HMC tips for Exchange: Part 2 - Adding a distribution list

The second tip is distribution lists, which are also kind of an important thing to get set up. To do this you need to craft an CreateDistributionList XML request, this is just an XML file which looks like:

<request> 
    <data> 
        <container>LDAP Path</container>
        <preferredDomainController>Domain Controller</preferredDomainController>
        <managedBy>List Owner</managedBy>
        <name>List Name</name>
    </data>
    <procedure> 
        <execute namespace="Hosted Email 2007" procedure="CreateDistributionList" impersonate="1" > 
            <before source="data" destination="executeData" mode="merge" />
            <after source="executeData" destination="data" mode="merge" />
        </execute>
    </procedure>
</request>

Sample

<request> 
    <data> 
        <container>LDAP://OU=MyCustomer,OU=MyReseller,OU=Hosting,DC=litware,DC=local</container>
        <preferredDomainController>srv01</preferredDomainController>
        <managedBy>[email protected]</managedBy>
        <name>Triage</name>
    </data>
    <procedure> 
        <execute namespace="Hosted Email 2007" procedure="CreateDistributionList" impersonate="1" > 
            <before source="data" destination="executeData" mode="merge" />
            <after source="executeData" destination="data" mode="merge" />
        </execute>
    </procedure>
</request>

You can then run that on your HMC server using the provtest command. So how do you manage who actually is in the list? Well this actually very easy, thanks to Outlook. First just open an email and type the list name in to line, then right click and select properties:

You can then use the Modify Members… button to add/remove members of this list.

Note: This can ONLY be done my the list owner which you specified when you created the list in the managedBy node.