New Exchange Server 2013 Architecture
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Exchange 2013 introduces a new server role architecture with two main building blocks - the Database Availability Group (DAG) and the Client Access server role. The DAG allows for multiple Mailbox servers to host copies of mailbox databases and provide failover capabilities. The Client Access role is a load balanced front end that routes clients to the appropriate Mailbox server based on the active database copy. This new architecture aims to simplify deployment and administration while improving hardware efficiency and cross-version interoperability compared to previous versions of Exchange.
New Exchange Server 2013 Architecture
- 1. Exchange Server 2013 Architecture Ross Smith IV Principal Program Manager, Exchange Server
- 2. Disclaimer © 2012 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved. Microsoft, Office 365, and other product and service names are or may be registered trademarks and/or trademarks in the U.S. and/or other countries. The information herein is for informational purposes only and represents the current view of Microsoft Corporation as of the date of this presentation. Because Microsoft must respond to changing market conditions, it should not be interpreted to be a commitment on the part of Microsoft, and Microsoft cannot guarantee the accuracy of any information provided after the date of this presentation. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS, IMPLIED OR STATUTORY, AS TO THE INFORMATION IN THIS PRESENTATION.
- 3. Agenda Agenda Discuss the new server architecture in Exchange 2013 Discuss the Client Access server role Discuss the Mailbox server role
- 4. E2007/E2010 Server Role Architecture Enterprise Network 5 major roles Tightly coupled • Functionality • Geo affinity Forefront Online Protection for Exchange External SMTP servers Edge Transport Routing and AV/AS Hub Transport Routing & policy Mailbox Storage of mailbox items • Versioning • User partitioning Mobile phone Layer 7 LB Web browser Outlook (remote user) Phone system (PBX or VOIP) Outlook (local user) Unified Messaging Voice mail and voice access Client Access Client connectivity Web services Line of business application AD
- 5. What’s wrong with the existing model? • • Exchange deployments are overly complicated Doing Exchange load balancing “right” is hard and often requires expensive solutions – Requiring session affinity at the load balancer significantly impacts scalability – Many hardware load balancing solutions are expensive and thus, are a luxury many of our customers can’t afford or don’t have the expertise to deploy • Customers deploy based on dedicated server roles – This means that in many cases, hardware is deployed that is unutilized (e.g., DIMM slots and disk slots, etc.) or under-utilized • Too many namespaces are required (especially in site resilient designs)
- 6. Exchange: The Evolution LB L7 LB CAS Ex MBX Ex HT Ex SAN MBX Ex
- 7. Exchange: The Evolution 2000/2003 2007 2010 2013 Role differentiation through manual configuration Separate roles for ease of deployment and mgmt. segmentation Separate HA solutions for each role Simplify for scale, balanced utilization, isolation Introduced the DAG Integrate HA for all roles Rich management experience using RBAC Simplify network architecture Hardware solutions for “reliability” ($$$$) Support cheaper storage Leaves resources on the ground in each role Ex Ex SAN Ex Ex CAS HT MBX MBX L7 LB LB
- 8. The new server role architecture
- 9. Exchange 2013 Architecture Theme Use Building Blocks to facilitate deployments at all scales – from self-hosted small organizations to Office 365 – Server role evolution – Network layer improvements – Versioning and inter-op principles Benefits – – – – Hardware efficiency Deployment simplicity Low friction cross-version inter-op Failure isolation
- 10. Exchange 2013 Server Role Architecture 2 Building Blocks Database Availability Group • Evolution of E2010 DAG • Includes core server protocols Loosely coupled • Functionality • Versioning • User partitioning • Geo affinity Forefront Online Protection for Exchange External SMTP servers CAS Array CAS CAS MBX CAS MBX MBX CAS MBX Mobile phone Web browser Outlook (remote user) AD MBX CAS Edge Transport Routing and AV/AS DAG Layer 4LB Client Access Array • Evolution of E2010 CAS Array • SMTP Front-End Enterprise Network Outlook (local user) Line of business Phone system application (PBX or VOIP)
