Configure the External Postmaster Address

 

Applies to: Exchange Server 2010 SP3, Exchange Server 2010 SP2

You can configure and manage the external postmaster address. The external postmaster address is used as the sender for system-generated messages and notifications sent to message senders that exist outside the Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 organization. An external sender is any sender that has an e-mail address that contains a domain not defined in the list of accepted domains for the Exchange 2010 organization.

In Exchange 2010, configuration of the external postmaster address is controlled by the ExternalPostmasterAddress parameter in the Set-TransportConfig cmdlet. In Exchange Server 2007, you configure this parameter using the Set-TransportServer cmdlet on every computer running Exchange 2007 that has the Hub Transport server role or Edge Transport server role installed.

Important

Because management of the external postmaster address changed in Exchange 2010, you must configure the external postmaster address in two places if you have both Exchange 2010 and Exchange 2007 servers in your organization. You need to configure the external postmaster address once for the Exchange 2010 environment and once per server for the Exchange 2007 environment.

By default, the value of the ExternalPostmasterAddress parameter on every Hub Transport server and Edge Transport server is set to the value $null. The value $null causes the following behavior on Hub Transport servers and Edge Transport servers in the Exchange organization:

  • For all Hub Transport servers in the Exchange organization or an Edge Transport server that has been subscribed to the Exchange organization, the external postmaster address is postmaster@<Default accepted domain>.

  • For any Edge Transport server that hasn't been subscribed to the Exchange organization, the external postmaster address is postmaster@<Edge Transport server FQDN>.

    After the Edge Transport server is subscribed to the Exchange organization, the external postmaster address becomes postmaster@<Default accepted domain>.

Note

If you specify a custom value for the external postmaster address, that value isn't replicated to any Edge Transport servers subscribed to the Exchange organization. If you specify a custom value for the external postmaster address, you must manually configure the external postmaster address on any Edge Transport servers.

Looking for other management tasks related to transport servers? Check out Managing Transport Servers.

Use the EMC to modify the external postmaster address for your organization

You need to be assigned permissions before you can perform this procedure. To see what permissions you need, see the "Transport configuration" entry in the Transport Permissions topic.

  1. In the console tree, navigate to Organization Configuration > Hub Transport.

  2. In the result pane, select the Global Settings tab.

  3. Right-click Transport Settings, and then select Properties.

  4. On the General tab, type the e-mail address you want to use as the external postmaster address in the Specify the external postmaster address field.

  5. Click OK.

Use the Shell to modify the external postmaster address for your organization

You need to be assigned permissions before you can perform this procedure. To see what permissions you need, see the "Transport configuration" entry in the Transport Permissions topic.

This example designates postmaster@contoso.com as the external postmaster address.

Set-TransportConfig -ExternalPostmasterAddress postmaster@contoso.com

For detailed syntax and parameter information, see Set-TransportConfig.

Other Tasks

After you configure the external postmaster address, you may also want to:

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