Previous Page TOC Next Page



— 12 —
Configuring Exchange Clients


by Greg Todd

Chapter 4, "Client Components," introduced the Microsoft Exchange client software and went over its architecture and its major features and functions.

In this chapter, I'd like to take that a bit further and actually delve into the client itself and look at things in more detail. This should serve two purposes. First, it will provide an understanding of the various client features and how and why you would want to use them. Second, it will help you know what to do and where to start when you need to configure your own Exchange client.

There will be some overlap between the two chapters, but if you haven't read Chapter 4, go ahead and skim over it now. It's fairly short and shouldn't take too long. Plus, there are some foundational elements explained there that might help this chapter make more sense.



As mentioned in Chapter 4, there are several versions of the Microsoft Exchange client software. Currently, there exists a version for Windows NT, Windows 95, Windows 3.x, and MS-DOS. And by the time this goes to print there should be a Macintosh version available. For simplicity, I refer to any of these simply as the client, regardless of operating system version. The examples used in this chapter are based on the Windows NT 3.51 client. The Windows 95 and Windows 3.x clients are very similar. However, although similar in operating principle, the DOS client is somewhat different in several places. Check the Exchange documentation for details.

There is a list of items I should cover in order to provide a good overview of the client. In this chapter you learn about the following:

It's probably a good idea to begin with a review of the client architecture. This section reiterates some of the ideas brought out in Chapter 4.

After that you can dive right into one of the key aspects of the client—user profiles and information services, and how they interrelate. This is an area where the client gets much of its power and versatility.

Following that you learn about folders, which are another key aspect of the client. Folders work together to form a powerful feature of the software, and you should find them quite natural to use (as I have).

For those who either work remotely or in an occasionally connected environment, it makes sense to discuss the client's capabilities in that area. Exchange uses RAS/PPP and offline folders to accomplish this, and it is arguably one of the most handy features in the program.

Next, a discussion of Exchange Address Books is in order. Here you learn about the different kinds of address books and how and why you would want to use them.

Wrapping up the client, you look at some of the remaining user options. There are many configurable options, but this section discusses the most general ones and picks up some that were not covered in the previous sections. Things such as rules-based mail processing, custom views, and searching are included.

After reading this chapter, you should have a good grasp of how the Exchange client works, of its architecture, of its major features, and why you would want to use them. You should see the similarities between the clients on all operating systems and get some idea of where the DOS client differs. And although it covers a lot of ground, this chapter is intended to supplement, not replace, the documentation that comes with Exchange. The Exchange manuals are well done, so use them!

Architecture Review


As covered in Chapter 4, there is a key aspect to the Exchange client architecture: modularity. This approach to the design enables the client to lend itself well to playing the role of "universal inbox." Figure 12.1 illustrates this.

Figure 12.1. The Exchange client derives its flexibility and extensibility from its modular architecture.

It is clear that at an architectural level the client really is designed to be a means of managing all kinds of information, regardless of the type and source. Whereas many systems provide plain old electronic-mail storage, Exchange goes beyond that and literally acts as a universal inbox to contain all kinds of information. So rather than being the central focus of the product, e-mail is relegated to existing as one of many types of information the client can manage. In fact, the client can connect to a variety of data sources simply by implementing the proper information services.

Modularity and Consistency


An important thing to remember is that the client is consistent no matter what data source it is connected to. Therefore, whether you are connecting to an Exchange server, an MS Mail post office, or another source of data, the basic user interface and functionality remain the same. It's just a matter of adding in the right information service to get to the information you need.

Another aspect of consistency as a result of modularity is that the client is freed from constraints imposed by network transports or storage mediums. These are abstracted from the interface the user sees, so the client does not change whether you are running TCP/IP or IPX/SPX, looking at e-mail, or listening to voice mail. When sending information, the client does not need any knowledge of the destination. Conversely, when the client is receiving information, it does not need any knowledge of where it came from. It's just sort of one big information blob out there, and you see it through the Exchange client with a consistent interface.

One other point about consistency. The personal address book and personal store are always available regardless of the type of external data the client is connected to. That implies you can move data around and put it in a personal (local) storage medium for later use. This is a great feature, especially if you need to archive data or take it with you when you are not connected to the network.

Extensibility


An important byproduct of the client's modular design is extensibility. That is, the architecture supports "bolting on" additional pieces to the client where necessary. That way, no one has to wait on Microsoft to develop all the pieces that anyone anywhere might need. Using the MAPI SDK, third parties can develop their own information services to fill whatever need might arise.

