Directory Synchronization and SMTP Address Space Sharing between Exchange 2000 and Lotus Notes/Domino R5 

The information in this document applies to:

• Microsoft Exchange 2000 Server and Active Directory

•  Lotus Notes/Domino R5 Server

• Microsoft Exchange Connector for Lotus Notes

SUMMARY

The scenario: two merging organizations, one with Microsoft Exchange and the other with Lotus Notes.  Both organizations have their own Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) address space but plan to merge the two into one new shared address space while maintaining routes to their respective old address spaces.

This document describes how to configure Exchange 2000 and Lotus Notes/Domino R5 to:

•  Synchronize the directories using the Microsoft Exchange Connector for Lotus Notes,

•  Route messages between the two systems using SMTP,

•  Share the new SMTP address space, and

•  Maintain availability of existing address spaces to receive mail.

For additional information, please refer to the following Microsoft source articles:

321721 XCON: Sharing SMTP Address Spaces in Exchange 2000

303724 XFOR: Directory Synchronization Between Notes and Exchange with SMTP Addresses

CONFIGURATION OVERVIEW

The configuration in this document assumes that Exchange 2000 accepts incoming mail from the Internet, looks for a matching recipient, and if not found, forwards the message to Lotus Notes/Domino R5 via SMTP, rather than using the Notes Connector. Lotus Notes then looks for a matching recipient, and if not found, returns a non-delivery report (NDR).  The Notes Connector is used solely for synchronizing the Exchange and Notes/Domino directories.

Given:

• The existing SMTP address space for the Exchange organization is insurance.abc.com.

• The existing SMTP address space for the Notes organization is banking.abc.com.

• The new SMTP address space to which these two will migrate is finance.abc.com. 

The following sections describe how to configure each system component to achieve the desired goals.

CONFIGURE MICROSOFT EXCHANGE 2000

When we are finished, we want the primary address space for both systems to be finance.abc.com.  Since Exchange 2000 receives incoming SMTP mail and then transfers messages with unresolved recipients to the Notes system, the Exchange system cannot be the authority on the new domain.  Otherwise, Exchange would return NDRs for the unresolved recipients rather than forwarding them on to the Notes system. 

Exchange 2000 must always be authoritative for the primary (bold) SMTP address on the default recipient policy.  You will notice the This Exchange Organization is responsible for all mail delivery to this address checkbox is grayed out in the user interface as a result.  Therefore, we must add a second recipient policy to override the default recipient policy in order to make Exchange non-authoritative on the new domain.  Set the new address space as primary on the new recipient policy and deselect the This Exchange Organization is responsible for all mail delivery to this address checkbox.  Leave the existing domain as a secondary proxy address and make sure its This Exchange Organization is responsible for all mail delivery to this address checkbox is selected.

Once we have added this new policy, apply the policy and force an update of the Recipient Update Service to update Exchange Recipients with the new address.  Then, restart the Microsoft Exchange Routing Engine and Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) services.  Since the existing address space insurance.abc.com is publicly addressable (via DNS) and present in Exchange Recipient entries now as a secondary SMTP proxy address, users will continue to receive mail addressed to the old domain.

Because Exchange 2000 is now non-authoritative for the new address space finance.abc.com, when Exchange cannot find a matching address in Active Directory (AD), it tries to find an external path to that address space, first by looking for a connector, and then by checking the Domain Name Server (DNS). Since the DNS Mail Exchanger (or MX) record for finance.abc.com points to the Exchange 2000 server, we create an SMTP connector to route the mail to a specific host, in this case the Notes/Domino bridgehead server.

Next, we configure the Notes/Domino system to accept mail from the new address space as the primary domain and to return NDRs for messages with unresolved recipients.

CONFIGURE LOTUS NOTES/DOMINO R5

We must configure Notes/Domino to accept mail addressed to the new primary domain, while still accepting mail addressed to the existing domain.  We do this by updating the primary Global Domain document in the Domino Directory.  We also make sure the new address space is not restricted by any SMTP inbound controls in the Server Configuration documents.

We must also configure our Notes system to send Internet mail using the new address.  One way to do this is to update the InternetAddress field for all of the Notes users’ Person records to reflect the new address.  We can do this by using either the Notes Internet Address tool or a simple agent.  Even if we use a simple agent, it is still a good idea to use the Internet Address tool to verify that all addresses are unique.

We recommend creating a secondary directory (which the Notes Connector will update) to store Exchange recipient addresses in Notes rather than updating the primary directory.  You may want to setup a Directory Catalog as well so that users may see both Notes and Exchange recipients in one address list interface.  Refer to the Domino 5 Administration Help database for more information. 

We’ll also have to create a Notes user ID for use by the Notes Connector to read user entries from the Domino Directory and update/delete user entries in the secondary directory.  Server and database permissions should be set accordingly.

Next, we configure the Notes Connector to perform directory synchronization between the Exchange and Notes/Domino systems.