Settings

Office Communications Server 2007 R2 has three levels of settings:

Global level settings, which apply to all computers in the forest. These settings are stored in Active Directory Domain Services (AD DS).
Pool-level settings, which apply to a pool on a Standard Edition server or to all servers in an Enterprise pool.
Computer-level settings (also referred to as machine-level settings), which are specific to each individual computer running Office Communications Server 2007 R2.

In general, these three levels of settings provide all the information required for restoration of most Office Communications Server 2007 R2 settings. The exception is Communicator Web Access restoration, which requires restoration of the virtual server configuration.

The following table describes which settings and configurations must be backed up for each server role.

Note:
Enterprise Voice settings are included in the global, pool, and computer-level settings. Enterprise Voice settings cannot be backed up and restored separately.

Table 1. Settings Requirements

Server role	Settings required
Standard Edition servers or Front End Servers in Enterprise pools	Global-level, pool level, and computer-level settings: Global-level , pool-level, and computer-level settings are backed up from the Standard Edition server or one Front End Server, so only computer-level settings are backed up from other Front End Servers. For restoration: In the event of loss of the Active Directory Domain Services, restoration of all three levels of settings is generally required. In the event of an Enterprise pool loss (all Front End Servers in an Enterprise pool or the back-end server) or the loss of a Standard Edition server, restoration of pool-level and computer-level settings is generally required. In the event of loss of an individual Front End Server, computer-level settings are generally the only settings that require restoration.
Mediation Servers Forwarding proxy servers Archiving Servers Monitoring Servers	Global-level and computer-level settings: Global settings are backed up from the Standard Edition server or Front End Server, so only computer-level settings are backed up from each Mediation Server, Archiving Server, Monitoring Server, and forward proxy server. In the event of loss of a Mediation Server, Archiving Server, Monitoring Server, or forward proxy server, computer-level settings are generally the only settings that require restoration.
Communicator Web Access	Virtual server configuration. In the event of loss of the 2007 R2 version of Microsoft Office Communicator Web Access, no other settings usually need to be restored.
Group Chat Servers	Computer-level settings: Computer-level settings are backed up from each Group Chat Server. In the event of loss of a Group Chat Server, computer-level settings are generally the only settings that require restoration.
Group Chat Compliance Server	Computer-level settings: Computer-level settings are backed up from each Group Chat Compliance Server. In the event of loss of a Group Chat Compliance Server, computer-level settings are generally the only settings that require restoration. The compliance adapter must have a different name than the one used by the previous Group Chat Compliance Server.
Edge Servers	Computer-level settings: Computer-level settings are backed up from each edge server. In the event of loss of an edge server, computer-level settings are generally the only settings that require restoration.

If your deployment has multiple servers for a role (such as multiple Mediation Servers), you need to back up computer-level settings from each additional server.

Note:
Backing up settings for a Front End Server also backs up settings for the Web Conferencing Server, A/V Conferencing Server, Web Components Server, Application Server, and Application Sharing, so they do not need to be backed up separately.

Important:
Backing up and restoring application settings is not covered in this documentation. You can use your own internal procedures and tools for backing up application settings, as well as using the Application Settings Export Tool in the Resource Kit to back up and restore some application settings. However, the Application Settings Export Tool does not support restoring application settings in a pool that does not have the same pool name as the backed-up pool.

Important:

Backing up and restoring application settings is not covered in this documentation. You can use your own internal procedures and tools for backing up application settings, as well as using the Application Settings Export Tool in the Resource Kit to back up and restore some application settings. However, the Application Settings Export Tool does not support restoring application settings in a pool that does not have the same pool name as the backed-up pool.

Note:
Backing up settings for Office Communications Server backs up certificate settings, so restoration using these settings requires the use of certificates that have the same certificate issuer.