Using this design approach also extends the life of Exchange beyond what a bunch of marketing types—or engineer types—sitting in a room can dream up. And that's good, because none of us likes having to throw away something like a messaging system after making such a huge investment to get it up and running.

Going back to the user interface for a minute, there's an additional goodie in the case of connecting to other data sources. There can be user-interface modifications, or extensions, to customize the client for accessing a particular type of data. If you look back at Figure 12.1, you will notice a U.I. Extensions box on the top of the user interface. The types of client extensions include the following:

For example, if you access voice data you might want play, stop, and pause buttons on the toolbar. You might also want additional information specific to voice data in the menu items or property pages.

That about does it for the review of the client architecture. Now move into some details of the client itself. This is where the really good stuff starts.

Profiles and Information Services


Profiles and information services are somewhat related.

An information service—sometimes referred to as a service, a service provider, or simply a provider—is the way the client connects to an external information source. This is a modular component that bolts on to the client to provide access to whatever information is needed.

A profile is a collection of information services. If you think of an information service as being like an .INI file, you can think of a profile as a container for multiple .INI files.

Information services and profiles are a part of MAPI.

Let's look closer at information services first, then profiles . After that you should see the relationship between the two more clearly.

Information Services


MAPI defines interfaces for three main types of information services.

These three information services serve as building blocks for messaging applications or other information services, which can contain any or all of them.

In reality, an information service is just a DLL. In the simplest and most common case, a DLL contains one information service. Sometimes a DLL can contain more than one information service, or an information service can be composed of more than one DLL.

If you open the Mail and Fax applet in the Control Panel and click the Add button, as shown in Figure 12.2, the available information services will appear.

Figure 12.2. The available information services are shown when you try to add a service to a profile.

There are four information services that come with the Exchange client:

There are also several related DLL files.



In the 32-bit operating systems—Windows NT (shown here) and Windows 95—the 32-bit client is used, so the DLLs just listed have a "32" appended to them. In the 16-bit versions they have nothing appended—for example, EMSABP32.DLL is EMSABP.DLL.

The Microsoft Exchange Server information service is composed of EMSABP32.DLL, EMSMDB32.DLL, and EMSUI32.DLL. This is an example of an information service made up of multiple DLLs.

The Microsoft Mail information service is composed of MSFS32.DLL. This is an example of the simplest case—an information service in a single DLL.

Both the Personal Address Book and the Personal Folders information services are contained in MSPST32.DLL. This is an example of a single DLL containing two information services.

Profiles


With the client's modular extensible architecture it is easy to add new information services. However, at some point it gets difficult to keep track of all the services. That is where profiles come into the picture.

Profiles are used to keep track of the user's configuration of various information services on a client, and they provide one of the client's most flexible features. When you start the Exchange client, the profile tells the client what information services to start.

For example, a single user can have multiple profiles on a single workstation. If you use a laptop both at work and at home, you can have a profile tailored for the way you use Exchange in both places.

As another example, many users can have a profile on a single workstation. If several users share a certain client machine, each one can have a personal profile tailored to the specific and varying configuration needs of that person.

Figure 12.3 illustrates how profiles might be used.

Figure 12.3. Profiles provide flexibility in maintaining Exchange client configurations.

Using Figure 12.3 as an example, User 1 has a computer for work and a separate computer for home. The work computer has a profile named Work, which contains work-related information services. Likewise, the home computer has a profile named Home, which contains home-related information services.

User 2 has a single computer for both office use and travel use. When User 2 is in the office, he selects the Office profile when Exchange starts. Likewise, when he's on the road he selects the Travel profile.

Finally, Users 3, 4, and 5 all share a computer. They have the same information services, but because they don't use identical client settings (they each have different mailboxes, for example) each user can select a personalized profile when Exchange starts.

Accessing Profiles in the Client


There are two completely different ways to get to the profiles. I found this confusing at first, but after you get the idea that both approaches are doing the same thing, it's easy to understand.

The first way to access client profiles is through the Mail and Fax applet. Although both methods are similar, this is the more flexible way of managing profiles. When you activate the applet it shows the current default Exchange profile, as shown in Figure 12.4.

Figure 12.4. One way to access the client profiles is by using the Mail and Fax applet in the Control Panel.



Note that you can accomplish the same thing by opening the MS Exchange Services icon, which was installed in the Microsoft Exchange group during client setup. This just runs Control Panel and opens the Mail and Fax applet in one step.

The second way to access client profiles is through the Exchange client itself. This will show the currently in use profile when Exchange is opened. And unless you configure the client to enable selecting another profile at startup, this will be the default profile.

Open the Tools menu, and select the Services menu item to bring up the Services dialog box as shown in Figure 12.5.



