Programming Tutorials

Is autodiscover CNAME a must in Office 365

By: Ashley in Office365 Tutorials on 2012-06-12  

The Autodiscover service makes it easier to configure Outlook 2007 or Outlook 2010 and some mobile phones. You can't use the Autodiscover service with earlier versions of Outlook, including Outlook 2003. In earlier versions of Microsoft Exchange (Exchange 2003 SP2 or earlier) and Outlook (Outlook 2003 or earlier), you had to configure all user profiles manually to access Exchange. Extra work was required to manage these profiles if changes occurred to the messaging environment. Otherwise, the Outlook clients would stop functioning correctly.

The Autodiscover service uses a user's e-mail address and password to automatically configure a user's profile. Using the e-mail address, the Autodiscover service provides the following information to the client:

· The user's display name

· Separate connection settings for internal and external connectivity

· The location of the user's Mailbox server

· The URLs for various Outlook features that govern functionality such as free/busy information, Unified Messaging, and the offline address book

· Outlook Anywhere server settings

When a user's Exchange information is changed, Outlook automatically reconfigures the user's profile using the Autodiscover service. For example, if a user's mailbox is moved or the client can't connect to the user's mailbox or to available Exchange features, Outlook will contact the Autodiscover service and automatically update the user's profile to include the information that's required to connect to the mailbox and Exchange features.

More details at http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/bb124251.aspx

Therefore, you are advised to add the autodiscover CNAME for your domains.

If not added, you will have to manually configure the outlook profile