- 11. Every Server is an Island EWS protocol MRS proxy protocol SMTP Protocols, Server Agents MRS MRSProxy EWS Transport Custom WS MRS MRSProxy Transport Storage Assistants Assistants RPC CA XSO Mail Item XSO Mail Item CTS Business Logic RPC CA Other API CTS Other API Store Content index Store Content index ESE File system ESE File system Server1 (Vn) Banned E2010 Server2 (Vn+1) EWS
- 12. Functional Layering E2010 Architecture L7LB Load Balancer AuthN, Proxy, Re-direct CAS, HT, UM AuthN, Proxy, Re-direct Protocols, API, Biz-logic Assistants, Store, CI Store, CI MBX2013 Protocols, API, Biz-logic MBX CAS2013 Hardware LB E2013 Architecture
- 13. The key to enlightenment… User For a given mailbox’s connectivity, the protocol being used is always served by the protocol instance that is local to the active database copy CAS This means that the rendering for clients like OWA occurs on the Mailbox server This means that Transport transcoding is occurring on the Mailbox server etc… DAG1 MBX-A MBX-B
- 15. What is the CAS2013 role? • CAS2013 is comprised of three components: • Thin, stateless (protocol session) servers organized in a load balanced configuration – Client protocols (HTTP, IMAP, POP) – SMTP – UM Call Router – Session affinity NOT required at the load balancer • • Provides a unified namespace and authentication for clients Where the logic “lives” to route a specific protocol request to the “correct” destination end point – Capable of supporting legacy servers with redirect or proxy logic • Is a domain-joined machine in the corporate forest
- 16. CAS2013 Client Protocol Architecture OWA Outlook EAS EAC PowerShell IMAP SMTP Telephony Load Balancer Redirect IIS CAS2013 POP IMAP HTTP Proxy POP IMAP HTTP UM SMTP POP IMAP IIS MBX2013 SMTP Transport UM RpcProxy RPS OWA, EAS, EWS, ECP, OAB RPC CA MDB MailQ SIP + RTP
- 17. Outlook Connectivity RPC/HTTP and the death of RPC/TCP RPCProxy.dll • What are the benefits? – Does not require a “RPC CAS array namespace” for the DAG – No longer have to worry about “The Exchange administrator has made a change that requires you to quit and restart Outlook” during mailbox moves or *over events – Extremely reliable and stable connectivity model – the RPC session is always on the MBX2013 server hosting the active database copy • What changes? – RPC end point for Outlook client is now a GUID (and SMTP suffix) – Support for internal and external Outlook Anywhere namespaces
- 18. Third-Party MAPI Products • Third-party MAPI products will need to use RPC/HTTP to connect to CAS2013 • Exchange 2013 will be the last release that supports a MAPI/CDO download – Third-parties must move to EWS in the future • The MAPI/CDO download will be updated to include support for RPC/HTTP connectivity – Will require third-party application configuration; either by programmatically editing a dynamic MAPI profile or setting registry keys – Legacy environments can continue to use RPC/TCP
- 19. CAS2013 Client Protocol Connectivity Flow HTTP HTTP Load Balancer HTTP Proxy HTTP MBX CAS IIS HTTP Proxy HTTP MBX Site Boundary IIS Site Boundary CAS Load Balancer HTTP MBX Protocol Head Protocol Head Protocol Head DB DB DB Local Proxy Request OWA Cross-Site Redirect Request Cross-Site Proxy Request
- 20. Trade-Offs Who’s it for? Exchange Load Balancing Options Generalist IT admin Those with increased network flexibility Those who want to maximize server availability Functionality Simplicity + Simple, fast, no affinity LB + Single, unified namespace + Minimal networking skillset + Per protocol availability + Single, unified namespace - One namespace per protocol - Per Server Availability + Simple, fast, no affinity LB + Per protocol availability - SSL termination @ LB - Requires increase networking skillset
- 21. A Single Common Namespace Example Geographical DNS Solution Sue (somewhere in NA) mail.contoso.com DNS Resolution Round-Robin between # of VIPs VIP #1 DAG Sue DNS Resolution via Geo-DNS Round-Robin between # of VIPs VIP #2 VIP #3 DAG (traveling in APAC) VIP #4
- 22. CAS2013 Client Protocol Benefits • Simplifies the network layer • Deployment flexibility • Simplifies upgrade and inter-op – No longer requires session affinity at the load balancer – Just get the traffic to CAS2013 and let it handle the affinity – CAS2013 can be “farther away” from MBX2013 and still offer good client performance (because it is a 1:1 proxy) – Removes the need for RPC Client Access arrays – CAS2013 provides more deployment flexibility; for example, consolidate to fewer sites – Can deploy a single world-wide namespace – Designed to proxy to multiple Mailbox server versions, up and down level – DAGs can be replaced with E2013 at any desired pace
