Email Archiving and Mailbox Size - Best custom Recommendations Under Microsoft's transfer Server

Background

Today's businesses, large and small, depend on their email systems for a vital majority of their communication needs. Email has industrialized from a rudimentary, inaccessible technology used only by the tech-savvy to its current role as a rapid, dependable communications tool for just about everyone. Along the way, as user needs and data storage have evolved - remember when 1 Mb of storage was a big deal? - the use of email systems has increased well beyond their original scope of sending and receiving short messages. Today's email systems supply calendaring, group collaboration, task management, workflow and, ever-increasingly, file and data storage. Users now store many years worth of email and attachments, and refer back to them on a frequent basis for leading historical information.

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This expanding document retention, along with the ever-increasing size of attachments, has caused email systems to dramatically increase in size and therefore question higher technical capacity and management. Meanwhile, the email article itself has increased in value - often being sensitive, possession or even mission-critical in nature. It is vital that today's business protects its email venture and related systems with document holding and archiving policies. An productive procedure will balance theory needs for security & stability with user needs that comprise rapid access.

Over the years of working with our clients, Seitel Systems has industrialized a set of best practices for dealing with these involved needs. Outlined below are our recommendations for holding and archiving under Microsoft's exchange Server.

Group procedure Templates

Regardless of either Outlook Auto Archive is used to conduct mailboxes, the Outlook Group procedure Template should be used to centrally control settings (including either or not archiving is allowed). Configuration data is ready below.

Outlook 2007: Outlk12.adm Outlook 2003: Outlk11.adm

Exchange 2000 Environments exchange 2000 is miniature in the number of ready storage to 16 Gb (17 Gb for short term repairs). As a result, Ssl recommends that these organizations implement mailbox supervision policies as follows:

1. Mailbox Size Limits: to 500 Mb or smaller depending on the total size of the organization. Smaller organizations can have larger mailbox limits. This should be managed through mailbox quotas enforced by exchange Server. As users coming their assigned quota they'll receive warning messages to that effect. Once they reach the quota they'll be restricted from sending and receiving emails.

2. Outlook Email Auto Archive should be configured for all users to run with the following settings:

Turn On Auto Archive: Yes

Run AutoArchive every days: 7

Prompt before AutoArchive runs: No

Delete Expired Items: No

Archive or delete old items: No

(note: this is a setting relevant to email holding policies and expiration dates, not the deleted items folder)

Show archive folder in folder list: Yes

Clean out items older than: Never

Permanently delete old items: No

(note: this is a setting relevant to email holding policies and expiration dates, not the deleted items folder)

3. Archive folders should be stored in the following locations:

· Workstation users should archive to a pst file located on the network. This runs the risk of file corruption as Msft recommends against using a network share for email auto archiving but alternative solutions (such as archiving locally) entail greater risk of data loss due to disk or backup issues.Search the Microsoft retain site for kb/297019 to find the supporting article.

· Laptop users should archive to a pst file located on their local hard drive. A manual process will be required to copy these psts to the network on a regular basis (minimum weekly) to ensure that they are backed up. Ssl recommends placing a recurring appointment on the user's calendar.

· A manual process will be required for all users to ensure that individual pst files do not exceed 2 Gb in size. The frequency of this process will depend on the rate of email sending & receiving, but should be checked on at least an yearly basis. Ssl recommends placing a recurring appointment on the user's calendar.

Exchange 2003 Environments exchange 2003 is miniature in the number of ready storage to 75 Gb. This is likely more storage space than will be consumed by the median small business, but for those businesses that coming this limit Ssl recommends one of the following solutions:

· Upgrade to exchange Server 2007 with its near-unlimited storage space. This is the likely explication for businesses on older hardware or naturally wanting to take benefit of the features of 2007.

· Add in a second mailbox store on the existing exchange Server and migrate mailboxes to balance the storage load. This explication assumes ready disk space and remaining useful life of the server hardware.

Due to the large ready storage space and the potential complexities of archive files Ssl does not advise implementing mailbox size limits or email auto-archiving policies except for laptop (mobile) users. frugal user supervision of their mailboxes is encouraged through deletion of non-essential emails especially those with large attachments that do not need to be archived. The Outlook Group procedure Template should be used to preclude users from enabling Auto Archive on their mailbox.

Mobile users with large mailboxes will touch vital operation degradation when operating exterior of the office Lan. Cached exchange mode or offline storage files are not recommended as they are both miniature to 2 Gb file sizes, plus their required synchronization time can be painful when done over a Wan connection (broadband or otherwise). For mobile users Ssl recommends the following:

1. Outlook should be configured to use Rpc over Https to allow obtain access to the exchange Server whenever the laptop is related to the internet

2. To keep operation at an thorough level it is recommended that mobile users need to keep their mailboxes below 500 Mb in size. This could be managed through mailbox quotas enforced by exchange Server.

3. Auto Archive should be enabled for mobile users to run quietly every 7 days and archive data to a pst file located on their local hard drive. A manual process will be required to copy these psts to the network on a regular basis (minimum weekly) to ensure that they are backed up. Ssl recommends placing a recurring appointment on the user's calendar.

4. A manual process will be required for mobile users to ensure that individual pst files do not exceed 2 Gb in size. The frequency of this process will depend on the rate of email sending & receiving, but should be checked on at least an yearly basis. Ssl recommends placing a recurring appointment on the user's calendar.

Exchange 2007 Environments exchange 2007 offers near unlimited storage miniature only by the ready hard drive space. As a result, Ssl does not advise implementing mailbox size limits or email auto-archiving policies except for laptop (mobile) users. frugal user supervision of their mailboxes is encouraged through deletion of non-essential emails especially those with large attachments that do not need to be archived. The Outlook Group procedure Template should be used to preclude users from enabling Auto Archive on their mailbox.

Mobile users with large mailboxes will touch vital operation degradation when operating exterior of the office Lan. Cached exchange mode or offline storage files are not recommended as they are both miniature to 2 Gb file sizes, plus their required synchronization time can be painful when done over a Wan connection (broadband or otherwise). For mobile users Ssl recommends the following:

1. Outlook should be configured to use Rpc over Https to allow obtain access to the exchange Server whenever the laptop is related to the internet

2. To keep operation at an thorough level it is recommended that mobile users need to keep their mailboxes below 500 Mb in size. This could be managed through mailbox quotas enforced by exchange Server.

3. Auto Archive should be enabled for mobile users to run quietly every 7 days and archive data to a pst file located on their local hard drive. A manual process will be required to copy these psts to the network on a regular basis (minimum weekly) to ensure that they are backed up. Ssl recommends placing a recurring appointment on the user's calendar.

4. A manual process will be required for mobile users to ensure that individual pst files do not exceed 2 Gb in size. The frequency of this process will depend on the rate of email sending & receiving, but should be checked on at least an yearly basis. Ssl recommends placing a recurring appointment on the user's calendar.

Links:

Configuration data for holding settings is ready at: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/library/cc303413.aspx (Click on "configure holding settings).

The Outlook executive template is located in the Office resource Kit which can be downloaded from: http://technet.microsoft.com/en-us/office/desktop/default.aspx. distinct versions are ready via the Home->Versions link.

Email Archiving and Mailbox Size - Best custom Recommendations Under Microsoft's transfer Server

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