bdSystems)
Peterson Air Force base, CO, USA


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