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Configuring SharePoint 2010 Document Libraries with Exchange Server 2010 to receive mails from internal/external world

This article will help you to configure SharePoint 2010/2007 server to receive Incoming emails. Following are high level step in order to configure this

  • Configure SMTP Server on SharePoint Server which will receive emails
  • Configure SharePoint to pick up the email from the SMTP server
  • Configure Document Library to receive email
  • Configure Exchange Server, create External Email ID
  • Configure Exchange Server, create "Transport Rule"
  • Configure Exchange Server, create "Send Connector"

This article will help you to configure SharePoint 2010/2007 server to receive Incoming emails. Following are high level step in order to configure this

  • Configure SMTP Server on SharePoint Server which will receive emails
  • Configure SharePoint to pick up the email from the SMTP server
  • Configure Document Library to receive email
  • Configure Exchange Server, create External Email ID
  • Configure Exchange Server, create "Transport Rule"
  • Configure Exchange Server, create "Send Connector"

 

Configure SMTP Server on SharePoint Server which will receive emails

Perform the following actions on SharePoint Server where you intend to use SMTP Service for Incoming email to be picked-up by SharePoint.

  1. Start Menu
  2. Search for “Windows Power”
  3. Right click “Windows PowerShell”
  4. Click on “Run as administrator”
  5. Click “Yes” if prompted by “User Account Control”
  6. On command prompt type command “Import-Module ServerManager”
  7. On command prompt type command “Add-WindowsFeature SMTP-Server”
  8. Close PowerShell
  9. Click on Start Menu
  10. Click on “Control Panel”
  11. Click on “System and Security”
  12. Click on “Administrative Tools”
  13. Click on “Internet Information Services (IIS) 6.0 Manager”
  14. Click “Yes” if prompted by “User Account Control”
  15. Expand and select the “[SMTP Virtual Server #1]”
  16. From toolbar click on “>” (Start)
  17. Expand and select the "Domains"
  18. On right hand pane make note of the "Domain Name" for "Local (Default)" e.g. "spdemo.contso.com". Here "spdemo" is machine name and "contso.com" is domain to which the machine is joined
  19. Close "IIS Manager Snap-in"
  20. Check to see if incoming SMTP traffic is allowed by firewall

    image

Configure SharePoint to pick up the email from the SMTP server

  1. Open SharePoint Central Administration website (make sure that you have administrators privilege on box where you are running both SMTP and Central Admin site. Start the Internet Explorer by right click and "Run as administrator", and then type URL to central admin site)
  2. Click on "Operations"
  3. Click on "Incoming e-mail settings" under "Topology and Services"
  4. Select "Yes" under "Enable sites on this server to receive e-mail?"
  5. Select "Advanced" under "Settings mode"
  6. Select "No" under "Use the SharePoint Directory Management Service to create distribution groups and contacts?"
  7. Type your machines FQDN if it is not same as you noted earlier under SMTP server e.g. "spdemo.contso.com"
  8. Type location of email drop folder under "E-mail drop folder:" by default it is "c:\inetpub\mailroot\drop"
  9. Click on "OK" to save settings
  10. Close Central Admin
  11. Open Windows Explorer
  12. Browse to the Drop folder "c:\inetpub\mailroot\drop"
  13. Right click on drop folder and "Properties" and then select "Security" tab
  14. Click on "Edit" and add the id which is used by Central Administration Site which is also know as Farm Account.
  15. Select Full Control for the Central Admin Id which you added
  16. Click on OK and close the box

Configure Document Library to receive email

  1. Browse to the Document library
  2. From Ribbon under "Library" tab click on "Library Settings"
  3. Click on "incoming e-mail settings" under "Communications"
  4. Set  parameters as depicted in image below
    • Select "Yes" for "Allow this document library to receive e-mail?"
    • Type the E-mail id you want under "E-mail address:" e.g. resume
    • Select "Accept e-mail messages from any sender" under "E-mail security policy:"
    • Click on "OK" to save settings

    image

Configure Exchange Server, create External Email ID

Perform the following actions on server which has Exchange Server 2010 Management Tools

  1. Open "Exchange Management Console" from the start menu
  2. Expand "Microsoft Exchange" > "Microsoft Exchange On-Premises" > "Recipient Configuration" > "Mailbox"
  3. Right click on "Mailbox" and click on "New Mailbox…"
  4. Select "User Mailbox" and click on "Next>"
  5. Select "New user" and click on "Next>"
  6. Type appropriate information (First name, Last Name, User logon name, Password and Confirm Password, click on "Next>"
  7. Type "Resume" under "Alias:" and click on "Next>"
  8. Click "Next>" on "Archive Settings" page
  9. Click "New" on "New Mailbox" page
  10. Click on "Finish"

Configure Exchange Server, create "Transport Rule"

Perform the following actions on server which has Exchange Server 2010 Management Tools

