Is there any way to synchronize AD users with Office 365 but still be able to edit them online?
- by Massimo
I'm performing a migration to Office 365 from a third-party mail server (MDaemon); the local Active Directory doesn't include any Exchange server, and never had any.
We will need directory synchronization in order to enable users to log on to Office 365 using their domain credentials; but it seems that as soon as you enable directory synchronization, you can't perform any action anymore on Office 365 users: all changes need to be made on the local Active Directory, and then replicated by the synchronization process.
For ordinary users with a single e-mail address and standard features, this is not a big problem; but what about users which need an additional address? What if I need to configure some nonstandard setting, like "hide from address list" or a custom mailbox quota?
From what I've gathered, the only supported way to do this, as you can't directly edit Office 365 objects anymore after synchronization is enabled, is to extend the local AD schema with Exchange attributes, and then manually edit them (!). Or, you can install at least one local Exchange server, and then use the Exchange administrative tools to configure the required settings.
Is this correct or am I missing something?
Is there any way to synchronize user accounts and password, but still be able to edit user settings directly in Office 365?
If not (everything really needs to be set locally and then synchronized), is there any simpler way to do this than manually editing LDAP attributes or installing a local Exchange server?
