Enrollment and Deployment Process

Live@edu offers your institution a robust set of e-mail, calendar and collaboration services, all at no cost. To enroll with Live@edu, provide some basic information about your institution and domain to set up an administrator account.

Once you’ve enrolled, there are four phases to customize and launch the Live@edu services for your institution. Select the tabs below to walk through each of the phases and corresponding deployment steps. We also recommend you download the complete Live@edu deployment checklist.

Watch the Enrollment Overview Video
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Sign in to the Service Management Portal using the Live@edu Administrator ID and password you created at enrollment to complete the deployment process. If you have any questions, visit Live@edu Answers or find a partner.

Watch a video of General Manager Bobby Kishore as he welcomes you to your Live@edu deployment and shares Microsoft’s overall vision for the education sector.

FOUR STEPS TO LIVE@EDU DEPLOYMENT

Step One:

Verify Domain Ownership for your Institution

Step Two:

Plan and Prepare for your Live@edu Deployment

Step Three:

Test and Integrate your Live@edu Service

Step Four:

Launch Live@edu at your institution

Download the complete Live@edu deployment checklist

Verify Domain Ownership for your Institution

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Create or modify a DNS record
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Use the information provided in the box at the top of the Home page to create or modify a DNS record with your Domain Registrar. Select your Domain Registrar from the drop-down menu and click on the corresponding link, or see the DNS hosting services comparison chart for detailed instructions on creating a new record with your specific registrar.

IMPORTANT: Verification of domain ownership is required before you can have full access to the Service Management Portal to complete the deployment process.
Verify your new DNS record has been confirmed
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After you submit your request, it may take up to 72 hours for your DNS record to update. Sign in to the Service Management Portal to check your domain verification status.
Update your institution profile
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Your Administrator and Critical Notification Alias contact information will be used to notify you of any important service update information.

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Go to the Institution Profile page on the Service Management Portal, add the contact information for your Critical Notification Alias for your institution.

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Enter any missing data and verify all the information displayed is correct.
Establish your deployment team
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Gather the colleagues who will play a role in the technical and promotional launch of your Live@edu service. You can use the complete Live@edu deployment checklist and Campus Promotion Guide to help establish overall timelines, key milestones, and determine roles and responsibilities for team members.

Plan and Prepare for your Live@edu Deployment

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Choose a domain addressing option
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Select one of the following options:

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Separate Domain

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Shared Domain

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Custom Solution

To understand the requirements of the deployment process based on your selected addressing option, see the Deployment Guide.
Select a tool to create user accounts
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Go to the Users and Groups page on the Service Management Portal and, choose one of the following provisioning tools to create and manage users and distribution groups:

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Outlook Live Control Panel

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Windows PowerShell and Windows Remote Management

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Outlook Live Directory Sync

For help deciding which tool is right for your institution, review How to Provision Users.
Set up single sign-on (SSO)
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By default, your systems will prompt users to sign in with a Windows Live ID to access their Live@edu resources, and their institution ID to sign in to institution resources. However, there are several options you can select from to authenticate users, including single sign-on (SSO). SSO lets users sign on just once to access both your on-premises resources and Live@edu services. To find the best option for your institution, see the Authentication Scenarios article and learn more about the benefits of Implementing an SSO Solution.
Determine your shared addressing needs
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Decide how you want to configure your domain when sharing the same Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) e-mail address space with a different e-mail system:

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On-Premises Relay

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Outlook Live Relay

For more information on evaluating the options, see Shared Address Space.
Explore your co-branding options
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You can customize the look and functionality of your Live@edu service with an institution logo and links specific to your needs. Plus, adding co-branding to your Live@edu services turns off all advertising on those pages. To learn more about your options, see the Co-Branding Administrator’s Guide.
Prepare to spread the word
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Develop a plan to promote your Live@edu services to your students, educators, and staff. For a wide variety of useful templates, plus tips on creating a timeline and assigning responsibilities, visit Live@edu Promote on Campus page.

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Reach out to student leaders, educators, and campus media outlets to help promote and encourage usage of your new Live@edu services.

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Use the sample timeline to create a communication plan for promoting your new service at your institution.

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Use the Campus Promotion Guide to determine which of the provided materials you would like to customize for your institution.

Test and Integrate your Live@edu Service

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Create a test domain
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Go to the Domains page on the Service Management Portal and, click the Windows Live Admin Center link to add a test domain to your primary domain.

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When adding your test domain, make sure to select the Outlook Live mail option under Choose mail service for your domain.

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We suggest you use a name that clearly indicates that this is a test domain.

