This blog post is probably out of date. If you want to set up Exchange ActiveSync, you should instead consult one my guides:
	iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Setup		iPad Exchange ActiveSync Setup
	iPhone ActiveSync Troubleshooting		iPad ActiveSync Troubleshooting

iPhone OS 3.0 is here, offering enhancements for enterprise Exchange ActiveSync

iPhone OS 3.0 was released today, and I’ve had a chance to play with it for a bit now. I am very impressed with the improvements Apple has made, and think that 3.0 will be much more welcome in Microsoft Exchange environments. However, it’s still not quite up to the high standard set by the BlackBerry.

Wondering how to get Exchange working in 3.0? Start here:
How To Set Up iPhone Exchange ActiveSync

For the most up-to-date information, see my iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Guide!

This post is part of my series focused on integrating the iPhone with Microsoft Exchange using ActiveSync:

• iPhone OS 3.0 information:
  1. First Look: iPhone 3.0 And Exchange ActiveSync Integration
  2. How To Subscribe To Internet Calendars In iPhone OS 3.0
  3. How To Access LDAP Directories In iPhone OS 3.0
  4. iPhone 3.0 Exchange ActiveSync: Better But Not Perfect
• How To Set Up iPhone Exchange ActiveSync
1. A Few iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Gotchas
2. Can the iPhone Sync With Multiple Exchange Servers?

Major Changes

Apple made some significant updates to all three of the components touched by ActiveSync: Mail, Calendar, and Contacts.

• The Calendar has been totally re-done, more smoothly supporting multiple calendars, syncing with local calendars and Exchange at the same time, CalDAV and .ICS natively, and allowing on-phone creation of meeting invitations for Exchange users.
• The Contacts application can now sync with local address books and Exchange at the same time.
• Mail is more flexible, with per-folder downloading of Exchange messages.

As I noted last month, however, OS 3.0 is not all roses. In particular, the following issues continue to haunt the phone:

1. The iPhone only supports full ActiveSync with a single Exchange server. Although you are free to establish as many IMAP connections as you like, including connecting to Exchange with IMAP, you cannot use more than one ActiveSync service.
2. Still no notes and tasks sync (with Exchange). Although iPhone OS 3.0 does allow synchronization of notes with Apple Mail for Mac users, it does not support Exchange or Apple’s own MobileMe over-the-air services.
3. No public folder support.
4. ICS and CalDAV seems to be desktop-sync only.
5. Spotlight does not include full-text search of mail messages.
6. Push email remains slow, flaky, and battery-consuming. This is a very tough nut to crack!

Mail

The mail application gets numerous improvements for all mail servers. Notable among these is landscape mode and spotlight search. When it comes to Exchange ActiveSync, the changes are harder to notice. One thing that struck me was the ability to specify which folders to “push” along with the Inbox. Perhaps this was there all along and I missed it, but I never noticed it before.

Note that the Push settings have been moved under “Mail, Contacts, Calendars” in OS 3.0.

Calendar

OS 3.0 is much more sensible in organizing and synchronizing multiple calendar types

Although iPhone OS 2.0 supported multiple calendars, it was very confusing and not at all integrated with Exchange. OS 3.0 has cleaned things up significantly. As illustrated, the iPhone now organizes calendars into categories: Those synced from the Mac or PC and those synced over the air from an Exchange server.

That’s right – the iPhone can now sync calendar entries over both USB and Exchange at the same time! This is super handy, since iTunes supports CalDAV and ICS subscribed calendars through iCal on OS X, and presumably on Windows as well. I’ve written before about TripIt’s solid iPhone app, and this gives another way to view trips. But the iPhone doesn’t seem to support either CalDAV of ICS over the air, which is something of a disappointment. We can’t have everything, can we? Update: I missed it! iPhone OS 3.0 does include over-the-air CalDAV and ICS!

Of course, the new spotlight search supports calendar entries as well, allowing quick access to appointments.

