HELP: A problem with rapid growth of the transaction log

Goran Kimovski · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 4

Hello folks,

My company produces a service that connects to an Exchange Server using CDO
to collect users from a selected address list and appointments from a 7 day
period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been working fine on more
than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5 and Exchange 2000
without any problems. However, now we have a customer that runs 12 Exchange
Servers in a network, where one central server is replicating the address
lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes are not replicated to
it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs the synchronisation
cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes (around 250 in total),
the transaction log increases rapidly.

I know that by performing regular online backups the log files from the
MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the question is not how to
workaround the problem, but rather why reading appointments causes the
transaction log to increase?

We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are found on the local
servers, but we're accessing them through the central server is making
Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox our service is
opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in the log.

I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion and have any
suggestions?

Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600 maiboxes where we
again connect to a central server, but they replicate the mailboxes to the
central server too and we do not see this problem there ...

/Kima

Goran Kimovski
Chief Technical Officer
Seavus Group

www.seavus.com

"Turning your visions into technical solutions and products."

Archived from group: microsoft>public>exchange2000>applications

Lanwench [MVP - Exchange] · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 191

Do you have any file-level antivirus software that might be scanning the M
drive or any of the Exchange folders (it shouldn't be...)

Goran Kimovski wrote:
> Hello folks,
>
> My company produces a service that connects to an Exchange Server
> using CDO to collect users from a selected address list and
> appointments from a 7 day period for the user's mailboxes. The
> service has been working fine on more than 30 customer sites, both
> connecting to Exchange 5.5 and Exchange 2000 without any problems.
> However, now we have a customer that runs 12 Exchange Servers in a
> network, where one central server is replicating the address lists
> from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes are not replicated
> to it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs the
> synchronisation cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
> (around 250 in total), the transaction log increases rapidly.
>
> I know that by performing regular online backups the log files from
> the MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the question is
> not how to workaround the problem, but rather why reading
> appointments causes the transaction log to increase?
>
> We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are found on the
> local servers, but we're accessing them through the central server is
> making Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox our
> service is opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in the
> log.
>
> I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion and have any
> suggestions?
>
> Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600 maiboxes
> where we again connect to a central server, but they replicate the
> mailboxes to the central server too and we do not see this problem
> there ...
>
> /Kima
>
> Goran Kimovski
> Chief Technical Officer
> Seavus Group
>
> www.seavus.com
>
> "Turning your visions into technical solutions and products."

Mark Arnold [MVP] · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 1126

Nothing is making Exchange replicate mailbox information
anywhere. The creation of the log files is possibly due
to your application extracting data from and writing to
the mailboxes some form of data or flag etc. Would that
make sense based on your knowledge of your application?
If your app just read some data then it wouldn't create
so many logs.

>-----Original Message-----
>Hello folks,
>
>My company produces a service that connects to an
Exchange Server using CDO
>to collect users from a selected address list and
appointments from a 7 day
>period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been
working fine on more
>than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5
and Exchange 2000
>without any problems. However, now we have a customer
that runs 12 Exchange
>Servers in a network, where one central server is
replicating the address
>lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes
are not replicated to
>it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs
the synchronisation
>cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
(around 250 in total),
>the transaction log increases rapidly.
>
>I know that by performing regular online backups the log
files from the
>MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the
question is not how to
>workaround the problem, but rather why reading
appointments causes the
>transaction log to increase?
>
>We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are
found on the local
>servers, but we're accessing them through the central
server is making
>Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox
our service is
>opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in
the log.
>
>I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion
and have any
>suggestions?
>
>Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600
maiboxes where we
>again connect to a central server, but they replicate
the mailboxes to the
>central server too and we do not see this problem
there ...
>
>/Kima
>
>Goran Kimovski
>Chief Technical Officer
>Seavus Group
>
>www.seavus.com
>
> "Turning your visions into technical solutions and
products."
>
>
>.
>

Goran Kimovski · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 4

Hello Mark,

the service can't be more simple ... it simply is scheduled to go through
all accounts in the global address list, open the mailboxes for each account
and read the appointments scheduled for today and the coming 7 days ... it
does not write anything in the mailboxes nor anywhere else ... Since it is
purely CDO-based, the only possible way that something is written is by the
CDO itself, but I highly doubt that ...

What made me suspect it could be so that some temporal replication is
performed is that we have another customer with 6 Exchange Servers and total
of 600 mailboxes on them, where the mailboxes are synchronised to the
central server (don't aks me why Smile

) and we're reading the appointments
from the central server using the same service, but we do not have any
problems with the transaction log there ... As far as we can see, the only
difference between the two customers is the fact that the mailboxes are
replicated to the central server at one customer, while not at the other ...