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When your test domain is verified, update the MX record for the test domain.

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On the Domains page, click Update an MX record.

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Use the information provided to update your MX record with your Domain Registrar.

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When your MX record has been confirmed, you can begin to create test accounts.

Note: Your test domain should be set up as a subdomain, also known as an accepted domain.
Create test accounts in your test domain
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Go to the Users and Groups page on the Service Management Portal and, click the Outlook Live Control Panel link.

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On the Outlook Live Control Panel, open the Mailboxes tab. Manually create at least three or four test accounts, or import test account data as a CSV file.

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To manually create accounts:

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Click the New link, enter the appropriate information for your test account, and then click Save.

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Repeat process for each test account.

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To import data to create accounts, click Import users and follow the instructions to upload a CSV file of test account data.
Apply co-branding
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Go to the Co-branding page on the Service Management Portal and, click the Windows Live Admin Center link to start customizing your Live@edu services.

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On the navigation menu in the Windows Live Admin Center:

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Click Outlook Live, follow the steps to add your co-branding elements, and then click Save.

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Click Header and Footer, select your customization options, and then click Save.

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Click Co-branding, and then click the Preview changes button.

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Click the preview link for each service.

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If you are satisfied with the results, click Publish to the Web.

For additional assistance and information on co-branding, refer to the Co-branding administrator’s guide.
Test mail flow
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Confirm that you can send and receive messages from each of your test accounts.

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Go to http://outlook.com.

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Click Sign In.

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Verify that all co-branding is displayed properly and that you can send and receive messages.
Set up and test single sign-on (SSO)
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Implement and test the authentication solution you selected in the step two. For help establishing your authentication settings, see the Authentication Scenarios article and learn more about Implementing a Single Sign-on Solution.
Create materials that help spread the word
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Finalize and distribute the materials you created as part of your plan to inform students and staff about their new Live@edu services.

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Develop and produce your communication materials using the templates available on the Live@edu Promote on Campus page.

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Send out a press release announcing your partnership with Live@edu.

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In conjunction with the launch of your Live@edu services, distribute the communications materials you have prepared.

For tips, information, and templates, visit Live@edu Promote on Campus page.

Launch Live@edu at your institution

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Ensure proper mail delivery
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Go to the Mail Delivery page of the Service Management Portal and use the following tools to make sure e-mail messages will be routed properly within your systems.

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Create an SPF (TXT) record. This validates the Outlook Live messaging servers as a legitimate source of mail for your domain.

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In the Create an SPF record section, locate your Live@edu account information.

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Provide this information to your domain registrar to create a TXT record.

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For additional information, read the SPF record help article.

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Enable content filtering by safe-listing mail servers. This allows messages from these servers to bypass connection and content filtering, and arrive at the appropriate mailboxes in your domain.

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In the Safe-list mail servers section, click Manage IP safe-lists.

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Enter the IP addresses of gateway servers and internal mail servers you wish to add to your safe-lists.

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Click Submit.

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Configure your shared address space. If needed, configure your domain to share the same Simple Mail Transfer Protocol (SMTP) e-mail address space with a different e-mail system. Based on your selection in the planning phase, follow the steps outlined in the articles below to:

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Configure a Shared Address Space with On-Premises Relay

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Configure a Shared Address Space with Outlook Live Relay

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Add additional accepted domains.

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Go to the Domains page on the Service Management Portal, click the Windows Live Admin Center link.

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Enter any domains that will need to send and receive SMTP e-mails to your accepted domains list.

To learn more, review the Accepted domains article.
Note: Accepted domains are also known as subdomains.
Create all user accounts
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Using the account creation tool selected during the planning phase, create all the user accounts and distribution groups your institution needs. For detailed guidance, see How to Provision Users article.
Update your MX record
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Go to the Domains page of the Service Management Portal, and then click Update an MX record.

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Use the information provided on the Web page to update your MX record with your Domain Registrar.
Publicize your new Live@edu service
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Distribute the communication materials you created to promote awareness of your new Live@edu services and help inform students and staff of how to access their Live@edu accounts. For additional templates and tips, visit Live@edu Promote on Campus page.

Additional Resources

Have questions about the deployment process? Visit Live@edu Answers.
Need help with an advanced deployment solution? Find a Microsoft partner in your area.
For technical solutions and tools created by your colleagues, visit the CodePlex open source project community.
For marketing tips, templates, toolkits, and more, visit Live@edu Promote on Campus.
For help co-branding your Live@edu services, follow the steps in the Co-Branding Administrator’s Guide.

Microsoft Live@edu Core Services Terms of Use (TOU)