Exchange 2010 "Get-mailboxdatabase" command fails

[Laalamani]

I have recently upgraded to Exchange 2010 and have configured some databases on it. Now talking about my problem, when I try to run the Get-mailboxdatabase command, it works for some databases but for the others it isn't. I get the message which says the term is not recognized as the name of a commandlet. Basically the name of the database has hyphen "-" in it, do you think that may create the problem with the command? How can I avoid it in such a situation?

[Trio]

I don't think the name of the database can create that problem. It appears to me problem of right or permissions. Do you have sufficient rights on your account for running the shell or command? You must be the part of the domain admin or may be just the member of organizational management group on Exchange. Also make sure you have all the services running. To define the necessary rights use the below command:

get-mailboxdatabase '<Exchange2010>\Storage Path\Mailbox Database' | add-adpermission -user <BESAdmin> -accessrights GenericRead, GenericWrite -extendedrights Send-As, Receive-As, ms-Exch-Store-Admin

[Ricky58]

That is not the correct way of using Get-MailboxDatabase command. As we all know the Get-MailboxDatabase cmdlet is used to retrieve one or more mailbox database objects from a server or organization, so here is the syntax with its parameters description.

Syntax

Get-MailboxDatabase [-Identity <DatabaseIdParameter>] [-DomainController <Fqdn>] [-DumpsterStatistics <SwitchParameter>] [-IncludePreExchange2010 <SwitchParameter>] [-Status <SwitchParameter>]

Get-MailboxDatabase -Server <ServerIdParameter> [-DomainController <Fqdn>] [-DumpsterStatistics <SwitchParameter>] [-IncludePreExchange2010 <SwitchParameter>] [-Status <SwitchParameter>]

Parameters

Server - The Server parameter specifies the name of the server from which to retrieve mailbox database information. If you specify this parameter, the command retrieves information about all of the mailbox databases on the server that you specify.
DomainController - The DomainController parameter specifies the fully qualified domain name (FQDN) of the domain controller that retrieves data from Active Directory.
DumpsterStatistics - The DumpsterStatistics parameter specifies that transport dumpster statistics be returned with the database status.
Identity - The Identity parameter specifies a mailbox database.
IncludePreExchange2010 - The IncludePreExchange2010 parameter specifies whether to return information about the mailbox databases that reside on computers running Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 and earlier versions of Exchange.
Status - The Status parameter specifies whether to get information about BackupInProgress, Mounted, OnlineMaintenanceInProgress or Available free space in the database root.

[GhostRider]

If you think the hyphen might be causing you the problem then why don't you try it out. Who knows what may help you. And moreover there is no harm in testing it. This is just a get command and so you will not be performing any kind of modification or addition which might affect your database. If you want to then try its variations like Get-MailboxDatabase 'database_name' or Get-MailboxDatabase "database_name", I mean using with single quote or double quote. I have seen some people having the habit of using the quotes if the database name includes some space or anything apart from alphanumeric characters. You should also try to implement it and see if that helps.

[Techno01]

It may be because the database was not ready to reply to your request. This may happen sometime when your database is in backup state. In the previous version of Microsoft Exchange this was not possible but with the introduction of Exchange 2010, you can determine this Microsoft has provided an appropriate command. To check this you can use the following commands:

To find the whitespace:

Get-MailboxDatabase -Status | Select -Object Server,Name,AvailableNewMailboxSpace

To find the backup state:

Get-MailboxDatabase -Status | Sort -Property LastFullBackup |ft Identity,LastFullBackup