If you notice a slight response delay in opening the Tools menu immediately after the client has been started, don't be alarmed. You are seeing an artifact of certain optimizations built into the client. It is designed to present a usable viewer as quickly as possible while still instantiating the menus for several seconds after the client starts and the viewer appears.

Figure 12.5. Another way to access the client profiles is by using the Services entry in the Tools menu of the client.



Here again, you can accomplish the same thing by opening the Tools menu, selecting Options, and selecting the Services tab. This is identical to using the Tools | Services menu.

I suppose if you're counting, this actually makes four distinct ways to configure profiles.


Notice the slight difference between the information shown in Figure 12.4 and Figure 12.5. Don't let this confuse things—both are accessing exactly the same profile information. In reality, Figure 12.5 is a subset of Figure 12.4, so it makes sense that they both show the same things.

However, there are a few differences that make the Mail and Fax applet a slightly more flexible way to manage profiles than the client's Tools | Services menu.

Figure 12.4 is titled Default Exchange Profile Properties; Figure 12.5 is entitled simply Services. The title of Figure 12.4 will change depending on which profile is set as the default. For example, if Davy Crockett is the name of the default profile, the title will read Davy Crockett Properties rather than Default Exchange Profile Properties. The title of Figure 12.5 does not change.

Also, Figure 12.4 has two extra tabs that Figure 12.5 does not. They give additional profile configuration such as specifying a folder where new mail is sent, which address books are used, and the order in which the address books are searched.

Finally, Figure 12.4 has a Show Profiles button. This shows all the profiles available on the client machine, as depicted in Figure 12.6. From here you can configure the information services in any of the displayed profiles. You can also set which profile will be the default when the Exchange client starts on this computer.

Figure 12.6. Using the Mail and Fax applet, you can manage any profile available on the client machine.

Usually, you would use the Mail and Fax applet if you want to make changes to any profile that exists on the client machine. It is also the way to create new profiles. For example, if you maintain multiple profiles on the same machine—say, one for work and one for home—you could easily configure the profiles this way.

Similarly, if you currently have the client open and just need to add a new information service (or remove an old one) from your active profile, then using the Tools | Services method would be the way to go.

That should do it for profiles and information services. You should now have a better idea of what they both are, how they relate to the client, and when and why you would use them. Let's move on to the next key element of the client: folders.

Folders


If you're like me, you sometimes have a hard time trying to keep things organized. I find myself putting papers and letters and bills and whatever into piles everywhere, especially when I'm in a hurry.

Fortunately, one day I discovered manila folders. These are great, and now instead of piling things up everywhere I can put stuff in folders, label the folders, and put them in a drawer or filing cabinet.

It just so happened that the engineers at Microsoft figured the folder metaphor is a good one to use for the Exchange client too. This makes it much easier to organize all that information you'll undoubtedly get in your universal inbox. And unlike real-world folders (or at least the ones I use), Exchange client folders can contain other folders as well as messages. So if one level of hierarchy isn't enough, making more is a simple matter. All in all, client folders are quite natural to use.

There are three categories of folders in the client

A private folder is a server-based folder that is part of a user's mailbox. Inbox and Outbox are examples of private folders. Private folders are stored in the private-information store on an Exchange Server, and they are displayed under the Mailbox object in the client.

A personal folder is a client-based folder that contains any kind of information the user wants to store off the server. You must create your own personal folders after installing the Personal Folders information service. Personal folders are usually stored on the user's local hard drive, and they are displayed under the Personal Folders object in the client.

A public folder is a server-based folder that is available to all users of Exchange, much like a bulletin board. It can contain various types of information including e-mail, spreadsheets, graphics, and voice mail. Public folders are stored in the public-information store on an Exchange Server, and they are displayed under the Public Folders object in the client.

Figure 12.7 shows a view of the client with all three types of folders installed and expanded so you can see them.

Figure 12.7. The Exchange client is configured with Private, Personal, and Public folders.

The next three sections take a closer look at the different types of folders.

Private Folders


Private folders are your mailbox folders. When you install the Microsoft Exchange Server information service, the client is given access to private folders. Look at Figure 12.8, which depicts an open mailbox with all the private folders in it.

Figure 12.8. The Mailbox contains all the user's private folders.

You can see in this figure that there are three messages in the Inbox. One of the messages, at the top, is bold because it is unread; the other two have been read. Also, notice on the left side the highlighted Inbox icon has a (1) to the right of it. That indicates the number of unread messages in the Inbox—in this case, 1. This makes it easy to see at a glance how many unread messages you have.