/Kima

"Mark Arnold [MVP]" wrote in message$6fd25f10$a401280a@phx.gbl...
> Nothing is making Exchange replicate mailbox information
> anywhere. The creation of the log files is possibly due
> to your application extracting data from and writing to
> the mailboxes some form of data or flag etc. Would that
> make sense based on your knowledge of your application?
> If your app just read some data then it wouldn't create
> so many logs.
>
>
> >-----Original Message-----
> >Hello folks,
> >
> >My company produces a service that connects to an
> Exchange Server using CDO
> >to collect users from a selected address list and
> appointments from a 7 day
> >period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been
> working fine on more
> >than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5
> and Exchange 2000
> >without any problems. However, now we have a customer
> that runs 12 Exchange
> >Servers in a network, where one central server is
> replicating the address
> >lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes
> are not replicated to
> >it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs
> the synchronisation
> >cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
> (around 250 in total),
> >the transaction log increases rapidly.
> >
> >I know that by performing regular online backups the log
> files from the
> >MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the
> question is not how to
> >workaround the problem, but rather why reading
> appointments causes the
> >transaction log to increase?
> >
> >We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are
> found on the local
> >servers, but we're accessing them through the central
> server is making
> >Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox
> our service is
> >opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in
> the log.
> >
> >I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion
> and have any
> >suggestions?
> >
> >Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600
> maiboxes where we
> >again connect to a central server, but they replicate
> the mailboxes to the
> >central server too and we do not see this problem
> there ...
> >
> >/Kima
> >
> >Goran Kimovski
> >Chief Technical Officer
> >Seavus Group
> >
> >www.seavus.com
> >
> > "Turning your visions into technical solutions and
> products."
> >
> >
> >.
> >

Lanwench [MVP - Exchange] · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 191

Goran Kimovski wrote:
> Hello Mark,
>
> the service can't be more simple ... it simply is scheduled to go
> through all accounts in the global address list, open the mailboxes
> for each account and read the appointments scheduled for today and
> the coming 7 days ... it does not write anything in the mailboxes nor
> anywhere else ... Since it is purely CDO-based, the only possible way
> that something is written is by the CDO itself, but I highly doubt
> that ...
>
> What made me suspect it could be so that some temporal replication is
> performed is that we have another customer with 6 Exchange Servers
> and total of 600 mailboxes on them, where the mailboxes are
> synchronised to the central server (don't aks me why Smile

) and we're
> reading the appointments from the central server using the same
> service, but we do not have any problems with the transaction log
> there ... As far as we can see, the only difference between the two
> customers is the fact that the mailboxes are replicated to the
> central server at one customer, while not at the other ...

How are mailboxes being replicated? Nothing native to Exchange/AD does this.

>
> /Kima
>
> "Mark Arnold [MVP]" wrote in message
> $6fd25f10$a401280a@phx.gbl...
>> Nothing is making Exchange replicate mailbox information
>> anywhere. The creation of the log files is possibly due
>> to your application extracting data from and writing to
>> the mailboxes some form of data or flag etc. Would that
>> make sense based on your knowledge of your application?
>> If your app just read some data then it wouldn't create
>> so many logs.
>>
>>
>>> -----Original Message-----
>>> Hello folks,
>>>
>>> My company produces a service that connects to an
>> Exchange Server using CDO
>>> to collect users from a selected address list and
>> appointments from a 7 day
>>> period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been
>> working fine on more
>>> than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5
>> and Exchange 2000
>>> without any problems. However, now we have a customer
>> that runs 12 Exchange
>>> Servers in a network, where one central server is
>> replicating the address
>>> lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes
>> are not replicated to
>>> it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs
>> the synchronisation
>>> cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
>> (around 250 in total),
>>> the transaction log increases rapidly.
>>>
>>> I know that by performing regular online backups the log
>> files from the
>>> MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the
>> question is not how to
>>> workaround the problem, but rather why reading
>> appointments causes the
>>> transaction log to increase?
>>>
>>> We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are
>> found on the local
>>> servers, but we're accessing them through the central
>> server is making
>>> Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox
>> our service is
>>> opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in
>> the log.
>>>
>>> I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion
>> and have any
>>> suggestions?
>>>
>>> Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600
>> maiboxes where we
>>> again connect to a central server, but they replicate
>> the mailboxes to the
>>> central server too and we do not see this problem
>> there ...
>>>
>>> /Kima
>>>
>>> Goran Kimovski
>>> Chief Technical Officer
>>> Seavus Group
>>>
>>> www.seavus.com
>>>
>>> "Turning your visions into technical solutions and
>> products."
>>>
>>>
>>> .

Goran Kimovski · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 4

Hello Lanwench,

unfortunately I can't answer your question as the servers are hosted by a
third party service provider and the information about the mailbox
replication is something I've got through them ...