- 23. The Mailbox Server Role
- 24. The Mailbox Server Role • • • A server that hosts all the components that process, render and store the data Clients do not connect directly to MBX2013 servers; connectivity is through CAS2013 Evolution of E2010 DAG – Collection of servers that form a HA unit – Databases are replicated between servers in a given DAG – Servers can be in different locations, for site resiliency – Maximum of 16 Mailbox servers – 50 database copies / server MBX1 MBX2 MBX16
- 25. The New Store Process • Store is effectively made up of three processes – Replication service – Store service process/controller – Store worker process • Replication service initiates failovers and is responsible for issuing mount/dismount operations • Store service process/controller manages the store worker processes • Each database has its own Store worker process
- 26. Exchange IOPS Trend DB IOPS/Mailbox 1 +99% 0.8 0.6 reduction! 0.4 0.2 0 Exchange 2003 Exchange 2007 Exchange 2010 Exchange 2013
- 27. Large Mailboxes for the win! Large Mailbox Size 100GB+ – Aggregate Mailbox = Primary Mailbox + Archive Mailbox + Recoverable Items – 1-2 years of mail (minimum) Increased knowledge worker productivity Eliminate or reduce PST reliance Eliminate or reduce third-party archive solutions Outlook 2013 allows you to control OST size! – Gives more options around mailbox deployments 1 Day 150 11 MB 1 Month 3300 242 MB 1 Year 39000 2.8 GB 2 Years 78000 5.6 GB 4 Years 156000 11.2 GB
- 28. New Exchange Search Infrastructure • Leverages Search Foundation – Common, actively developed search platform used across Office server products – Does consume more memory (1/6 available memory) to improve query performance • Provides – Significantly improved query performance compared to E2010 – Significantly improved indexing performance compared to E2010 • Feature parity with E2010 search • Leverages the same cmdlets like Get-MailboxDatabaseCopyStatus
- 29. Exchange Indexing Reduced Processing of Body and Attachments MBX2013 MBX2013 Transport Transport Content Transformation Service Mailbox Store Log DB Mailbox Local Delivery ExSearch Reliable Event CTS Index Node Read Content Passive Log Idx DB Idx
- 30. Public Folders Dawn of a New Age Architectural bet Public folders are based on the mailbox architecture Details Private logon Public Logon Public logon CAS 2013 Hierarchy Mailbox MBX2013 Content Mailbox MBX2013 MBX2013 • Hierarchy is stored in PF mailboxes (one writeable) • Content can be broken up and placed in multiple mailboxes • The hierarchy folder points to the target content mailbox • Uses same HA mechanism as mailboxes • No separate replication mechanism • Single-master model • Similar administrative features to current PFs (setting quota, expiry, etc.) • No end-user changes (looks just like today’s PFs) Not all public folder usage scenarios are best served by public folders
- 32. Transport Components on Client Access Front-End Transport Service • Handles all inbound and outbound external SMTP traffic for the organization, as well as client endpoint for SMTP traffic – Does not replace the Edge Transport Server Role • Functions as a layer 7 proxy and has full access to protocol conversation • Will not queue mail locally and will be completely stateless • All outbound traffic appears to come from the CAS2013 • Listens on TCP25 and TCP587 (two receive connectors)
- 33. Processing Inbound Messages Externa l Server CAS MBX 1. New SMTP Connection 2. CAS performs envelope filtering 3. CAS determines route to best MBX server 4. Message delivery begins 1. If successful, CAS returns 250 OK acknowledgement to external server 2. If unsuccessful, CAS returns 421 response
- 34. Benefits of SMTP Front-End Service • The SMTP Front-End Service provides: – Protocol level filtering – performs connection, recipient, sender and protocol filtering – Network protection – centralized, load balanced egress/ingress point for the organization – Mailbox locator – avoids unnecessary hops by determining the best MBX2013 to deliver the message – Load balanced solution for client/application SMTP submissions • Scales based on number of connections – just add more servers