Perhaps the most-anticipated calendar feature for iPhone OS 3.0 is meeting invite support. I can confirm that it is possible to create a meeting, add attendees, and send invites right from the iPhone, and that this works over the air! This is a specific Exchange feature, so of course it only works for the Exchange calendar. But you can easily change an existing non-exchange item to the Exchange calendar and start inviting attendees, even those not using Exchange.

But there are still limitations. You cannot add invitees to someone else’s meeting. You cannot make any changes to an appointment synced from the desktop (CalDAV and ICS included). You cannot forward a meeting request from the calendar app. You cannot see free/busy time when scheduling. It’s not like you have Outlook in your pocket!

One more weird thing I noticed: Nearly every app now has a landscape mode, including mail and contacts, but calendar is locked in portrait only!

Contacts

Like calendars, contacts now supports both iTunes and over-the-air Exchange syncing

The other application to see some updates is Contacts. Like the calendar app, Contacts can now sync to both local desktop and over-the-air Exchange sources at the same time. The iPhone sync combines desktop sources into an “on my iPhone” category and maintains Exchange contacts separately. It also includes access to an Exchange global address list (GAL), and this seems to work much better now than it used to.

Contact management is somewhat limited, however. If you locate a user in the GAL, you can’t add them to your Exchange or iPhone contact list without copy and paste (did I mention that it works?) or finding an email message from them. The phone also has no de-duplication features, so if your desktop contact list is synced with Exchange already you will have a world of duplicate entries.

Summary

All in all, iPhone OS 3.0 is a worthwhile upgrade, especially for business users. Everything seems to work more smoothly and logically than in 2.0, and the added Exchange calendar invite support is great. The complete set of additions, from copy and paste to spotlight search, are excellent as well. But, like the Mac, the iPhone remains just a bit left-of-center in the world of business and Microsoft Exchange. Maybe that’s for the best!

Check out Paul Robichaux’s comments on 3.0′s mail as well!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2009. | First Look: iPhone 3.0 And Exchange ActiveSync Integration
This post was categorized as Apple, Personal. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.

This blog post is probably out of date. If you want to set up Exchange ActiveSync, you should instead consult one my guides:
	iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Setup		iPad Exchange ActiveSync Setup
	iPhone ActiveSync Troubleshooting		iPad ActiveSync Troubleshooting

I’ve been running OS 2.0 on my (first-generation) iPhone for a week and a half now, and as I mentioned before, Exchange ActiveSync push email, calendaring, and contacts was one of the main things Iwas looking for when I upgraded.  That article on setting up ActiveSync has since become my top blog post by far, pulling in literally thousands of hits per day, so I must not be alone in wanting this functionality.

But it turns out that the green grass of iPhone/Exchange integration has a tint of brown.  Folks have experienced issues getting the service set up, and it guzzles battery juice like a toddler at a lemonade stand.  Read on for my notes and suggestions…

For the most up-to-date information, see my iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Guide!

This post is part of my series focused on integrating the iPhone with Microsoft Exchange using ActiveSync:

• iPhone OS 3.0 information:
  1. First Look: iPhone 3.0 And Exchange ActiveSync Integration
  2. How To Subscribe To Internet Calendars In iPhone OS 3.0
  3. How To Access LDAP Directories In iPhone OS 3.0
  4. iPhone 3.0 Exchange ActiveSync: Better But Not Perfect
• How To Set Up iPhone Exchange ActiveSync
1. A Few iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Gotchas
2. Can the iPhone Sync With Multiple Exchange Servers?

Which Server?

