Could not get a MAPI session from the session pool... Journaling Service Pr

[Victor_Geyyer]

Hi all,
I have 3 Journaling Services running on the Vault Server. 2 Journaling Services work fine (knock on wood), but 1 Journaling Services does not grab messages from the journaling mailbox posting 'Could not get a MAPI session from the session pool' message every 5 min
Any help would be greatly appreciated.
Thanks in advance,
Victor

[David_Hamilton]

An excerpt from a MAPI troubleshooting doc I receive from KVS Support.

Run the Outlook utility fixmapi.exe
As part of the Outlook installation, it installs a utility called fixmapi.exe. Usually you can find it in C:\WINNT\system32.

To run this utility, simply double click on it. Note that this utility runs very quickly and does not display any output so you might not realise it has run.

After you have completed the above steps, you need to reboot the server to be sure that the changes take effect.

[David_Hamilton]

Found the complete doc.

http://seer.support.veritas.com/docs/273298.htm

[David_Messeng1]

I stongly advise you not to run fixmapi.exe.

[David_Hamilton]

Reasons?

Problems with mapisvc.inf afterward?

[David_Messeng1]

David,

scan this thread http://forums.veritas.com/discussions/thread.jspa?forumID=106&threadID=54936&messageID=4399665?

There are some links in there to other documents as well.

I *think* fixmapi is actually an Outlook Express thing (hawk, spit). When we first built EV (version 5.0 when it was actually masquerading as version 4.1 nearly 2 years back (or is it 3?)) we ran thru Outlook trying to "heal itself" with the KVS consultant (who I trust A LOT). He said do not under any circumstances let Outlook heal itself. This is effectively what fixmapi is doing. Overwriting ESM MAPI with Outlook MAPI.

We built 8 EV servers. They worked about as well as I expected them to (i.e. a bit crap but could be worse) and then started playing up severely. Loads of errors and service crashes. All sorts of stuff. Took me ages to figure out that someone on the KVS support desk (who I trust NOT AT ALL) had advised one of my team to run fixmapi.exe. I'm still not sure why. I guess it was on his list of "things to do to get rid of a case quickly even if you haven't a clue what the problem is"?!? It might fix someone who was runnig the O/S MAPI on an NT4 server I suppose...

I asked them (Veritas at that point) why they'd done this. They didn't know. I escalated the call. What version of MAPI do we need? "We don't know, it's up to you". WTF?!?! :( :( :( It's Gold Certified by MS and totally MAPI based but they don't know what versions of the files we should have on the servers!! Confidence rock bottom by this stage. Posted the above thread. Implemented the fix and....

... everything is much better thank you (rember how you built the EV server? O/S --> Outlook --> Exchange --> EV). You can't import Unicode PST files (well you can, you just swap the MAPI files out when you do it and make sure there's no archive runs imminent, you probably have to stop the services temporarily to release the file locks) but IMHO you get fewer issues running day to day with ESM MAPI. I could be wrong but I'm sticking with what I've seen in the field for now until convinced otherwise.

Hope that helps!! :)

[Matthew_Edwards]

David's right about Fixmapi -its not going to fix this problem.

Looking through this thread, if you've tried everything suggested to the letter then we are beginning to run out of things to try.

Let's try a different approach.

Can you temporarily point the journal service at a different mailbox on the server and see if it can suck the items out of it (don't switch the Exchange journal for now...let that carry on filling the mailbox). If the journal service likes a different mailbox, then there is something definitely wrong with the original one. At this point switch the Exchange journal mechanism to point to the new box and manually copy the old journal mailbox's contents into it using Outlook or Exmerge.

I know that this is a work around more than a fix - but its a low-risk approach and heck I'm sure that most of us will still sleep well even without getting to the bottom of it :)

[Victor_Geyyer]

Guys,
You are perfect...
You are not leaving me in the trouble...
I run fixmapi too fast and it did not fix the problem and I will have other problems later :(
Ok...
I was frustrated enough to re-point the Journaling Service to another mailbox, which did not fix the issue... Furthermore more interesting stuff appeared: now I have 2 exactly same errors complaining about MAPI session (see above) on 2 mailboxes: JournalOld and JournalNew...
....
I was surprised where the information about JournalOld pop up and went ahead and remove the Journaling Service and created the new one pointing to the new mailbox JournalNew... After I started the service I got 2 same old 'MAPI session' errors for JournalNew... and JournalOld... I don't know where the new Journaling Srevice took the information about JournalOld from: I totally removed the Journaling Service and readded it... I checked the database and at least JornalingServiceEntry table does not have any knowledge about JournalOld...
....
Strange things are happening... I'm glad that 2 other Journaling Services work properly (so far)...
...
Thanks for not leaving me out in cold... :)
-Victor

