MS Exchange Blog

Exchange Server Forums

There are many blogs, tutorials, and information sites available for Microsoft Exchange information. Where do you go if you have a non-urgent question regarding Exchange configuration, features, third-party applications or general Exchange and Outlook messaging?

What peer resources are available for Microsoft Exchange assistance? There are still a few e-mail listservers out there covering Microsoft Exchange.

Sunbelt Exchange List

http://lyris.sunbelt-software.com/read/?forum=exchangelist&sb=1

Or you can subscribe directly with your default e-mail client.

mailto:[email protected]?body=Subscribe exchangelist

YahooGroups Lists

There are several groups hosted at Yahoo! dedicated to Exchange Server as well. You can access these groups directly through the Yahoo! web interface or you can subscribe via e-mail. Send an e-mail to <groupname>[email protected], such as [email protected]. Using the website:

Exchange 2003 http://groups.yahoo.com/group/exchange -2003

Exchange 2007 http://groups.yahoo.com/group/exchange2007

Exchange 2010 http://groups.yahoo.com/group/exchange2010

There are also web forums where you can ask questions. Microsoft hosts TechNet forums and other sites have added their own communities for discussions as well.

Microsoft TechNet

All of Exchange Server

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/exchangeserver

Exchange Server 2010

http://social.technet.microsoft.com/Forums/en-US/category/exchange2010

(Nevermind that the tag cloud is full of Spam words, this is still a reasonable resource if you like web-based forums.)

MSExchange.org

http://forums.msexchange.org/

The guys at MSExchange.org have separated the forums by Exchange version as well as by category.

Windows IT Pro Forum

http://community.exchangeprovip.com/web/forum/categories.aspx?catid=40&entercat=y

Windows IT Pro is a great resource. You will have to register, of course.

TechTarget SearchExchange.com Ask The Experts

http://searchexchange.techtarget.com/expert/Knowledgebase/0,289622,sid43,00.html

And, thankfully, there is still the old standby, the NNTP forums. Windows 7 does not ship with an NNTP client, functionality served by Outlook Express and Windows Mail in earlier versions. Hopefully, this does not diminish these newsgroups as a resource, but it seems like that may be the case. 

News.Microsoft.com

Point your news reader to news.microsoft.com and find the set of newsgroups beginning with:

Microsoft.public.exchange.*

William Lefkovics

Microsoft Exchange Server 2010 is Code Complete

According to the MSExchangeTeam blog, Exchange 2010 is going RTM today. And so begins the next chapter of Exchange Server. Do I cloud? Do I DAG? Do I UM? Do I bother?

"We are happy to announce that Exchange 2010 is Code Complete!  Our senior leadership team has signed off on the final code, and it has been sent to our early adopters for one final look before its public release. This Release to Manufacturing (RTM) milestone means we are on our way to general availability"

William Lefkovics

Gauging the Real Value of Collaboration SaaS Whitepaper

The Collaboration Software Guild (which is mostly just Karen Holbert writing a bunch of articles over the last 6 months) composed a whitepaper to help quantify the value of hosted services for small and medium businesses in the messaging and collaboration realm.

The paper entitled Gauging the Real Value of Software as a Service (SaaS) E-mail for Small and Medium Businesses does not crunch any numbers, but provides an overview of issues facing SMBs and they mention a few of the many offerings in the increasingly competitive hosted services unified messaging.

William Lefkovics

Red Gate Software Releases Exchange Archiver

Red Gate Software, known for their SQL Server tools, has announced the release Exchange Server Archiver. Red Gate focussed on ease of use for their product.

If you are considering a third party archive solution, add Exchange Archiver to your research list. They do offer a 30 day free trial.

William Lefkovics

Novell Introduces GroupWise Competitive Migration Offer

I know. I know. You're thinking GroupWise still exists? Novell has announced a competitive migration offer for companies with Exchange, Lotus Notes and other messaging solutions.

Novell today announced a new promotion designed to help organizations move to Novell GroupWise 8 at a significantly reduced cost. Organizations currently using a competitor's messaging platform can now exchange each existing competitor license for a free GroupWise 8 license. Customer who take advantage of this offer for their integrated collaboration environment will only be required to commit to one year of maintenance support for each user seat.

Novell is offering their GroupWise 8 seats for free (matching the number of competitor seats in use) but will require an annual maintenance fee for the seats of $36/user. That is a compelling offer, but in the end, it is still GroupWise.

William Lefkovics

Exchange Server 2010 Beta Released

The worst kept secret in the E14 development phase was the intended name: Exchange Server 2010 after leaks to WSUS and people (me included) accidentally anticipating the name long before it was known.

Microsoft has finally released an Exchange 2010 beta for administrators for review.

I can hardly wait for Exchange Server 2012.  Oops.

William Lefkovics

Google Partners Exchange Comparison Document

There are some poorly compiled marketing reports out there for CIOs to read in their in-flight magazines. This new 7 Keys to Comparing Google Apps Premier Edition with Microsoft Exchange Server 2003/2007 report misses the mark by so much, it cannot even pretend it isn't marketing crap. (This document is a .pdf file.)

1) No, client software is not 'required' to run Exchange. Some companies do use OWA in the browser as their only client.

2) No, on premise hardware is not required. There are hosted Exchange solutions out there. Why does Google never seem to compare itself to other hosted offerings?

3) What is the Google offline experience like? Non-existent perhaps?

Those are just a few thoughts. This document was a frustrating read. I understand the great benefits and significant shortcomings that accompany a move to a hosted messaging solution, including GMail through Google Apps Premier. I understand that they need to attack the biggest fish in the sea of messaging. Chris posted some information on GMail as a hosted option for Exchange earlier.

In their comparison chart, it suggests that Exchange 2003 and 2007 come with an Instant Messaging solution, which they do not. These comparisons also tend to call things even because they both offer 'calendars' or 'contacts'. Well, almost all messaging solutions have 'calendar' functionality and Google's calendar options and features are not in the same level as that of Exchange Server or Lotus Domino or Zimbra or most other solutions with an on-premise option for that matter.

I think Google spent more effort on April Fools Day articles.

William Lefkovics

Article: Exchange alternatives: Pros and cons

A recent article at Network World suggests that the alternatives may not be compelling enough to 'yank' out Exchange Server.

 

This article claims that the six Exchange alternatives tested are ok, but not enough to pull out Exchange. No problem there.  But what about the market that is trying to decide whether to move TO Exchange or some other alternative? I would have liked to have seen Exchange as part of the testing and finish within the same grading system they used for the six products tested. I also would have liked to have seen others included, such as IMail, Axigen, Zarafa, Cisco PostPath and Icewarp's Merak. The focus seemed to be on SMB companies with the price comparison set at 100 users. Zimbra came in as ‘best of the rest’ which makes sense to me. 

 

Exchange Server is not the best answer for everyone, but it is a darn good answer for many.

 

William Lefkovics

Simple-Talk.com Exchange Server Articles

The website Simple-Talk.com is sponsored by SQL Server software vendor Red Gate Software. Red Gate is working on Exchange Server Archiver, their entry into the somewhat crowded e-mail archiving software market. You can e-mail them if you want to be included in the beta, which is scheduled to start in November.

I was honoured to be asked to contribute a few articles to Simple-Talk.com in support of their Exchange efforts:

• Message Hygiene in Exchange 2007

• Controlling E-Mail with Transport Rules

• Customizing Outlook Web Access in Exchange 2007 (coming late Oct 2008)

William Lefkovics