Phasing in new e-mail, calendaring systems
By JAMES COPE
November 20, 2008 (reprinted from NDWorks)
A new e-mail system is being introduced to faculty and staff in administrative offices throughout campus. Early users attest the system is faster and more effective.
The change introduces Microsoft’s Exchange Server and sets a higher bar for e-mail functionality and reliability than the central system it replaces, says Katie Rose, program manager for enterprise initiatives. “The change (to Exchange central e-mail) is seamless to staff and faculty users, and they still can use their favorite desktop e-mail applications, including Eudora,” Rose says. As the central server in the University data center, Exchange works in conjunction with any e-mail program, including the popular Eudora and Outlook.
Frances Shavers, chief of staff and special assistant to the president, notes, “The transition went smoothly here. It (Exchange) gives us the capacity to communicate more quickly and effectively than before.” The staff of the Investment Office and the Mendoza College of Business also reported smooth transitions.
The all-campus e-mail transition is occurring nightly, as OIT engineers, division and department managers and IT staffs migrate e-mail accounts on a rolling basis. All faculty and staff are expected to be using Exchange by Christmas. To smooth the process, OIT is working closely with departments to notify individual users before and after their e-mail is moved to Exchange.
According to Rose, some 600 e-mail users had been moved over to the new system as of Nov. 10. “We will double that over the next few days, after which the number migrated will increase exponentially as we head toward Christmas break,” she says.
David Yeh, IT director for business school information technology, says a big bonus of the move to Exchange is a new and more robust Webmail employing Outlook Web Access (owa.nd.edu). It includes task, note, address book and calendaring features. “Everyone who uses it finds that it’s very fast.” Yeh also likes it that contact names and information now can reside on the Exchange servers instead of taking up space on the computer user’s local hard drive.
The Investment Office staff is particularly pleased with Exchange’s integration with smart phones such as iPhones and Blackberries, says David Ludwig, Investment Office director of IT and analytics.
Yeh and Ludwig say they also appreciate the quadrupling of e-mail storage—1 gigabyte for Exchange compared to 250 megabytes on the soon-to-be-old e-mail system.
On Jan. 7, users of CorporateTime will switch their calendaring program to Exchange. It will allow users of Windows Outlook collaboration program to manage and share calendars, tasks and notes. Macintosh users will enjoy similar features through Apple’s Entourage 2008.
All computer users with Internet access will be able to use Outlook Web Access (owa.nd.edu) when it replaces Notre Dame’s current Webmail. Visit oit.nd.edu/exchange for further information.