Mailscape 4.5, Feature Pack 2

Feature Summary

Mailscape, the Microsoft Exchange experts' favorite monitoring and reporting tool, just got better.

• Are you migrating to Exchange 2007 or 2010?
• Do you have a limited budget and timeframe to complete the project?

The award-winning Mailscape will save your company time and money during your migration, and help ensure a smooth transition.

• Need to do more with less?
• Want to empower your help desk to take a more active role in managing the e-mail system?

Mailscape makes the Exchange team and help desk’s job of maintaining the e-mail system easier by streamlining tedious IT tasks and reducing resolution times during outages.

• Worried about the mobile devices connecting to your network?
• Want to provide your users with greater business mobility while maintaining a secure system?

Mailscape’s robust reporting capabilities deliver the critical statistics you need to prevent data breaches and e-mail misuse, protect against computer hackers, and control the access your distributed workforce has to the e-mail system.

In a world dominated by Twitter, Facebook, and iPhones, instantaneous communication is more than sought after – it is expected. The same insatiable desire for faster communication is found in the workplace. The stakes keep rising as more businesses strive to maintain their competitive advantage. E-mail communication is the lifeblood of all organizations, connecting staff to each other, customers, prospects, partners, and stakeholders. As the reliance on e-mail grows, so does the pressure to keep this vital communication continuously available for users.

The latest version of Microsoft’s messaging platform provides new and faster ways for people to communicate and collaborate. Exchange Server 2010 delivers value for businesses in the form of increased productivity, easier ways for users to communicate, and seamless collaboration with other Microsoft applications. The new platform also makes it easier and less expensive for IT staff to implement High Availability and Disaster Recovery solutions.

These advances in technology have led many companies to make the decision to migrate to Exchange 2010. Once the decision has been made, the challenge then becomes how to make this transition seamlessly, without any interruptions. Since e-mail is one of the most visible components of the IT infrastructure, migrating to a new system is an inherently risky process.

Many companies divide their project into four manageable phases. In the planning phase, time is spent discovering and cleaning up the current environment. The design phase then follows where the detailed configuration of the server roles is documented. Next, the deployment phase begins and the design is built out. The final phase is the actual migration of the users and their data.

How will your company ensure a smooth transition while keeping IT costs low?

Discover how Mailscape makes your life easier in all aspects of your migration…..

Planning Phase

Understanding where you have been and where you currently are is the first step in getting to where you want to go. The key to a successful migration is diligent planning. Mailscape saves you time and money during this crucial phase by providing the information you need to get a clearer picture of your current infrastructure and growth rate.

Many companies find it beneficial to spend time cleaning up their environment before they begin their migration. By eliminating old mailboxes and other resources, you not only reduce what you have to migrate, but you can also find a cost savings when it comes to licensing your new environment.

• Mailbox Reporting – Identify and delete mailboxes that are not being used. Target your largest mailboxes.
• Public Folder Reporting – Easily eliminate public folders that are not being used. Mailscape can report on the last time a folder was accessed and the folder owner.

After you have cleaned up your environment, it is important to spend time understanding how your users are utilizing the messaging system. This information will ensure that your new messaging platform will not only meet their needs today, but also in the future. Mailscape contains many reports that help you achieve this goal.

• Mailscape Storage Reports – Determine how much space your Exchange data is taking up on your storage system. Discover the size of your databases, amount of white space and mailbox count. With Mailscape’s storage trending reports, you can see your growth rate and then be in the best position to plan out your new Exchange storage design.
• User Profile and Traffic Reports – Assess your organization’s messaging use. Determine what type of load your users put on the system and identify traffic trends. Are the majority of your users heavy users? How much mail volume is processed in a single day, week or month? How much mail is sent externally? Use this data to justify better performing hardware.
• Outlook Version Reports - Determine what versions of Outlook you have deployed and what modes they are running.
• Outlook Web Access Reporting - Define how much load is being placed on your CAS servers and which users are actively using this feature.
• Mailscape Mobile reports – Discover over 40 reports that provide detail on your mobile users, including what types of devices they use, so you can effectively migrate them. For example, do you know how many iPhones, Blackberries, Droid, ActiveSync or Windows Mobile devices that are currently in use?

  Deployment Phase

  After you have finished the planning phase, it is time to implement your design by installing and configuring Exchange. During the deployment phase, it is crucial to ensure that your newly built servers are tested and configured properly before you go live. Mailscape’s automated health checks verify each server’s core components and ensure that they are not only functioning, but also configured in harmony with Microsoft Best Practices. If any of these tests fail, the Mailscape dashboard lights up and the IT team can then quickly address the issue. Mailscape gives you peace of mind by helping you answer the questions below.

  • Are your new Exchange servers functioning as designed?
    • Have your CAS servers been setup correctly? (OWA, ActiveSync, Outlook Anywhere, and SSL SAN Certificates)
    • Is your high availability design working as designed? (CCR, SCR, or DAG replication verification)
    • Are your new servers communicating with Active Directory and DNS?
  • Is Mail flowing between your databases, servers, and to the internet?

  Migration Phase

  Once you have validated your new messaging platform, it is time to begin planning your data migration. Most companies gradually migrate users on to the new servers over a period of time. Mailscape can help you define your migration batches and also ensure that the data is safely moved without interruption.

