Setting Default Language & Time Zone In Exchange 2010 SP1

The title gives the feeling that it is a simple job to centrally configure everyone’s mailbox with a language and time zone, so that when users login to OWA, they don’t see the screen asking them to set it manually. The job is simple enough if you know the right way of configuring it.

I had blogged in the past on setting the same for OWA 2007 users here. This applies to Exchange 2010 RTM as well. But, things are different in 2010 SP1. The funny thing is that the same command Set-OWAVirtualDirectory with the defaultclientlanguage parameter works in 2010 SP1. You don’t get any errors while running it in the shell, but when you login to OWA 2010 as a user and select options (ECP), you are presented with a page to choose the language and time zone.

If that wasn’t enough, you get an HTTP 400 error page once you try to set it manually.

So, the right way to set the same option in 2010 SP1 is to stamp it on a per mailbox basis. You can no longer set it on the OWA virtual directory & make OWA and ECP work.

The cmdlet we need is Set-MailboxRegionalConfiguration. In order to stamp one mailbox, run

Set-MailboxRegionalConfiguration –identity “rajith” –Language en-GB –DateFormat “dd/MM/yyyy” –TimeFormat “HH:mm” –TimeZone “GMT Standard Time”

Replace the language & time zone with the one you need. If you want to set it on all mailboxes, run

Get-Mailbox –ResultSize unlimited | Set-MailboxRegionalConfiguration –Language en-GB –DateFormat “dd/MM/yyyy” –TimeFormat “HH:mm” –TimeZone “GMT Standard Time”

If you are in co-existence with (say 2003) and want to stamp it for all 2010 mailboxes, run

Get-Mailbox –ResultSize unlimited | ? {$_.RecipientTypeDetails –eq “usermailbox”} | Set-MailboxRegionalConfiguration –Language en-GB –DateFormat “dd/MM/yyyy” –TimeFormat “HH:mm” –TimeZone “GMT Standard Time”

If you want to reset the options selected by the user, run

Set-Mailbox –identity “user” –Languages $null.

This has been tested on Exchange 2010 SP1 UR5. Not sure whether the Set-OWAVirtualDirectory issue is fixed in SP2+. Please comment if it is working for you.