However, it seems that the problem was actually related to an anti-virus
program scanning the M: partition ... we could easily reproduce the same
behaviour on a simple installation of a single Exchange 2000 Server with
dozen of mailboxes ... by running Norton Corporate Anti-virus on the M:
partition and starting our service, the transaction log files started to
pile up ... this seems to slow down the service too, actually ... don't know
if the problem makes the read operation take more time or something ... we
didn't investigate much further since it seems we now have what to look for
at the customer site ...

One thing regarding this ... do you recon it is safe to exclude the M:
partition and/or other folders from virus scaning? I'm not sure it'll be
acceptable for the service provider hosting the Exchange Servers to do that,
though, so if you have any other suggestions, please let me know them ...

/Kima

"Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
wrote in message
news:%23CL7Qw2CEHA.1544@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
> Goran Kimovski wrote:
> > Hello Mark,
> >
> > the service can't be more simple ... it simply is scheduled to go
> > through all accounts in the global address list, open the mailboxes
> > for each account and read the appointments scheduled for today and
> > the coming 7 days ... it does not write anything in the mailboxes nor
> > anywhere else ... Since it is purely CDO-based, the only possible way
> > that something is written is by the CDO itself, but I highly doubt
> > that ...
> >
> > What made me suspect it could be so that some temporal replication is
> > performed is that we have another customer with 6 Exchange Servers
> > and total of 600 mailboxes on them, where the mailboxes are
> > synchronised to the central server (don't aks me why Smile

) and we're
> > reading the appointments from the central server using the same
> > service, but we do not have any problems with the transaction log
> > there ... As far as we can see, the only difference between the two
> > customers is the fact that the mailboxes are replicated to the
> > central server at one customer, while not at the other ...
>
> How are mailboxes being replicated? Nothing native to Exchange/AD does
this.
>
> >
> > /Kima
> >
> > "Mark Arnold [MVP]" wrote in message
> > $6fd25f10$a401280a@phx.gbl...
> >> Nothing is making Exchange replicate mailbox information
> >> anywhere. The creation of the log files is possibly due
> >> to your application extracting data from and writing to
> >> the mailboxes some form of data or flag etc. Would that
> >> make sense based on your knowledge of your application?
> >> If your app just read some data then it wouldn't create
> >> so many logs.
> >>
> >>
> >>> -----Original Message-----
> >>> Hello folks,
> >>>
> >>> My company produces a service that connects to an
> >> Exchange Server using CDO
> >>> to collect users from a selected address list and
> >> appointments from a 7 day
> >>> period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been
> >> working fine on more
> >>> than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5
> >> and Exchange 2000
> >>> without any problems. However, now we have a customer
> >> that runs 12 Exchange
> >>> Servers in a network, where one central server is
> >> replicating the address
> >>> lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes
> >> are not replicated to
> >>> it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs
> >> the synchronisation
> >>> cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
> >> (around 250 in total),
> >>> the transaction log increases rapidly.
> >>>
> >>> I know that by performing regular online backups the log
> >> files from the
> >>> MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the
> >> question is not how to
> >>> workaround the problem, but rather why reading
> >> appointments causes the
> >>> transaction log to increase?
> >>>
> >>> We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are
> >> found on the local
> >>> servers, but we're accessing them through the central
> >> server is making
> >>> Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox
> >> our service is
> >>> opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in
> >> the log.
> >>>
> >>> I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion
> >> and have any
> >>> suggestions?
> >>>
> >>> Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600
> >> maiboxes where we
> >>> again connect to a central server, but they replicate
> >> the mailboxes to the
> >>> central server too and we do not see this problem
> >> there ...
> >>>
> >>> /Kima
> >>>
> >>> Goran Kimovski
> >>> Chief Technical Officer
> >>> Seavus Group
> >>>
> >>> www.seavus.com
> >>>
> >>> "Turning your visions into technical solutions and
> >> products."
> >>>
> >>>
> >>> .
>
>

Lanwench [MVP - Exchange] · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 191

Goran Kimovski wrote:
> Hello Lanwench,
>
> unfortunately I can't answer your question as the servers are hosted
> by a third party service provider and the information about the
> mailbox replication is something I've got through them ...
>
> However, it seems that the problem was actually related to an
> anti-virus program scanning the M: partition ... we could easily
> reproduce the same behaviour on a simple installation of a single
> Exchange 2000 Server with dozen of mailboxes ... by running Norton
> Corporate Anti-virus on the M: partition and starting our service,
> the transaction log files started to pile up ... this seems to slow
> down the service too, actually ... don't know if the problem makes
> the read operation take more time or something ... we didn't
> investigate much further since it seems we now have what to look for
> at the customer site ...
>
> One thing regarding this ... do you recon it is safe to exclude the M:
> partition and/or other folders from virus scaning? I'm not sure it'll
> be acceptable for the service provider hosting the Exchange Servers
> to do that, though, so if you have any other suggestions, please let
> me know them ...