[Victor_Geyyer]

Hi all,
Here is the update on the issue:
After we restarted the troubled Exchange Server, I'm getting different issue now:
I can't start the Journaling Service with the following error message:

Source: EV
Event ID: 3077
Description:
Unable to determine the version of the Exchange server Server1, the service will shut down
Reason: Access Denied
....
Any ideas how to fix this?
Thanks,
Victor

[Michael_Bilsbor]

Is the Exchange server running Win2k3 sp1?

If so it's a known win2k3 sp1 bug. You need to either make vault service account member of local admins on exchange server or speak to microsoft regarding a hotfix which is available(I think) or goto V6 sp1

[Victor_Geyyer]

The Vaul Admin account is in the Administrators group on the Exchange Server...
Anything else?
Thanks a lot...
-Victor

[Michael_Bilsbor]

Hi,

On the EV server goto computer manager and then switch to the exchange server and list the services. Does that work or do you get Access denied.

That is effectively what EV is doing at that point. So if it doesn't work you need to get computer mgt working first.

[David_Messeng1]

3 pages. Longest thread yet. Don't know about you lot but I'm totally confused....

[Matthew_Edwards]

Ok - this looks a little better (the error - not the issue!)

Could you make the EV service account a member of the local Administrators group in the domain where the Exchange server is located (not the Domain Admins group but the in the BUILTIN OU).

Also is the domain in the same AD forest?

Are there any firewalls between the EV server and the Exchange server?

[Tremaine]

Have you tried adding the EV service account to the Exchange server in question local admin group?

[Victor_Geyyer]

Hi to all,
The original error came back...
The Vault Server and Exchange Server are in the different forests and yes, there are firewalls between two networks...
But we've been through the original setting up the Journaling Service (open ports on firewalls, creating trusts on domain level, adding Vault System account to the admin groups both on the domain level and local for Exchange, setting up appropriate permissions for Vault System account on Exchange)...
And it was working before!... Before installing SP1 on Windows 2003 on Exchange Server... Maybe it is a coincidence, but I don't think so...
Thank you for your help… And if you continue sharing ideas, I would be grateful…
-Victor

[David_Messeng1]

Why are your firewalls there? Are you doing any NATting? What ports are you blocking? Any changes recently?

[Victor_Geyyer]

> Why are your firewalls there?

Because it's 2 different companies...

>Are you doing any
> NATting?

As far as I know, it's PIX-to-PIX firewall, I don't think there "NATting" involved... It's in hands of network engineers, but nothing has changed recently and it worked fine prior to W2k3 SP1 installation...

> What ports are you blocking? Any changes
> recently?

[David_Messeng1]

Outlook (which is a lot of what EV is) won;t work properly thru NAT (beacuse UDP can't route).

Can you confirm -- different companies, but same AD and same Exchange Organisation right?

[Victor_Geyyer]

> Outlook (which is a lot of what EV is) won;t work
> properly thru NAT (beacuse UDP can't route).

There is no NATting…

>
> Can you confirm -- different companies, but same AD
> and same Exchange Organisation right?

NO...
There are 2 forest (not the same ADs) and 2 different Exchange Orgs - trust relationship between domains… It worked just fine and it is still working fine (knock-knock on wood) for one of our other subsidiary – different ADs, different Exchange Orgs...

[Matthew_Edwards]

Victor

Can you check the ports open on your firewall (avoid the Sp1 loop - I still think it's a red herring).

Look at the following KB article for reference:

http://support.microsoft.com/?id=270836

Outlook 2003 uses dynamic port assignments which play havoc with firewalls (normally in highly partitioned environments I recommend RPC over HTTPS for clients - EV needs the full monty RPC connection however.)

Could your firewall guys give you a temporary 'open connection' just between the EV server and exchange server for testing?

You also need to turn up logging on the Exchange server and look at DS/DSProxy related errors.

Finally. Use the Outlook 2003 connection checker to verify DS access.

( -CTRL+Click the Outlook tray icon:

CTRL+Click

-Click 'Connection Status...')