Exchange

Introduction

The Exchange data source imports bookings from resource calendars in Exchange so that they can be presented on screen using the Wayfinder widgets.

Server requirements

Exchange Server 2010 to 2016 with EWS API enabled
Smartsign Server 10.2 or higher

Create an Exchange Data Source

Login to Smartsign Publisher, go to Management -> Data sources and click on Create New.

Select your Wayfinder Importer service in the list and then click "Next".

Select Exchange Calendar Import, click "Next" and fill in the necessary settings to synchronize calendars from your Exchange solution into Smartsign

Exchange Calendar Import - Data Source Settings

Setting	Description
User	Select a Smartsign user, we recommend creating a specific one for this purpose
Password	Password for the Smartsign user above
Hostname	Example: exchange.example.com This should generally be a fully qualified domain name (FQDN). It is important that it matches any SSL certificate used to authenticate the server.
ServicePath	/EWS/Exchange.asmx
Username	Exchange username with access to all relevant calendars
Password	Password for the Exchange user
Exchange real-time sync (This feature is experimental and should always be disabled.)	False
SearchRoomswithName	String to search for in room names. If blank, only room mailboxes that are members of a roomlist distribution group can be used.
RoomPrefix	Can only be used in combination with either Roomlists or the SearchRoomswithName setting. It adds an additional filter so that only rooms found beginning with RoomPrefix are transferred. Multiple Room prefixes can be used by separating them with a comma (,).
TrustedServerName	This should be the computer name of the Exchange server
Exchange on-premises	Should normally be set as follows: Exchange 2010, on premise: True Exchange 2013/2016, on premise: False If you see authentication issues in the log files (Error 401). Try the opposite setting.
HidePrivateBookingNames	True: Hide the booking name on private bookings.
BookingNameFilter (Available from version 10.5.43)	Input a string to only import bookings that contain that specific string. The matching is case sensitive. This allows you to explicitly select which bookings should be imported, by searching the booking names for a specific string. Only bookings that contain the string entered will be imported. In addition, you can also control the booking name shown on screen since only the text after the search string will be included. Make sure to use a string that should not match by accident. For example: @SCREEN If matched, the string itself and any additional content before it, will be removed from the booking name during import. Leave empty to import all bookings (default).
TwoWaySync	True: Import bookings created in Smartsign (calendar and on screen) into Exchange calendar. Calendar items created in Smartsign can only be modified in Smartsign and vice versa.
LookAheadTime	Example: 7.00:00:00 = 7 days This setting controls how far ahead bookings will be imported. To reduce unnecessary updates it's a good idea to keep this value low. The next few days is usually more than enough.
CompareWithArchive	True: Every export from Exchange is compared to the previous one to determine if there are any changes. If no change is detected, no import will be done. This reduces unnecessary updates.
MatchLogos	True: Search the Media library for images files where the filename or tags match the booking name. If found, the first match will be added to the booking in Smartsign allowing for company logos and similar to be shown on screen together with the booking information.
MatchLogoExact	True: Only match logos with names or tags matching exactly. False: Allow partial matches.
CreateChannels	True: Automatically create Channels for rooms with bookings found in import data False: Channels must be created manually. Any bookings on rooms without matching channel names will not be imported.
CombinedRoomNamesSplitFile	Path to splitfile (only used in special cases) A splitfile can be used to split an incoming booking. It can for example be used for a combined room. A booking on the room ABC can be split automatically so that it's imported to rooms A, B and C. It can also be used as an alias function on order to import bookings to a channel with a different name than the imported calendar room.

Booking names

Exchange resource calendars default to showing the name of the person that created the appointment. This behaviour can be changed in Exchange so that it shows the subject of the appointment instead. Please see the following Microsoft support article for information.
https://support.microsoft.com/en-us/help/2842288/resource-mailbox-s-calendar-shows-the-organizer-s-name-instead-of-the

Exchange Server setup

Exchange Server has several different types of mailboxes that can be created. In this setup guide we'll explore the purpose of a Room Mailbox in Exchange Server, how to create a Room Mailbox and look at different ways to configure a Room Mailbox to suit different scenarios.

Room Mailbox

A Room Mailbox is a special type of mailbox that is assigned to a fixed location such as a meeting space, conference room, classroom, training facility etc. RoomMailbox are fundamentally the same as regular mailbox in Exchange Server. However, when you create a Room Mailbox using Exchange Server the user account password is generated automatically by Exchange, and the users account is disabled by default so that it can't be used for interactive logins.

Creating a new Room Mailbox

Open the Exchange Management Console and navigate to Recipient Configuration-> Mailboxes, right click and select the New Mailbox option.

Select the Room Mailbox as the mailbox type to create.

Select New User to create a new user account for the Room Mailbox.

Configure Room Mailboxes
When you open the properties of a Room Mailbox you will notice some additional tabs that do not appear for normal User Mailboxes.

These additional options let you configure the Room Mailbox in different ways, such as:

1. Whether meeting requests are automatically accepted by the Room Mailbox
2. How the Room Mailbox handles conflicting appointments
3. The maximum length of time a meeting can book out the room
4. How far into the future bookings can be made

Grant Permissions to Room Mailbox
Delegates also need Editor access to the calendar and free/busy folder of the mailbox itself so that they can manage meeting requests. There are two ways to achieve this:

1. Grant an administrator Full Access Permission to the Room Mailbox, open it in Outlook, and edit the Calendar and Mailbox Permissions.
2. Grant the delegate Full Access Permissions to the Room Mailbox

To grant Full Access Permission we need to use Exchange Management Shell. Open the Exchange Management Shell and type the following command replacing with the user that should be given access.
Add-MailboxPermission -Identity "Conference Room 1" -User -AccessRights FullAccess

Creating a RoomList Distribution Group

You can only add Room Mailboxes to a room list distribution group. To create a room list distribution group use the EMS (Exchange Management Shell). It cannot be created using the EMC (Exchange Management Console).
To create a RoomList distribution group, open the Exchange Management Shell and type the following code. There are two ways to achieve this:
New-DistributionGroup -Name "My Rooms" -OrganizationalUnit "contoso.com/Users" -RoomList
A new RoomList with the name "My Rooms" will be created and you can add all the rooms to this group. Open the Exchange Management Console and click on Distribution Group under Recipient Configuration. Right click the newly created RoomList and go to properties and click on Members, click add to add the Room Mailboxes which are created earlier (Ex: Conference Room 1).
There is another alternative that can be achieved using the following code.

$Members = Get-Mailbox -Filter {(RecipientTypeDetails -eq "RoomMailbox")}  
New-DistributionGroup -Name "My Rooms" -OrganizationalUnit "contoso.com/Users" -RoomList -Members $Members

Creating a booking using Outlook Web App

Login to your outlook account and click on Calendar. Then click on share or My Calendar to add a new calendar resource.

A new window will appear, type the Room Mailbox name or click on the Name tab to select the available Room Mailboxes and click ok to add new calendar to your account.

A new calendar resource will be added to your calendars. Create an event in your default calendar and select the resource as Conference Room 1. The Conference Room will be booked for your event.

Your new event booking would look like this.

Once the Exchange Server setup has been completed, add a new DataSource in Smartsign Server to access the events from Exchange Calendar.