You must *always* exclude the M drive and all Exchange folders from backup
and file-level virus scanning. It can cause major problems.

>
> /Kima
>
> "Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
> wrote in
> message news:%23CL7Qw2CEHA.1544@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
>> Goran Kimovski wrote:
>>> Hello Mark,
>>>
>>> the service can't be more simple ... it simply is scheduled to go
>>> through all accounts in the global address list, open the mailboxes
>>> for each account and read the appointments scheduled for today and
>>> the coming 7 days ... it does not write anything in the mailboxes
>>> nor anywhere else ... Since it is purely CDO-based, the only
>>> possible way that something is written is by the CDO itself, but I
>>> highly doubt that ...
>>>
>>> What made me suspect it could be so that some temporal replication
>>> is performed is that we have another customer with 6 Exchange
>>> Servers and total of 600 mailboxes on them, where the mailboxes are
>>> synchronised to the central server (don't aks me why Smile

) and we're
>>> reading the appointments from the central server using the same
>>> service, but we do not have any problems with the transaction log
>>> there ... As far as we can see, the only difference between the two
>>> customers is the fact that the mailboxes are replicated to the
>>> central server at one customer, while not at the other ...
>>
>> How are mailboxes being replicated? Nothing native to Exchange/AD
>> does this.
>>
>>>
>>> /Kima
>>>
>>> "Mark Arnold [MVP]" wrote in message
>>> $6fd25f10$a401280a@phx.gbl...
>>>> Nothing is making Exchange replicate mailbox information
>>>> anywhere. The creation of the log files is possibly due
>>>> to your application extracting data from and writing to
>>>> the mailboxes some form of data or flag etc. Would that
>>>> make sense based on your knowledge of your application?
>>>> If your app just read some data then it wouldn't create
>>>> so many logs.
>>>>
>>>>
>>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>> Hello folks,
>>>>>
>>>>> My company produces a service that connects to an
>>>> Exchange Server using CDO
>>>>> to collect users from a selected address list and
>>>> appointments from a 7 day
>>>>> period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been
>>>> working fine on more
>>>>> than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5
>>>> and Exchange 2000
>>>>> without any problems. However, now we have a customer
>>>> that runs 12 Exchange
>>>>> Servers in a network, where one central server is
>>>> replicating the address
>>>>> lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes
>>>> are not replicated to
>>>>> it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs
>>>> the synchronisation
>>>>> cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
>>>> (around 250 in total),
>>>>> the transaction log increases rapidly.
>>>>>
>>>>> I know that by performing regular online backups the log
>>>> files from the
>>>>> MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the
>>>> question is not how to
>>>>> workaround the problem, but rather why reading
>>>> appointments causes the
>>>>> transaction log to increase?
>>>>>
>>>>> We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are
>>>> found on the local
>>>>> servers, but we're accessing them through the central
>>>> server is making
>>>>> Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox
>>>> our service is
>>>>> opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in
>>>> the log.
>>>>>
>>>>> I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion
>>>> and have any
>>>>> suggestions?
>>>>>
>>>>> Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600
>>>> maiboxes where we
>>>>> again connect to a central server, but they replicate
>>>> the mailboxes to the
>>>>> central server too and we do not see this problem
>>>> there ...
>>>>>
>>>>> /Kima
>>>>>
>>>>> Goran Kimovski
>>>>> Chief Technical Officer
>>>>> Seavus Group
>>>>>
>>>>> www.seavus.com
>>>>>
>>>>> "Turning your visions into technical solutions and
>>>> products."
>>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> .

Goran Kimovski · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 4

Thanks Lanwench, you've been of great help ...

I also found several articles in the MS KB related to virus scanning and
Exchange ... I guess some of the readers of the newsgroup could be
interested to read them (the company hosting the Exchange Server apparently
didn't Smile

), so I'll place them in this post:

245822 XGEN: Recommendations for Troubleshooting an Exchange Server Computer
with Antivirus Installed
(http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;245822)

299046 XADM: Calendar Items Disappear from User's Folders
(http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;299046)

298551 XADM: Large Number of Transaction Logs Created
(http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;298551)

298924 XADM: Do Not Back Up or Scan Exchange 2000 Drive M
(http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;298924)