There are several things you can do with private folders. (Actually, these actions pertain to all folders to some degree.) You can open and close them, create and delete them, move and copy them, rename them, and look at their properties. These particular actions are accessed via the File menu or via a right mouse button click.

You can do most actions with the mouse as well as with the menus—and many times it is more intuitive to use the mouse. For example, moving a folder is a matter of dragging and dropping. Opening is just a double click, and clicking the right mouse button on a folder (or any object in the client) will pop up a menu of actions appropriate for the object. Very simple.

Most of these actions—move, rename, and so on—are self-explanatory, but let's look at the properties for a moment. Figure 12.9 shows the properties for the Inbox private folder.

Figure 12.9. You can access the properties for any folder via the File menu or by pressing Alt+Enter on the highlighted folder.

Notice here that in the General tab you can type in a new name for the Inbox. That's right, you can actually rename the Inbox if you want to. So, I suppose if you don't like plain old Inbox name you could call it something more flashy, like Universal Inbox. That's probably what all the marketing types call theirs anyway.

There are other tabs on the properties sheet you should know about.



The tabs on the properties sheet, or a subset of them, are available to all three types of folders. The exact function of each is generally the same, but the details can vary depending on the folder type and whether the tab contents apply to that folder.

You use the Views tab to create custom views of your information. You learn more on this later in the chapter, in the section "Other User Options."

The Administration tab is mostly for public folders, but in the context of private folders it defines which view is the default when a user is opening the folder.

You use the Forms tab to install custom forms into the folder. You learn more on this in Chapter 23, "The Exchange Forms Designer."

The Permissions tab controls who, other than the folder's owner, has permissions to use the folder.

Finally, in the Synchronization tab you configure the folder to function as an offline folder—an extremely useful feature. You learn more about this in the section, "RAS and Working Offline."

One more thing about private folders. The four default private folders—Inbox, Outbox, Deleted Items, and Sent Items—cannot be moved or deleted.

Personal Folders


Personal folders are your own folders, which you use to contain whatever you want. Functionally, they are quite similar to private folders.

If you want to keep e-mail in your personal folders, that's fine. If you want to copy public folders or other things into them, that's fine too. The basic idea is that you can have your own personal folders—usually stored on your own hard drive or a file server—that you can do with whatever you want. So wherever your computer goes, your personal folders go, too.

For those of you familiar with MS Mail, personal folders are analogous to MS Mail .MMF files. In Exchange, a personal folder—also called a personal store—is kept in a .PST file. When you install the Personal Folders information service, the client is given access to personal folders. Figure 12.10 shows personal folders being added to the client's profile.

Figure 12.10. Personal folders are stored in .PST files. Access to them is added to the client profile with the Personal Folders information service.

You must select a path and .PST filename for the personal store. Also, you can rename the folder to something else if you want. You choose the type of encryption here, and you can enter a password if you want to password-protect your personal folders.



If you forget the password for your personal folders, there is no way to remove it or to get it back. The information in there will be inaccessible.

Of the six Property tabs that show up on private folders, only four of them appear on personal folders: General, Views, Administration, and Forms. However, these four function identically for personal folders and for private folders.



After you have created a .PST file, you can remove the Personal Folders information service without deleting the .PST file. Then, if you want to add the service again later—or move the .PST to another client and use it there—you can reuse the .PST, and all the information that was in it before will still be there.


Public Folders


Public folders are a bit different from private or personal folders. Although from a folder perspective they function similarly, their purpose is quite unlike private and personal folders.

Public folders form the foundation of Exchange's groupware and group-collaboration features. They provide the ability for information to be posted on an Exchange Server in such a way that anyone who uses the server can view, modify, and add to the information contained in the folders. And all this information is presented in a seamless, consistent way with the client.

Figure 12.11 shows a public folder with three postings in it.

Figure 12.11. Public folders provide an easy way to disseminate information to many Exchange users at once.

It isn't necessary to install an information service to make public folders available—they are in the client folder list by default.

If you are familiar with MS Mail, Exchange public folders loosely correspond to MS Mail public folders. I say "loosely" because Exchange public folders have been dramatically overhauled and given immensely more power with features such as replication.

A posting in a public folder looks much the same as an e-mail message, which makes sense given Microsoft's dedication to consistency in the client user interface. The main difference is semantic: typically, messages are posted to a public folder rather than sent and received as with e-mail.

As for Property tabs, of the six which show up on private folders only five appear on personal folders: General, Views, Administration, Forms, and Permission. However, these five function identically for public folders as for private folders with one exception. The Administration tab includes some extra features such as access permissions and rules-based processing for new additions to the folder.

