Create External Contacts with CSV and PowerShell

To create External Contacts in Office 365/Exchange Online I’ve created a script which uses a CSV file for input. The file must be saved as “Unicode, Semicolon separated” (;) and must contain the following fields:

Name	Description
ExternalEmailAddress	Email Address for the contact (this filed cannot contain spaces!)
Name	Full / Display Name
FirstName	First name
LastName	Last name
StreetAddress	Street Address
City	City
StateorProvince	State or Province
PostalCode	ZIP or Postal Code
Phone	Office Phone
MobilePhone	Mobile Phone
Pager	Fax
HomePhone	Address
Company	City
Title	State or Province
Department	ZIP or Postal Code
CountryOrRegion	Country or Region
Fax	Fax
Initials	Initials
Notes	Notes
Office	Office
Manager	Manager
Hidden	Hide or show the contact in the Global Address List with this field.It can contain only two values: TRUE or FALSE. When using TRUE the contact is hidden. If this field is left blank, the contact is made visible (=TRUE).

Script

Here’s the code for the script:

#### Create Function Logon to Office365 - Exchange Online
function Logon {
    #### Pop-up a dialog for username and request your password
    $cred = Get-Credential
    #### Import the Local Microsoft Online PowerShell Module Cmdlets and Connect to O365 Online
    Import-Module MSOnline
    Connect-MsolService -Credential $cred
    #### Establish an Remote PowerShell Session to Exchange Online
    $msoExchangeURL = “https://ps.outlook.com/powershell/”
    $session = New-PSSession -ConfigurationName Microsoft.Exchange -ConnectionUri $msoExchangeURL -Credential $cred -Authentication Basic -AllowRedirection
    Import-PSSession $session
                }

#### Create Function Logoff Office365 & Exchange Online
function Logoff {
    #### Remove the Remote PowerShell Session to Exchange Online ----
    Get-PsSession | Remove-PsSession
    #Remove-PsSession $session
                }

############################################################################################################################
############################################################################################################################

#### Logon to Office 365 & Exchange Online
Logon

#### Ask the user for input CSV File
[void] [System.Reflection.Assembly]::LoadWithPartialName("System.Windows.Forms")
$ofd = New-Object System.Windows.Forms.OpenFileDialog
#$ofd.InitialDirectory = "d:\scripts"
$ofd.ShowHelp=$true
if($ofd.ShowDialog() -eq "OK") { $ofd.FileName }
$File = $ofd.Filename

#### Create Log File + Start Logging
if ($File -ne $Null) {
$Log = $File + ".log"
$ErrorActionPreference="SilentlyContinue"
Stop-Transcript | out-null
$ErrorActionPreference = "Continue"
Start-Transcript -path $Log -append
   }

#### Import CSV
Import-csv -Delimiter ";" $File | ForEach {

#### Create Contacts
New-MailContact -Name $_.Name -DisplayName $_.Name -ExternalEmailAddress $_.ExternalEmailAddress -FirstName $_.FirstName -LastName $_.LastName

#### Add Extra Information depending on Manager Field
if (!$_.Manager) {
    Set-Contact -Identity $_.Name -StreetAddress $_.StreetAddress -City $_.City -StateOrProvince $_.StateOrProvince -PostalCode $_.PostalCode -Phone $_.Phone -MobilePhone $_.MobilePhone -Pager $_.Pager -HomePhone $_.HomePhone -Company $_.Company -CountryOrRegion $_.CountryOrRegion -Title $_.Title -Department $_.Department -Fax $_.Fax -Initials $_.Initials -Notes $_.Notes -Office $_.Office
    }
if ($_.Manager) {
    Set-Contact -Identity $_.Name -StreetAddress $_.StreetAddress -City $_.City -StateOrProvince $_.StateOrProvince -PostalCode $_.PostalCode -Phone $_.Phone -MobilePhone $_.MobilePhone -Pager $_.Pager -HomePhone $_.HomePhone -Company $_.Company -CountryOrRegion $_.CountryOrRegion -Title $_.Title -Department $_.Department -Fax $_.Fax -Initials $_.Initials -Notes $_.Notes -Office $_.Office -Manager $_.Manager
    }

#### Hide or show the DistributionGroup in the Global Address List
if ($_.Hidden) {
[boolean] $StoreBool = [System.Convert]::ToBoolean($_.Hidden)
Set-MailContact $_.Name -HiddenFromAddressListsEnabled $StoreBool
    }

}

#### Stop Logging
Stop-Transcript

#### Logoff
Logoff

Copy and paste the code in notepad (for example) and save it as “CreateExternalContacts.ps1”. Go through the following steps to use the script.

Steps

• Make sure you have the following tools installed before running the script:
  Microsoft Online Services Sign-In Assistant (IDCRL7) – 32 bit version
  Microsoft Online Services Sign-In Assistant (IDCRL7) – 64 bit version
  Microsoft Online Services Module for Windows PowerShell (32-bit version)
  Microsoft Online Services Module for Windows PowerShell (64-bit version)
  See: http://onlinehelp.microsoft.com/Office365-enterprises/ff652560.aspx
• Run the “CreateExternalContacts.ps1” script from this window.
• You will be asked to logon to Office 365. Use you an Administrator account for this login.
• Next you will be asked for the CSV file. Browse to the appropriate file and click OK.
• A log file will be created with the CSV file name and is given the extension.log.

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This is part 5 of a series of posts about some PowerShell scripts I created or used and modified for some Office 365/Exchange Online migrations.

In the final part (6) of this series I will share a script which can be used to assign a license to users based on group membership.

An overview of the series can be found here.

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