328841 XADM: Exchange and Antivirus Software
(http://support.microsoft.com/?id=328841)

/Kima

"Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
wrote in message@TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl...
> Goran Kimovski wrote:
> > Hello Lanwench,
> >
> > unfortunately I can't answer your question as the servers are hosted
> > by a third party service provider and the information about the
> > mailbox replication is something I've got through them ...
> >
> > However, it seems that the problem was actually related to an
> > anti-virus program scanning the M: partition ... we could easily
> > reproduce the same behaviour on a simple installation of a single
> > Exchange 2000 Server with dozen of mailboxes ... by running Norton
> > Corporate Anti-virus on the M: partition and starting our service,
> > the transaction log files started to pile up ... this seems to slow
> > down the service too, actually ... don't know if the problem makes
> > the read operation take more time or something ... we didn't
> > investigate much further since it seems we now have what to look for
> > at the customer site ...
> >
> > One thing regarding this ... do you recon it is safe to exclude the M:
> > partition and/or other folders from virus scaning? I'm not sure it'll
> > be acceptable for the service provider hosting the Exchange Servers
> > to do that, though, so if you have any other suggestions, please let
> > me know them ...
>
> You must *always* exclude the M drive and all Exchange folders from backup
> and file-level virus scanning. It can cause major problems.
>
>
> >
> > /Kima
> >
> > "Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
> > wrote in
> > message news:%23CL7Qw2CEHA.1544@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
> >> Goran Kimovski wrote:
> >>> Hello Mark,
> >>>
> >>> the service can't be more simple ... it simply is scheduled to go
> >>> through all accounts in the global address list, open the mailboxes
> >>> for each account and read the appointments scheduled for today and
> >>> the coming 7 days ... it does not write anything in the mailboxes
> >>> nor anywhere else ... Since it is purely CDO-based, the only
> >>> possible way that something is written is by the CDO itself, but I
> >>> highly doubt that ...
> >>>
> >>> What made me suspect it could be so that some temporal replication
> >>> is performed is that we have another customer with 6 Exchange
> >>> Servers and total of 600 mailboxes on them, where the mailboxes are
> >>> synchronised to the central server (don't aks me why Smile

) and we're
> >>> reading the appointments from the central server using the same
> >>> service, but we do not have any problems with the transaction log
> >>> there ... As far as we can see, the only difference between the two
> >>> customers is the fact that the mailboxes are replicated to the
> >>> central server at one customer, while not at the other ...
> >>
> >> How are mailboxes being replicated? Nothing native to Exchange/AD
> >> does this.
> >>
> >>>
> >>> /Kima
> >>>
> >>> "Mark Arnold [MVP]" wrote in message
> >>> $6fd25f10$a401280a@phx.gbl...
> >>>> Nothing is making Exchange replicate mailbox information
> >>>> anywhere. The creation of the log files is possibly due
> >>>> to your application extracting data from and writing to
> >>>> the mailboxes some form of data or flag etc. Would that
> >>>> make sense based on your knowledge of your application?
> >>>> If your app just read some data then it wouldn't create
> >>>> so many logs.
> >>>>
> >>>>
> >>>>> -----Original Message-----
> >>>>> Hello folks,
> >>>>>
> >>>>> My company produces a service that connects to an
> >>>> Exchange Server using CDO
> >>>>> to collect users from a selected address list and
> >>>> appointments from a 7 day
> >>>>> period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been
> >>>> working fine on more
> >>>>> than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5
> >>>> and Exchange 2000
> >>>>> without any problems. However, now we have a customer
> >>>> that runs 12 Exchange
> >>>>> Servers in a network, where one central server is
> >>>> replicating the address
> >>>>> lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes
> >>>> are not replicated to
> >>>>> it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs
> >>>> the synchronisation
> >>>>> cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
> >>>> (around 250 in total),
> >>>>> the transaction log increases rapidly.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> I know that by performing regular online backups the log
> >>>> files from the
> >>>>> MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the
> >>>> question is not how to
> >>>>> workaround the problem, but rather why reading
> >>>> appointments causes the
> >>>>> transaction log to increase?
> >>>>>
> >>>>> We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are
> >>>> found on the local
> >>>>> servers, but we're accessing them through the central
> >>>> server is making
> >>>>> Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox
> >>>> our service is
> >>>>> opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in
> >>>> the log.
> >>>>>
> >>>>> I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion
> >>>> and have any
> >>>>> suggestions?
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600
> >>>> maiboxes where we
> >>>>> again connect to a central server, but they replicate
> >>>> the mailboxes to the
> >>>>> central server too and we do not see this problem
> >>>> there ...
> >>>>>
> >>>>> /Kima
> >>>>>
> >>>>> Goran Kimovski
> >>>>> Chief Technical Officer
> >>>>> Seavus Group
> >>>>>
> >>>>> www.seavus.com
> >>>>>
> >>>>> "Turning your visions into technical solutions and
> >>>> products."
> >>>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> .
>
>

Lanwench [MVP - Exchange] · Joined: 05 Aug 2007 Posts: 191

You're most welcome! Yes, these articles are great.