New Folders


With all this talk of folders, you probably have this unstoppable urge to create a bunch of folders and get organized. Well, maybe not. But at some time you will need to create new folders.

Creating a new folder is simple; you use the File | New Folder menu item. After you select this—assuming you have proper permissions to create folders—all you do is give the folder a name and you're ready to use it. This procedure works the same for private, public, and personal folders.

Naturally, you can display an icon for this process on the toolbar for convenience. This is configured using the Tools | Customize Toolbar menu. Then all you have to do is click the icon to create a new folder.



You configure the client toolbar using the Tools | Customize Toolbar menu item. Any action that has a menu entry can be configured with an icon on the toolbar.


Folders and Messages


Before you move on, you need to learn about one last aspect of folders, which is, how does one put things in folders in the first place?

You can receive e-mail in your private folders, and you can view postings in public folders, but how do they get there originally? This might be obvious to most, but it's worth covering.

Composing new e-mail or a new posting is all contained in one main place: the Compose menu. And for convenience, there are two alternative ways to get at the same functions: by using the toolbar and by clicking the right mouse button on an existing message.

You usually put new messages in a private folder by sending an e-mail message using Compose | New Message.

You usually put new messages in a public folder by posting them using Compose | New Post in This Folder. You can also click the right mouse button on an existing message to display a menu of available options; among them will be a post action.

This is where a picture is worth a thousand words. Look at Figure 12.12, which shows the Compose menu opened while an e-mail is highlighted in the Inbox.

Figure 12.12. There are several actions that can be carried out on an e-mail message. The menu is context-sensitive, and it shows appropriate actions depending on what is highlighted.

There are a variety of actions available you can use to act upon an e-mail message. For example, if you highlight a posting in a folder, Reply to All would be grayed out. But highlighting an e-mail message in a folder looks just like Figure 12.12. If you have a custom application, this is one area where you might want to consider extending the user interface to include the appropriate action.

If you want to see all the options relevant for an object, click the right mouse button on it. Figure 12.13 shows what this looks like for a public-folder posting.

Figure 12.13. These are the actions for a posting, which are very similar to actions for a message.

You can also place icons on the toolbar that perform the same actions as those shown in the menu. Again, use Tools | Configure Toolbar.

That's all you need to know about folders to get started using them. The next section explains another neat aspect of the client: working remotely and offline.

RAS and Working Offline


Arguably one of the most valuable features of the client is the ability it provides the user to work remotely and offline. This section investigates these features, shows how they are related, and explains why you would want to use them.

Begin by learning the definitions of these two terms.

Working remotely is using the client while you are actually connected to the Exchange Server's network via a modem. In effect, you are online with the server using your remote connection.

Working offline is using the client while you are not connected to an Exchange Server. However, you still have the ability to use server-based folders—for example, private folders—that have been configured for offline use.

These two are related because you can configure folders to be used offline—that is, while you are not connected to the network. Then you can use RAS to dial in to your network to work remotely or synchronize your offline folders, for example. Sound useful? Let's look at this a little more.

Working Remotely


Working remotely involves using a dial-up protocol, such as Remote Access Services (RAS), Dial-Up Networking (DUN) or Point to Point Protocol (PPP). All of these are supported with the client, depending on which operating system you are using:

For purposes of this discussion I refer to RAS as it works with the Windows NT 3.51 client, but the principles apply across the board to all the clients using RAS, DUN, and PPP.

For example, say you have a computer at work and a computer at home. Normally, you process your e-mail while at work, but sometimes you like to check it while you're home. Working remotely, all you have to do is connect to the office network using RAS and log in to your Exchange Server using your home-based client. Then you can operate in Exchange as though you were at the office, albeit not as fast.

When you work remotely, you are actually connected to the Exchange Server network with your modem instead of with a network card. Everything works the same, just slower. The speed is directly proportional to the speed of your connection. I recommend no less than a 14.4Kbps modem; a 28.8Kbps modem is much better. If you have something faster, that's better still!

Assume you have configured RAS for a dial-up connection to a RAS server on your Exchange Server network. From there, it's simple to enable the client for remote usage (in three steps):

  1. Modify the Microsoft Exchange Server Information Service Properties in your profile to set the type of connection you want when the client starts.


  2. Modify the Microsoft Exchange Server Information Service Properties in your profile to include your RAS information.


  3. Modify the Microsoft Exchange Server Information Service Properties in your profile to configure Remote Mail.


When you are finished with these, connect to the network with RAS, and use the client as usual to connect to the Exchange Server.

Fortunately, you can configure the three configuration steps in a single place. Figure 12.14 shows the property sheet for the Microsoft Exchange Server information service.

