Deploying signatures to shared mailboxes

"Roaming Signature Feature ID: 60371" later just called "roaming".

When DS-Client runs on a machine it will automatically detect the currently logged on user and make signatures for that person. Some users have got shared mailboxes mounted, e.g. support@yourcompany.com and sales@yourcompany.com.

For this situation you have 2 distinct options.

Personal signature use:

You could wish that the user make use of their personal signatures already on the PC.

Then "John" would be replying from "Sales" with his personal signature, containing his personal contact information.

Previously, in Outlook it was possible for anyone to set a personal signature on a shared mailbox mount. But after roaming was introduced, signatures became personal. This prevented using personal signatures on any auxiliary MBs

Therefore a new configuration option to remedy this was introduced in 6.8.5. Under Template Configuration -> General -> AvailableToAllMBXs.

Setting this value will make the DS-Client clone the generating signature to all mounted mailboxes. However it will not try to also make it mandatory. Users can on their own accord set a signature default.

Distinct common signature:

You could also wish for a signature specifically made for the mailbox, with only general contact information presented. With a common signature mail recepients will be reaching out to the department rather than any particular staff member.

For this functionality you can use the calling command override "/U:sharedMb_ntSamAccountName"

In the vbs-helper-script that is typically used to call the client you will normally see:

Set objShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")

objShell.Run "\\comz.local\NETLOGON\DynamicSignature\DSClient\DynamicSignature.exe /I:Acorn.ini" ,,True

To make DS-Client ignore the username of logged on user, and instead make a signature with another set of data you can write:

Set objShell = CreateObject("WScript.Shell")

objShell.Run "\\comz.local\NETLOGON\DynamicSignature\DSClient\DynamicSignature.exe /U:sales /I:Acorn.ini" ,,True

This you would put in a new script that you make manually, as the generated ones will be overwritten when changes are published. You may be using PowerShell or Kix32 or a host of other options for distributing. Just note that the essential call is:

\\comz.local\NETLOGON\DynamicSignature\DSClient\DynamicSignature.exe /U:sales /I:Acorn.ini

Automatic Mount Detection:

As of 6.8.5 the DS-Client will now automatically detect if the local Outlook installation is set up to use the mailbox that is indicated using the override. If no such mailbox is configured, it will skip the generation. This filtering feature makes it possible to apply a shared mailbox on a top-level of your user base, and then let DS-Client decide if the signature is actually needed on each machine. This alleviates the necessity for trying to figure out who really needs it using security groups or other means, that would otherwise put a burden on the administration.

Note however that it only works on Outlook versions that has got personalised signatures that arrived in Outlook with roaming in 2023.

If roaming is not present, the /U override will be ignored.

Also note, /U override and the template configuration "AvailableToAllMBXs" are mutually exclusive. You can make "Johns" signature available to a shared mailbox, but you cannot make a shared signature available to "Johns" personal mailbox.

Thus "AvailableToAllMBXs" has no effect if /U is in the calling command.