Goran Kimovski wrote:
> Thanks Lanwench, you've been of great help ...
>
> I also found several articles in the MS KB related to virus scanning
> and Exchange ... I guess some of the readers of the newsgroup could be
> interested to read them (the company hosting the Exchange Server
> apparently didn't Smile

), so I'll place them in this post:
>
> 245822 XGEN: Recommendations for Troubleshooting an Exchange Server
> Computer with Antivirus Installed
> (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;245822)
>
> 299046 XADM: Calendar Items Disappear from User's Folders
> (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;299046)
>
> 298551 XADM: Large Number of Transaction Logs Created
> (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;298551)
>
> 298924 XADM: Do Not Back Up or Scan Exchange 2000 Drive M
> (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;298924)
>
> 328841 XADM: Exchange and Antivirus Software
> (http://support.microsoft.com/?id=328841)
>
> /Kima
>
> "Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
> wrote in
> message @TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl...
>> Goran Kimovski wrote:
>>> Hello Lanwench,
>>>
>>> unfortunately I can't answer your question as the servers are hosted
>>> by a third party service provider and the information about the
>>> mailbox replication is something I've got through them ...
>>>
>>> However, it seems that the problem was actually related to an
>>> anti-virus program scanning the M: partition ... we could easily
>>> reproduce the same behaviour on a simple installation of a single
>>> Exchange 2000 Server with dozen of mailboxes ... by running Norton
>>> Corporate Anti-virus on the M: partition and starting our service,
>>> the transaction log files started to pile up ... this seems to slow
>>> down the service too, actually ... don't know if the problem makes
>>> the read operation take more time or something ... we didn't
>>> investigate much further since it seems we now have what to look for
>>> at the customer site ...
>>>
>>> One thing regarding this ... do you recon it is safe to exclude the
>>> M: partition and/or other folders from virus scaning? I'm not sure
>>> it'll be acceptable for the service provider hosting the Exchange
>>> Servers to do that, though, so if you have any other suggestions,
>>> please let me know them ...
>>
>> You must *always* exclude the M drive and all Exchange folders from
>> backup and file-level virus scanning. It can cause major problems.
>>
>>
>>>
>>> /Kima
>>>
>>> "Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
>>> wrote in
>>> message news:%23CL7Qw2CEHA.1544@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
>>>> Goran Kimovski wrote:
>>>>> Hello Mark,
>>>>>
>>>>> the service can't be more simple ... it simply is scheduled to go
>>>>> through all accounts in the global address list, open the
>>>>> mailboxes for each account and read the appointments scheduled
>>>>> for today and the coming 7 days ... it does not write anything in
>>>>> the mailboxes nor anywhere else ... Since it is purely CDO-based,
>>>>> the only possible way that something is written is by the CDO
>>>>> itself, but I highly doubt that ...
>>>>>
>>>>> What made me suspect it could be so that some temporal replication
>>>>> is performed is that we have another customer with 6 Exchange
>>>>> Servers and total of 600 mailboxes on them, where the mailboxes
>>>>> are synchronised to the central server (don't aks me why Smile

)
>>>>> and we're reading the appointments from the central server using
>>>>> the same service, but we do not have any problems with the
>>>>> transaction log there ... As far as we can see, the only
>>>>> difference between the two customers is the fact that the
>>>>> mailboxes are replicated to the central server at one customer,
>>>>> while not at the other ...
>>>>
>>>> How are mailboxes being replicated? Nothing native to Exchange/AD
>>>> does this.
>>>>
>>>>>
>>>>> /Kima
>>>>>
>>>>> "Mark Arnold [MVP]" wrote in message
>>>>> $6fd25f10$a401280a@phx.gbl...
>>>>>> Nothing is making Exchange replicate mailbox information
>>>>>> anywhere. The creation of the log files is possibly due
>>>>>> to your application extracting data from and writing to
>>>>>> the mailboxes some form of data or flag etc. Would that
>>>>>> make sense based on your knowledge of your application?
>>>>>> If your app just read some data then it wouldn't create
>>>>>> so many logs.
>>>>>>
>>>>>>
>>>>>>> -----Original Message-----
>>>>>>> Hello folks,
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> My company produces a service that connects to an
>>>>>> Exchange Server using CDO
>>>>>>> to collect users from a selected address list and
>>>>>> appointments from a 7 day
>>>>>>> period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been
>>>>>> working fine on more
>>>>>>> than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5
>>>>>> and Exchange 2000
>>>>>>> without any problems. However, now we have a customer
>>>>>> that runs 12 Exchange
>>>>>>> Servers in a network, where one central server is
>>>>>> replicating the address
>>>>>>> lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes
>>>>>> are not replicated to
>>>>>>> it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs
>>>>>> the synchronisation
>>>>>>> cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
>>>>>> (around 250 in total),
>>>>>>> the transaction log increases rapidly.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I know that by performing regular online backups the log
>>>>>> files from the
>>>>>>> MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the
>>>>>> question is not how to
>>>>>>> workaround the problem, but rather why reading
>>>>>> appointments causes the
>>>>>>> transaction log to increase?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are
>>>>>> found on the local
>>>>>>> servers, but we're accessing them through the central
>>>>>> server is making
>>>>>>> Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox
>>>>>> our service is
>>>>>>> opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in
>>>>>> the log.
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion
>>>>>> and have any
>>>>>>> suggestions?
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600
>>>>>> maiboxes where we
>>>>>>> again connect to a central server, but they replicate
>>>>>> the mailboxes to the
>>>>>>> central server too and we do not see this problem
>>>>>> there ...
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> /Kima
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> Goran Kimovski
>>>>>>> Chief Technical Officer
>>>>>>> Seavus Group
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> www.seavus.com
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> "Turning your visions into technical solutions and
>>>>>> products."
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>>
>>>>>>> .