Figure 12.14. The configuration for using the client remotely is done in the Microsoft Exchange Server Information Services Properties.

The first item is configured in the General tab. This is a handy feature because you can have the client ask you which way you'd like to work whenever it loads.

The second item is configured in the Dial-Up Networking tab. This basically leverages the existing RAS setup. Whatever is configured in RAS will apply to this.

The third item is configured in the Remote Mail tab. See the following sidebar for more information on Remote Mail.



Remote Mail

The client contains a feature called Remote Mail. When you enable the client for remote use, the Remote Mail menu item is available in the Tools menu. You use Remote Mail to connect to Exchange Server to retrieve headers of your e-mail and to send e-mail you have composed while offline. Then you actually work with the e-mail using the main client interface—the Viewer.

You might ask, why would anyone use Remote Mail instead of always synchronizing an offline inbox (described in the next section, "Working Offline")? Some people will never use Remote Mail; others will use it extensively. The main advantage of using Remote Mail is you can select which e-mail headers to download. With an offline inbox, the only option is to synchronize the inbox with the one on the server. For example, if you have 50 new e-mails, but you care about only a few of them, Remote Mail lets you select only the ones you want for downloading. Otherwise, you would have to download all 50 e-mails to synchronize the inbox.

One other point. You can use Remote Mail two ways: with an offline folder and without an offline folder. In the first case, if you use Remote Mail with an offline folder, the downloaded e-mail lands in the offline folder. In the second case, if you use it without an offline folder, you must have a personal folder available for the e-mail to land in.

The online help in the client is useful for configuring for Remote Mail.


To this point, you've learned how to work when you are connected to the Exchange Server—even when the connection is a remote one. Next, you learn the notion of working with a folder while you aren't connected to the Exchange Server.

Working Offline


Working offline is an Exchange term. It refers to specific folders—such as the Inbox, Outbox, Sent Items, and Delete Items—which are configured to function whether the client is connected to the network or not.

This is an excellent feature for what I call the "occasionally connected" user. In other words, if you are the type of user who is connected to the network only sometimes, that qualifies for occasionally connected.

For example, say you work in the office part of the time, at home part of the time, and on the road part of the time. Aside from the fact that you work too much, you don't want multiple computers floating around—you just want to use your laptop wherever you are. While in the office you plug your laptop into the docking bay, which provides a network connection. No problem. While at home you use RAS to work remotely. No problem. But while on the road (or on a plane), you can't very well connect to the server to read those 300 new e-mails you have in your inbox.

Offline folders solve this. You can read and reply to your e-mail while you work offline. Then, when you get back in the office, you can synchronize the offline folders to get new e-mail and send the ones to which you replied.

In our example, the first thing to do is configure the inbox and the outbox as offline folders. This is simple: just modify the folder properties to make it an offline folder. Click on the inbox, and choose File | Properties. Then click the Synchronization tab and select When offline or online. Figure 12.15 shows the dialog box.

Figure 12.15. Configuring a folder for offline operation is a matter of modifying the folder properties.



You can configure any private folder and the Favorites public folders as offline. No other public folders can be configured for offline use.

From here, just click OK. If this is the first folder you have configured for offline use, a dialog box appears advising that an offline folder file—an .OST file—must be created. After you select where to keep the file, Exchange initializes the .OST file.

Notice that when you configure the inbox for offline use, the Deleted Items, Outbox, and Sent Items folders are also configured the same way. However, the Mailbox parent folder itself does not follow suit. That is because when you work with offline folders, your main e-mail folders—the Inbox, Outbox, Deleted Items, and Sent Items folders—are always available.

The final step is to synchronize the folders. You do this using the Tools | Synchronize menu as shown in Figure 12.16.

Figure 12.16. Any time you want to synchronize an offline folder with a server-based folder, use the Synchronize command.

You can either choose to synchronize all offline folders or just the one that is highlighted. If you have multiple offline folders with a lot of information in them, this could take a little time. If you need to re-sync only one folder, then do only that one. While the synchronization takes place, as shown in Figure 12.17, Exchange lets you know the progress of the operation.

Figure 12.17. Exchange presents a progress bar showing how much of the offline folder synchronization has been completed.

Now you're ready to work offline with your mailbox. You can read your unread mail, compose replies, and compose new mail, all while not connected to the Exchange Server. When you get back to the office, all you have to do is connect to the server; an offline folder synchronization will occur to send and receive your e-mail. Of course, you can connect to the server using either a LAN connection or a RAS connection; the synchronization will still happen. If you ask me, that is a powerful feature. It makes life much easier if you are out of the office for any amount of time.

