Provision Hosted Services
Provision Hosted Services
You can use Microsoft Provisioning System (MPS) to automate provisioning tasks for hosted services such as Hosted Exchange and Microsoft Windows SharePoint Services hosting services. In general, this will involve the use of MPS components such as managed namespaces, named procedures, providers, XML provisioning requests, and the Provisioning Engine.
Note
You must install and configure the hosted services you are offering in your environment before you install and configure MPS components.
Managed namespaces are the components that contain the common procedures you will use to provision hosted services. MPS includes numerous managed namespaces that are explicitly designed by Microsoft to provide common sets of related provisioning actions that apply to specific hosted services, including enhancements of the low-level provider with which each one is associated. These enhancements group related procedures in to a single named procedure.
Managed namespaces are the components that contain the common procedures you will use to provision hosted services. MPS includes numerous managed namespaces that are explicitly designed by Microsoft to provide common sets of related provisioning actions that apply to specific hosted services, including enhancements of the low-level provider with which each one is associated. These enhancements group related procedures in to a single named procedure.
For example, the CreateCustomerSite procedure of the Managed SharePoint 2007 Namespace contains logic that integrates low-level Active Directory Provider namespace methods with those in the SharePoint 2007 Provider in to a single named procedure to accomplish the following provisioning actions:
- Create a site for a specified customer.
- Create the site quota.
- Create a pointer to the site in the customer's organizational unit (OU).
For example, the Managed Customer Directory Integration Namespace enables you to assign the CDI plan to a customer organization, CDI-enable users in that organization, and modify or delete the CDI service for specific users.
Action Steps for Provisioning Hosted Services
To quickly accomplish a wide variety of provisioning actions that apply to your hosted services, use the named procedures of the MPS managed namespaces. The remainder of this section summarizes steps to implement the provisioning of hosted services using MPS managed namespaces.
Prepare the Environment |
To prepare the hosted services environment for provisioning, you need to review the following:
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Assess Provisioning Methods for Hosted Services |
Understanding the methods available to you in MPS is the key to taking advantage of MPS in performing routine provisioning tasks. Review the functions of the managed namespaces that apply to the hosted services you want to provision. The following table shows which managed namespaces, providers, and APIs apply to each of the hosted services. The following table provides a cross reference that shows which managed namespaces, providers, and APIs apply to each of the hosted services. See Microsoft Provisioning System SDK to review the topics that correspond to the managed namespaces and providers for a specific hosted service listed in the following table. Table: Hosted Services, Managed Namespaces, and Providers Cross Reference
Hosted Service Managed Namespaces Providers
CDI Managed Customer Directory Integration Namespace
Hosted Customer Directory Integration NamespaceActive Directory Provider
Hosted E-MailManaged Email 2007 Namespace
Managed Mobility 2007 Namespace Managed Unified Messaging Namespace Hosted Email 2007 Namespace Hosted Mobility 2007 NamespaceExchange 2007 Provider Exchange 2007 Mobility Provider Unified Messaging Provider
Windows SharePoint Services 3.0 Managed SharePoint 2007 Namespace
SharePoint 2007 Provider
DNS Not available DNS Provider
Active Directory Managed Active Directory Namespace
Hosted Active Directory Namespace Active Directory Provider Note In most cases, you will simply rely on the preconfigured methods provided by the managed namespaces. However, if you do not find the functionality you require, you should look at the provider API documentation available in Microsoft Provisioning System SDK. For an overview of the solution providers and managed namespaces, see:
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Create Provisioning Requests |
After using the MPS Deployment Tool to install the appropriate managed namespaces containing the named procedures you want to utilize to provision your hosted services, you will need to create an XML request that you can submit to the Provisioning Engine. In the request, you will specify the namespace and the procedure you are calling, in addition to the properties or other data required for the particular method you are invoking. See Develop Custom XML Provisioning Requests to learn how to create provisioning requests. |
Secure Provisioning Requests |
If you are creating your own custom provisioning requests, you should strongly consider how you would provide secure execution of the request. For example, you can configure who can call a procedure and who can execute a procedure. This type of security primarily applies to delegating provisioning tasks to other users, such as customers, although you can also apply it to administrative personnel in the service provider environment. See Microsoft Provisioning System Security to learn how to provide secure provisioning requests. |
Submit XML Provisioning Requests |
After you have created and secured an XML provisioning request and you are ready to submit it to the Provisioning Engine, you can use one of the methods described in Execute XML Provisioning Requests to do so. If you are not creating your own provisioning requests, you can take advantage of preconfigured requests and other methods exposed in the ASP.NET Web Service, from where you can submit a request. |
Use ASP.NET Web Service Methods |
The Microsoft Provisioning System SDK exposes public methods from a variety of MPS namespaces that you can use to provision your hosted services. You should review the functionality of the namespace methods and preconfigured requests exposed in the Web Service so you can decide whether the Web Service is sufficient to provision your hosted services. For more information see:
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