Goran Kimovski · Joined: 06 Aug 2007 Posts: 1

Forced to continue this thread as we still have problems ...

I've sent the KB articles to the hosting company where the 12 Exchange
Servers are hosted and they removed all of the folders listed in the MS
recommendation (some were indeed scanned by the anti-virus ... btw, they're
using GroupShield ... don't know what version). They also checked the backup
routines (they're using Computer Associates software for that) and say they
were set according to the recommendations already. However, they report no
changes in the behavior of the transaction logs, i.e. they still rapidly
grow when our service reads the appointments from the user's mailboxes. It
is also noted that the store.exe process, which is usually using very low
CPU resources, now runs at 15-20% on average and has peaks as high as
90-100% ...

Unfortunately I have too many communication layers to the hosting company,
plus they haven't been much trustworthy up to now (and they're big, so they
can easily convince the customer that they run everything perfectly and it
is our software that causes all the trouble), so I can't tell if the
anti-virus and backup are really excluding the M drive and Exchange folders
on all Exchange servers.

I would like to ask you, under the assumption that everything is really set
properly, if you can think of any other reason why we still have the same
problem ...
We're using CDO to:
- logon to the mailboxes,
- open the calendar folder,
- set a filter to read only 7 days and
- retrieve the appointment entries
.... without any write/set operation whatsoever ...

As I said in my first post in this thread, the installation is set so that
mailboxes are distributed over 11 Exchange servers and we access them by
performing a logon to the 12th, central Exchange Server and then using CDO
to retrieve the calendar.

Another thing worth noting may be that our service is run on a separate
machine, i.e. not on the central Exchange Server and the CDO on that machine
is installed from an Exchange 5.5 CD, i.e. CDO.DLL is of version 5.5 (with
post-SP4 update). We plan to install a new CDO from Exchange 2000 CD
tomorrow just to rule out if this could be of any relation to the original
problem or not, but don't expect any change ...

Any input from anyone who can say something to help us find a solution to
our problem is highly appreciated ...

/Kima

"Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
wrote in message@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
> You're most welcome! Yes, these articles are great.
>
>
> Goran Kimovski wrote:
> > Thanks Lanwench, you've been of great help ...
> >
> > I also found several articles in the MS KB related to virus scanning
> > and Exchange ... I guess some of the readers of the newsgroup could be
> > interested to read them (the company hosting the Exchange Server
> > apparently didn't Smile

), so I'll place them in this post:
> >
> > 245822 XGEN: Recommendations for Troubleshooting an Exchange Server
> > Computer with Antivirus Installed
> > (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;245822)
> >
> > 299046 XADM: Calendar Items Disappear from User's Folders
> > (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;299046)
> >
> > 298551 XADM: Large Number of Transaction Logs Created
> > (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;298551)
> >
> > 298924 XADM: Do Not Back Up or Scan Exchange 2000 Drive M
> > (http://support.microsoft.com/default.aspx?scid=kb;EN-US;298924)
> >
> > 328841 XADM: Exchange and Antivirus Software
> > (http://support.microsoft.com/?id=328841)
> >
> > /Kima
> >
> > "Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
> > wrote in
> > message @TK2MSFTNGP11.phx.gbl...
> >> Goran Kimovski wrote:
> >>> Hello Lanwench,
> >>>
> >>> unfortunately I can't answer your question as the servers are hosted
> >>> by a third party service provider and the information about the
> >>> mailbox replication is something I've got through them ...
> >>>
> >>> However, it seems that the problem was actually related to an
> >>> anti-virus program scanning the M: partition ... we could easily
> >>> reproduce the same behaviour on a simple installation of a single
> >>> Exchange 2000 Server with dozen of mailboxes ... by running Norton
> >>> Corporate Anti-virus on the M: partition and starting our service,
> >>> the transaction log files started to pile up ... this seems to slow
> >>> down the service too, actually ... don't know if the problem makes
> >>> the read operation take more time or something ... we didn't
> >>> investigate much further since it seems we now have what to look for
> >>> at the customer site ...
> >>>
> >>> One thing regarding this ... do you recon it is safe to exclude the
> >>> M: partition and/or other folders from virus scaning? I'm not sure
> >>> it'll be acceptable for the service provider hosting the Exchange
> >>> Servers to do that, though, so if you have any other suggestions,
> >>> please let me know them ...
> >>
> >> You must *always* exclude the M drive and all Exchange folders from
> >> backup and file-level virus scanning. It can cause major problems.
> >>
> >>
> >>>
> >>> /Kima
> >>>
> >>> "Lanwench [MVP - Exchange]"
> >>> wrote in
> >>> message news:%23CL7Qw2CEHA.1544@TK2MSFTNGP09.phx.gbl...
> >>>> Goran Kimovski wrote:
> >>>>> Hello Mark,
> >>>>>
> >>>>> the service can't be more simple ... it simply is scheduled to go
> >>>>> through all accounts in the global address list, open the
> >>>>> mailboxes for each account and read the appointments scheduled
> >>>>> for today and the coming 7 days ... it does not write anything in
> >>>>> the mailboxes nor anywhere else ... Since it is purely CDO-based,
> >>>>> the only possible way that something is written is by the CDO
> >>>>> itself, but I highly doubt that ...
> >>>>>
> >>>>> What made me suspect it could be so that some temporal replication
> >>>>> is performed is that we have another customer with 6 Exchange
> >>>>> Servers and total of 600 mailboxes on them, where the mailboxes
> >>>>> are synchronised to the central server (don't aks me why Smile