About Working Offline


Before you move on, there are a few things that need to be pointed out about working offline.

First, when you have an unsent e-mail, the Outbox icon turns red. That shows there is at least one message there that has not been sent, and it is a visual cue to synchronize your folder when you are reconnected to the server.

Second, when you are composing e-mail offline, you do not have access to the Global Address list. How are you going to address e-mail unless you have a list of available e-mail addresses? I'm glad you asked that. The next section, where you learn about address books, covers that in more detail. The quick answer is that you have to either use a personal address book or use an offline version of the Global Address list. With the latter, it is just a matter of synchronizing it like you do other offline folders. Keep reading, and I promise I will get to it in a minute.

Third, if you plan to often alternate between working online and working offline, configure your profile to prompt you each time Exchange starts whether you want to work online or offline. Just edit your profile as shown in Figure 12.18.

Figure 12.18. Sometimes, it is more convenient to configure your profile to prompt for the connection type when you start Exchange.

Check the box titled Choose the connection type when starting. Then, every time you start the client, you will be prompted to choose whether you want to work offline or connect to a server.

As promised, the next section explains address books.

Address Books


In Exchange, an address book is a directory of e-mail addresses you use with the client. It contains one or more lists of recipients.

This section covers the various aspects of Exchange address books and talks a little about addressing.

Address Book Types


There are typically two types of address books you have access to in the Exchange client:

The Global Address Book contains a list of names of all recipients in the Exchange organization. Remember, recipients include directory entities such as users, mailboxes, distribution lists, and public folders. In other words, the Global Address Book is a directory listing.

The Personal Address Book is a user address book stored locally in a .PAB file. Like the Global Address Book, it contains recipients as well, but just the ones the user puts in there.

One important addition to these two is the offline Address Book. It is basically a copy of all or part of the Global Address Book, and it is handled just like the offline folders covered in the last section. You learn more on this later in this chapter, in the section "Offline Address Book."

You can get to the address books via the Viewer menu. Choose Tools | Address Book. You can also press Ctrl+Shift+B or click the address-book icon on the toolbar. Doing so brings up a window similar to Figure 12.19.

Figure 12.19. The address book is a separate window in the client, invoked by menu, key combination, or toolbar icon.

Within these two address books, there are three main types of addresses that can appear.

The regular addresses are self-explanatory. They are made up of the normal recipients present in the Exchange Directory, such as other Exchange users, folders, distribution lists, and so on. They can exist in either the Global Address Book or a Personal Address Book.

Gateway addresses are addresses of users in e-mail systems outside the Exchange organization. These users are reached via a gateway, which is simply a software component that connects the Exchange system to the outside e-mail system. If these addresses are created by an Exchange administrator, they will appear in the Global Address Book. For example, if you use the Internet Mail Connector (IMC), which is a gateway to SMTP mail, you will likely have gateway addresses in the Global Address Book.

Custom addresses are really gateway addresses. When they are created by a user and stored in a Personal Address Book they are referred to as one-off addresses. There are localized templates available on the Exchange Server, which the client uses for creating one-off addresses, including Internet (SMTP), MacMail, Microsoft Mail, and X.400.

When you create a custom address, the proper format to use is


[AddressType:Address]

You must include the brackets. For example,


[smtp:davyc@alamo.com].

The following are valid AddressType entries:

SMTP

FAX

MHS

MCI

X400

X500

MSA

MS

MSPEER

PROFS

SNADS

COMPUSERVE

3COM

ATT

TELEX



Configuring the Address Book


If you click the drop-down list box Show Names from the: in Figure 12.19, you will see entries in addition to Global Address List such as Personal Address Book, the organization name, and so on. This determines which addresses you're looking at.

You can configure which of these shows up as the default using the Tools | Options menu. Select the Addressing tab as shown in Figure 12.20.

Figure 12.20. How the address book functions can be easily configured.

In this example, the Global Address List will show up when the address book is opened. Personal addresses are kept in the Personal Address Book, and it is searched for matching names before the Global Address Book is. That makes sense, especially when a user is working offline and the Global Address Book might not be available. Besides, any strange addresses you might have will likely be stored in the Personal Address Book.

Offline Address Book


As mentioned earlier, the offline Address Book is basically a local copy of all or part of the Global Address Book, and it is handled just like the offline folders covered in the last section.

The purpose for the offline Address Book is simple. When you work offline, there isn't any way to address e-mail because you are not connected to an Exchange server. Unless you have all the addresses you need stored in your Personal Address Book, you should create an offline Address Book.

You create the offline Address Book by selecting Tools | Synchronize | Download Address Book.