  • Use Mailscape’s custom reporting engine to define migration batches. (By department, user type, or mailbox size)
  • Monitor both your Source and your Target systems during the mailbox moves.
    • Keep an eye on mail flow during your migration.
    • Monitor key resources, such as CPU usage, memory, and other critical services.
    • Ensure that the transaction logs do not cause an outage.

Discover how Mailscape helps you work more efficiently. . .

Today’s economy poses challenges for businesses, and everyone is expected to do more with less. Budgets have been cut and IT teams have been reduced, yet workloads have increased. The only way to stay ahead of the game is to find faster, more efficient ways to accomplish tasks. The same is true about managing your company’s e-mail system. Imagine being able to complete tasks that used to take you hours in just a few minutes. What affect would that have on your IT team, your users, and your company’s bottom line?

Mailscape was named the Best Exchange Administration Tool by MSExchange.org the last two years because it enables your IT staff to achieve higher levels of reliability and performance through features that streamline e-mail system administration. It makes the IT Administrator’s job easier by simplifying and automating tedious tasks and helps diagnose technical issues quickly. But it does not stop there. Mailscape empowers your help desk personnel to be proactive and provide better service. In addition, it can provide management with information to help save the company money.

• Empower your Help Desk to be proactive and provide better service.
• Assist the Exchange team with maintaining the system. Reduce resolution times during outages.
• Provide Management with information that will save the company money.
  

Help desk operators and other first-line responders do not always have the technical knowledge needed to assist the IT team with troubleshooting. Other monitoring and reporting products are designed with the back-end administrator in mind, but Mailscape takes a different approach.

• Mailscape is simple and intuitive, so even your help desk operators can learn to use it within a matter of a few hours. The Mailscape dashboard graphically shows each vital component that directly affects Exchange uptime. The dashboard’s traffic light system is universally understood and easy to use (green = good, yellow=warning, red = critical.)
• Instead of adding new members to your IT Department, empower your help desk to take a more active role in managing the system. This will offload the IT team’s responsibility and reduce or eliminate the need to hire more IT staff.
• Mailscape’s reports enable the help desk to be more than secretaries for the IT Department. Mailbox quota reports and Active Directory Locked-Out Accounts reports give your first-line responders data they need to help users manage their inboxes. For example, with one proactive phone call, the help desk can assist users with their mailbox quotas and reset their Active Directory passwords.

With Mailscape, the Exchange team is in a better position to maintain the system and shorten problem-diagnosis and resolution times.

• The Database Report gives Exchange Administrators control over storage growth and helps them determine the best location for new mailboxes.
• The Mailscape Dashboard helps Administrators quickly diagnose issues by pinpointing the root cause of a problem.

Mailscape’s reports help management determine the most efficient way to utilize IT resources.

• Provide management with critical data on your system’s Client Access Licenses and mobile devices.
  • Mobile devices that are seldom used may be re-provisioned to save money.
  • Detailed statistics, such as the number of devices per carrier, enable managers to renegotiate contracts.
• Create a custom dashboard view for management so they can ensure that Service Level Agreements are being met.

Discover how Mailscape can help you control access to your system. . .

Your users want the freedom to connect to the e-mail system wherever they want, whenever they want, and by the device of their choice. While providing them with Anywhere Access enables greater business mobility and workforce productivity, it also introduces security risks. How do you give your users the flexibility to access their email from anywhere while maintaining a secure system and protecting your company’s vital information?

Mailscape’s robust reporting capabilities deliver the critical statistics you need to prevent data breaches and e-mail misuse, protect against computer hackers, and control the access your distributed workforce has to the e-mail system.

• Identify what types of mobile devices are in use.
• Monitor mailbox access and discover potential loopholes (permissions.)
• Track sensitive email communications.
  

BlackBerry is still the industry standard for corporate users, but with the growing popularity of other smartphones, such as the iPhone, many IT Departments are allowing personal devices to connect to the company network. This poses lots of security risks, and makes it more difficult to control which users are accessing the system and how.

What types of mobile devices are connecting to your system?

• Mailscape contains 40 built-in BlackBerry and ActiveSync reports that address:
  • Daily usage
  • Most/least active users
  • BlackBerry users by IT Policy, by Operating System, by BlackBerry Enterprise Server, and by carrier
  • ActiveSync users by Client Access Server, Mailbox server, device model, and OS version
    

What would happen if your company’s proprietary information fell into the wrong hands? An organization’s most valuable possessions are typically NOT their products or services – it’s their Intellectual Property. If your network is not secure, your business could be in danger of industry spies or computer hackers getting access to the coveted information your company has worked hard to keep secure and private.

Mailscape acts as a watchdog for your messaging system and can tell you things like:

• Who has access to which mailboxes and folders?
• What IP addresses are accessing this information?
• What types of permissions does each user have?
• Failed log-on attempts to warn you of potential hackers trying to access your system.
  

Do you know where users are sending messages?

• Reports such as Daily Activity Between Internal Recipients and Daily Activity Between External Recipients let you keep a watchful eye over unusual trends.
• Provide your HR Department with these vital statistics so they can prevent e-mail misuse.