  1. Open "Exchange Management Console" from the start menu
  2. Expand "Microsoft Exchange" > "Microsoft Exchange On-Premises" > "Organization Configuration" > "Hub Transport"
  3. Select tab "Transport Rules"
  4. From "Actions" click on "New Transport Rule…"
  5. Type "Resume" under "Name" and useful comment under "Comment:" and click on "Next>"
  6. Under "Step 1: Select condition(s)" select "sent to people"
  7. Under "Step 2: Edit the rule description by clicking an underlined value:" click on "people"
  8. Click on "Add…" in "Specify recipients" popup window
  9. Type "resume" in search box and click on "Find Now"
  10. Select the email id which should be the same you have created in previous procedure and click on "OK" to close the "Select Recipient…" window
  11. Click on "OK" to close the "Specify recipients" window
  12. Click on "Next >"
  13. Under "Step 1: Select Actions:" select "redirect the message to addresses"
  14. Under "Step 2: Edit the rule description by clicking an underlined value:" click on "addresses"
  15. Click on small down arrow next on add… button and click on "External E-mail Address…"
  16. Type the email [email protected] and click on "OK" (This is the same E-mail which we assigned to document library"
  17. Click on "OK" to close the "Specify recipients" window
  18. Click on "Next >"
  19. Click on "Next >"
  20. Click on "New"
  21. Click on "Finish"

Configure Exchange Server, create "Send Connector"

Perform the following actions on server which has Exchange Server 2010 Management Tools

  1. Open "Exchange Management Console" from the start menu
  2. Expand "Microsoft Exchange" > "Microsoft Exchange On-Premises" > "Organization Configuration" > "Hub Transport"
  3. Select tab "Send Connectors"
  4. From "Actions" click on "New Send Connector…"
  5. Type "Forward to SPDEMO"  and click on "Next >"
  6. Click on "Add…"
  7. Type "spdemo.contso.com" under "Address:" and click on "OK"
  8. Click on "Next >"
  9. Select "Route mail through the following smart hosts:"
  10. Click on "Add…"
  11. Select "Fully qualified domain name (FQDN):"
  12. Type "spdemo.contso.com" and click on "OK"
  13. Click on "Next >"
  14. Click on "Next >" (No change on page "Configure smart host authentication settings")
  15. Click on "Next >" (No change on page "Source Server")
  16. Click on "New"
  17. Click on "Finish"

Send a test mail now from you Gmail account 🙂

Following is the how the mail flows from internet to document library

  1. You send email from your Gmail account to [email protected]  which relays the mail to your domain.
  2. Exchange server receives the e-mail from Gmail and then check if there any rules defined.
  3. Exchange determines that this email matches the transport rule which we created called "Resume", per the rule it forwards it to [email protected]
  4. Exchange server’s now has this email in its queue to be delivered, it check if there is any specific route which it needs to use to relay this email
  5. Exchange determines that it matches the send connector which we created "Forward to SPDEMO", per the rule it relays the e-mail to SMTP server defined in the connector
  6. SMTP server running on SharePoint server receives the email and is kept in Drop folder
  7. SharePoint’s timer job picks the email from drop folder as we configured in Central Administration
  8. SharePoint processes the email, extracts the email id which it is send to, after extracting the id it now tries to match it with lists which are configured to receive the e-mails.
  9. It has matched this email to document library which we configured, per the document library settings anyone can send e-mail so no security check is done, SharePoint extracts all possible attachments from the email and uploads them to the library.

Food for crawlers

  • How to configure Exchange Server and SharePoint
  • Integrating Exchange Server with SharePoint
  • How to configure SharePoint Document Libraries to receive emails from Internet using Exchange Server
  • Integrating SharePoint Server 2007 with Exchange Server 2007 to receive emails
  • Configuring MOSS 2007 to receive e-mails from internet
  • Configuring SMTP service and exchange server to receive email into SharePoint
  • Creating Send Connector and Transport Rule in exchange server 2010 and 2007 to relay internal emails received from internet

By Sameer Dhoot

Welcome to my blog. I am IT Professional with 10 years of experience across several IT disciplines. I am currently based in Farmington Hills, Michigan, USA. I hope that you find my blog of interest. It is mostly around Microsoft platform including SharePoint, SQL Server, TFS, Windows OS, Virtualization as this is what I am currently working on, but my aim is to write about all of the competencies described in my profile and write contents which I believe can be helpful to broader audience (IT Pros) and may include general computing advice, how-to's, FAQ, Tips and Tricks. I would welcome contributors and critics who would help to build this blog in terms of better contents and usability.

5 replies on “Configuring SharePoint 2010 Document Libraries with Exchange Server 2010 to receive mails from internal/external world”

Can i use Exchange Server 2003 with SharePoint Server 2007 to do similar stuff. Is there any way SharePoint could receive email directly from the internet without having to depend on exchange server 2003?

In Dev its pretty hard to get the network guys do this, can we setup using own personal email accounts to receive emails?

Hello

I want to get incoming emails from a third party email, and we don’t have the exchange server on our servers. Is it possible to achieve this?

That is make sharepoint to accept emails from gmail or any other third party email, without an exchange server?

Thanks

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