Before you create the offline Address Book, you are presented with two options as shown in Figure 12.21. You can either download the entire Global Address Book and all the details, or you can skip the details. The latter downloads faster and takes less space. If you plan to use encryption, you must download details. Having a copy of the main address book is invaluable if you spend time working in Exchange while not connected to a server. Obviously, this process must be done while online and connected to the Exchange server.

Figure 12.21. When creating an offline Address Book, you can opt to not download the details if you want to save room and synchronize faster.

Other User Options


As you've probably noticed by now, there are many options available in the client—maybe even some you won't ever use. Besides the ones covered up to this point, there are several other user options available.

Some are intuitive and obvious, like saving a file, opening a file, setting general options, and so on. I won't bother talking about those. However, there are three other main ones I want to mention that serve to round out the client features.

Views


Views enable you to group your messages in ways to better organize and manage them.

The client Viewer has some default views built into it, and you can select them using the View | Personal Views or View | Folder Views menus. But if you don't like those, you can build your own.

Choose View | Define Views to bring up the Define Views dialog box as shown in Figure 12.22.

Figure 12.22. You can design your own Folder views and Personal views using the Define Views dialog box.

Folder views are available only to the specific folders in which they are created. For example, if you had some data that was specific to a particular folder, that would be a good place for a folder view. It wouldn't apply to all folders, just the one for which it was created.

Personal views are available to all folders. For example, if you have a personal preference for the way fields are presented when you look at your inbox, you could create a personal view for it. That view would also apply to other folders you open.

Simply select the type of view you want to create—Folder or Personal—and click New. From there just name your view, select the columns, groupings, sorting, and filter, and you're finished. The client online help provides more details.

The Assistants


There are two client assistants found in the Tools menu: the Inbox Assistant and the Out of Office Assistant, shown in Figures 12.23 and 12.24, respectively.

Figure 12.23. The Inbox Assistant lets you apply rules to process the incoming e-mail.

Figure 12.24. The Out of Office Assistant automates your mailbox while you are out of the office.

The functions of these two assistants are somewhat related in that they both provide automated processing for your incoming e-mail.

The Inbox Assistant is simply there to process your incoming e-mail and hopefully make life a little easier for you. By applying rules to each incoming message, the Assistant can decide whether to keep it, move it, trash it, and so on, depending on how you configure the rules.

For example, say you want to delete all mail that comes from someone named John Smith. Just configure the rule to look for e-mail from John, and select the Delete action. The Assistant takes care of it from there. If you decide to start keeping John's e-mail for some reason, just delete the rule.

The Out of Office Assistant is there to manage your mailbox for you when you aren't there to manage it personally. It performs the same function as the Inbox Assistant, with one addition: it will automatically respond to incoming e-mail with a message you give it.

For example, say you will be out of the office for a week, and you don't plan to take a computer with you to work remotely. And because you're so popular, you just know your mailbox will fill while you are gone. Plus, you really don't want to deal with people thinking you are just slacking off and ignoring them by not answering their e-mail. In addition, you still want to trash John Smith's e-mails. Just configure the Assistant as shown in Figure 12.24, and you're set.

Both Assistants' rules are server-based. That is, as long as the rule does not reference a personal folder (PST), they will be applied any time. You do not have to be logged in for the rules to take effect.

These features are quite useful. I recommend you play around with them and see for yourself how they work.

Searching


The client provides another useful tool: the ability to search any of your folders to find something. This is especially handy if you're like me and you keep tons of old e-mail. I can never remember where I put stuff after a few months.

You activate the search applet in the Tools | Find menu. I call it an applet because it is actually a separate window from the main Exchange client Viewer—much like the Address Book is a separate window.

Figure 12.25 shows what the Find applet looks like.

Figure 12.25. The Find applet gives you the capability to search your folders for messages.

For example, to continue talking about your pesky e-mail-sending colleague, John Smith, say you got some e-mail from him at one time that you decided to keep. You know you moved it to your personal folder, but you aren't sure how many there are and what they said. Just configure a search to look for all messages from John Smith, and it will locate them for you.

You can also use Find on the inbox or wherever you have messages stored.

Summary


Whew! This chapter covered a lot of client topics.

As you can see, the Exchange client has much to offer in features and functionality. I find it to be very useful, and everyone I talk to that uses it says they like it, too.

If you've never used the client before, hopefully you will like the looks of the Exchange client after reading this chapter. If you are already somewhat acquainted with it, then you probably have your opinions formed. Perhaps, though, this chapter has helped fill the gaps in your knowledge so you can get more out of the software than you had before.

Previous Page TOC Next Page