)
> >>>>> and we're reading the appointments from the central server using
> >>>>> the same service, but we do not have any problems with the
> >>>>> transaction log there ... As far as we can see, the only
> >>>>> difference between the two customers is the fact that the
> >>>>> mailboxes are replicated to the central server at one customer,
> >>>>> while not at the other ...
> >>>>
> >>>> How are mailboxes being replicated? Nothing native to Exchange/AD
> >>>> does this.
> >>>>
> >>>>>
> >>>>> /Kima
> >>>>>
> >>>>> "Mark Arnold [MVP]" wrote in message
> >>>>> $6fd25f10$a401280a@phx.gbl...
> >>>>>> Nothing is making Exchange replicate mailbox information
> >>>>>> anywhere. The creation of the log files is possibly due
> >>>>>> to your application extracting data from and writing to
> >>>>>> the mailboxes some form of data or flag etc. Would that
> >>>>>> make sense based on your knowledge of your application?
> >>>>>> If your app just read some data then it wouldn't create
> >>>>>> so many logs.
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>
> >>>>>>> -----Original Message-----
> >>>>>>> Hello folks,
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> My company produces a service that connects to an
> >>>>>> Exchange Server using CDO
> >>>>>>> to collect users from a selected address list and
> >>>>>> appointments from a 7 day
> >>>>>>> period for the user's mailboxes. The service has been
> >>>>>> working fine on more
> >>>>>>> than 30 customer sites, both connecting to Exchange 5.5
> >>>>>> and Exchange 2000
> >>>>>>> without any problems. However, now we have a customer
> >>>>>> that runs 12 Exchange
> >>>>>>> Servers in a network, where one central server is
> >>>>>> replicating the address
> >>>>>>> lists from all local servers, but the user's mailboxes
> >>>>>> are not replicated to
> >>>>>>> it. It's been reported to us that when our service runs
> >>>>>> the synchronisation
> >>>>>>> cycle, i.e. reads the appointments from the mailboxes
> >>>>>> (around 250 in total),
> >>>>>>> the transaction log increases rapidly.
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> I know that by performing regular online backups the log
> >>>>>> files from the
> >>>>>>> MDBDATA folder get purged and all that stuff, but the
> >>>>>> question is not how to
> >>>>>>> workaround the problem, but rather why reading
> >>>>>> appointments causes the
> >>>>>>> transaction log to increase?
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> We're suspecting that the fact that the mailboxes are
> >>>>>> found on the local
> >>>>>>> servers, but we're accessing them through the central
> >>>>>> server is making
> >>>>>>> Exchange to do some temporal replication of the mailbox
> >>>>>> our service is
> >>>>>>> opening, which is seen as a transaction and placed in
> >>>>>> the log.
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> I would like to hear if anyone can confirm our suspicion
> >>>>>> and have any
> >>>>>>> suggestions?
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> Btw, we have a customer with 6 Exchange Servers and 600
> >>>>>> maiboxes where we
> >>>>>>> again connect to a central server, but they replicate
> >>>>>> the mailboxes to the
> >>>>>>> central server too and we do not see this problem
> >>>>>> there ...
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> /Kima
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> Goran Kimovski
> >>>>>>> Chief Technical Officer
> >>>>>>> Seavus Group
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> www.seavus.com
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> "Turning your visions into technical solutions and
> >>>>>> products."
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>>
> >>>>>>> .
>
>

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