- 35. Transport Components on Mailbox • Transport in MBX2013 has been broken down into three components – Transport Service - Stateful and handles SMTP mail flow for the organization and performs content inspection (Was previously referred to as “Hub Transport”) – Mailbox Transport Delivery Service - Receives mail from the Transport service and deliveries to the Mailbox Database – Mailbox Transport Submission Service - Takes mail from the Mailbox Databases and submits to the Transport service • • Mailbox Transport is stateless and does not have a persistent storage mechanism Mailbox Transport performs content conversion
- 36. Transport Components on Mailbox Responsibilities • Receives all inbound mail to the organization (Proxied through CAS or direct) • Submits all outbound mail from the organization (Proxied through CAS or direct) • Handles all internal message processing such as Transport Rules, Content Filtering, and Anti-Virus • Performs mail flow routing • Queue messages • Supports SMTP extensibility
- 37. Routing Optimizations • Next hop selection is broken down into distinct delivery groups: – – – – – • • • Routable DAG Mailbox Delivery Group Connector Source Servers AD Site (Hub Sites; Edge Subscriptions) Server list (DG expansion servers) Queuing is per delivery group, connector, or mailbox Once message is received at final destination, Transport will deliver the message via SMTP to Mailbox Transport on the server hosting the active database copy Send/Delivery-Agent Connectors can have source servers from multiple DAGs or AD Sites, and can be proxied through CAS
- 40. Service Availability Improvements • Best copy selection now includes health of services when selecting best copy • Failover time reductions • Lagged copy enhancements • Simpler site resilience strategy • Managed Availability
- 41. Managed Availability • • • Monitoring and recovery infrastructure is integrated with Exchange’s high availability solution Detects and recovers from problems as they occur and are discovered Is user focused – if you can’t measure it, you cannot monitor it
- 42. Managed Availability Managed Availability + Retries…“stuff breaks and the Experience does not” LB CAS-1 DAG MBX-1 OWA DB1 DB2 DB1 DB2 DB1 DB2 MBX-2 CAS-2 OWA MBX-3 OWA —OWA send —OWA failure —OWA failure detected —OWA restart service —OWA restart complete —OWA verified as healthy —OWA send —OWA failure —OWA failure detected —OWA restart service —OWA restart service failed —Failover server’s databases —OWA service restarts —OWA verified as healthy —Server becomes “good” failover target (again)
- 43. Transport High Availability Improvements • Every message is redundantly persisted before its receipt is acknowledged to the sender • Delivered messages are kept redundant in transport similar to active messages • Every DAG represents a transport HA boundary and owns its HA implementation – If you have a stretched DAG, you also have transport site resilience • Resubmits due to transport DB loss or MDB *over are fully automatic and do not require any manual involvement
- 44. Transport HA CAS2013 or MBX2013 SMTP 250 OK R1, R2, R3 250 OK Transport Transport 1. Maintain a copy of the message in the queue database but don’t acknowledge the DATA verb 2. Generate a shadow copy on another MBX2013 server in the DAG (remote site preferred) 3. Wait for acknowledgement from the shadow server 4. Send acknowledgement to SMTP client 5. Delete message from queue after SafetyNet threshold has expired Transport Transport R1 R1,R3 R3 R2, R2 Mail.que Mail.que MBX Transport Mail.que MBX Transport Mail.que MBX Transport MBX Transport 250 OK Store DB 2 Log MBX1 Transport R3 DB 1 Log DB 2 Mail.que MBX Transport MBX5 DB 1 Log DB 2 Log DB 4 MBX6 MBX3 Store DB 1 Log DB 2 MBX Transport Store Log DB 4 MBX4 Mail.que MBX Transport DB 3 Log Transport Mail.que Store DB 3 Log Transport MBX Transport Store DB 4 250 OK Transport Mail.que DB 3 MBX2 Store Site Boundary DB 1 Store MBX7 Store DB 3 Log DB 4 MBX8
- 45. – – – – – Facilitates deployments at all scales – from self-hosted small organizations to Office 365 Provides more flexibility in namespace management All core Exchange functionality for a given mailbox is served by the MBX2013 server where that mailbox’s database is currently activated Simplifies the network layer Transport protection is built-in – – All components in a given server upgraded together No need to juggle with CAS <-> MBX versions separately – – – Utilize CPU core increase, cheaper RAM Utilize capacity effectively Fewer disks/server => simpler server SKUs
- 46. Thank you!