By far the biggest problem folks have encountered when trying to enable Exchange ActiveSync on the iPhone has been finding the correct server name.  Update: It turns out that Exchange 2007 has an Autodiscovery service for ActiveSync devices, and the iPhone supports and attempts to use this.  But it will fail for anyone using Exchange 2003 or with an admin that turned this off…

If Autodiscovery fails, you have to manually enter the address.  Most Exchange implementations have a variety of different servers these days, each with a unique hostname and IP address:

• The main Exchange server, which is normally only used for internal or VPN connections to Outlook using the MAPI/RPC protocol and often has an excitingly-weird name like em22dc.yourcompany.com.  This is not what you are looking for.
• The external Exchange server for RPC over HTTPS connections from Outlook, which often has a nicer name like rpc.yourcompany.com.  This is also not what you’re looking for.
• The Outlook Web Access server used by Entourage and for accessing mail using a web browser, which is often called “owa.yourcompany.com”.  Getting warmer, but still not the right one.
• Entourage also uses an LDAP server, often called “ldap.yourcompany.com”, and might alias the OWA server as “dav.yourcompany.com”.  Still not the right server for the iPhone.
• The one you want is the ActiveSync server, sometimes called “oma.yourcompany.com” since it’s mainly used for Outlook Mobile on Windows Mobile devices.

If your techies don’t know the first thing about the iPhone, change your tactics.  Ask them which hostname they enter when configuring Windows Mobile smartphones and PDAs – these are very common, and this is the server you need with the iPhone!

One more thing:  You might get lucky and find that one of those other server names works for the iPhone’s ActiveSync.  This does not mean you’re using DAV or OWA on the iPhone – instead it means that they set up two services on the same hostname.  But I haven’t seen this myself.

The Problem With Push

Let me start by saying that, so far, the push email experience with Exchange ActiveSync to the iPhone has been flawless for me. Amazingly, messages appear on my iPhone before they show up in Outlook on my PC, which is online with RPC over HTTPS.  Whatever Apple (and Microsoft) did to enable push email certainly worked well! Perhaps a bit too well, though.  After using ActiveSync push for a few days, I noticed that my battery was draining by early afternoon.

At first, I chalked this up to increased usage of the phone’s new features.  But having spent the day (mostly) ignoring the phone while on vacation, I was shocked to see the battery icon turn red before dinner.  Clearly something was eating my battery alive!

As an experiment, I turned off push in the iPhone’s Settings pane, opting for manual just to be safe. Are you surprised to learn that my battery was green all the next day?  In fact, it barely used any power at all, even with 30-minute IMAP updates from Google Mail still running.

Note that the Push settings have been moved under “Mail, Contacts, Calendars” in OS 3.0.

Clearly ActiveSync push is a major battery hog, and I would imagine that 3G would be even worse than the miserly EDGE in the first-generation phone! What to do?  You’ve got just a few choices:

1. Go back to IMAP fetch and lose Exchange integration (boo!)
2. Leave push enabled but plan to charge up more often or use WiFi, which is much more battery-friendly.
3. Switch Exchange from push to fetch, which leaves the integration intact but doesn’t guzzle the juice as quickly
4. Switch Exchange to manual update, which is very battery-friendly

I have decided on option 3 when I’m out and about to conserve battery power, since most of my email can wait a few minutes.  And if I’m low on juice, I’ll switch over to option 4.  But if I’m in the office, with my most-excellent WiFi and broadband connectivity, I’m leaving push enabled.

I think it’s worth noting that the push settings are stored in a separate control panel from the other mail settings, which is either an odd gaffe or an indication that other non-mail push options will eventually be added here.

• There’s a master switch on the main panel (shown above) which is nice, since you can quickly turn off all push to conserve juice.
• I’d love another setting option of turning off push mail based on battery level or on a schedule, like the BlackBerry has.
• You can also tweak the master fetch schedule setting here.
• Tap Advanced, and you can set each account’s settings – select push, fetch, or manual for each account based on your own preferences.  If I was using MobileMe for personal email, I might be tempted to turn off push just for that account, since my spam can wait!
• One more thing – notice that you can set the name of your mail accounts to something other than your email address.  That’s done in each account’s settings panel.

Hopefully, these two suggestions will help the multitude of folks who are having problems with Exchange ActiveSync on the iPhone.  Drop me a line if I can be of more help!

© sfoskett for Stephen Foskett, Pack Rat, 2008. | A Few iPhone Exchange ActiveSync Gotchas
This post was categorized as Apple, Terabyte home. Each of my categories has its own feed if you'd like to filter out or focus on posts like this.