So I’ve been busy lately and some things weren’t really related to Archiving.  Yesterday I officially added US Citizenship to my list of accomplishments.

One of the main reasons for me to become a US Citizen (I get to keep the other one that I have so I have now 2 passports) is plain and simple.  In the US the voting/democracy system is different.  People get to vote regularly in general elections on things that directly impact them and their community.  After having lived in the US for many years I got more and more frustrated that I wasn’t allowed to voice my opinion on things that matter to me and impact the future of my family and children. Therefore I made the choice myself to go through the process.   The ceremony was pretty nice … had 147 people from 41 countries in the room which is a nice mix of people and it sort of reminded me of the fact that everyone in the US somehow is either a direct immigrant or a decedent of immigrants and we should be proud for having such diversity.

It makes some things easier … some things more complicated for me, but I’m glad I made the decision (plus I was actually able to register to vote in time for the November elections last night).

A little late with posting this one .. but interesting none the less.   Since MSFT already has search after the multi billion dollar purchase of FAST, it makes you wonder what else MSFT could be interested in.   Interwoven?

Autonomy jumps on Microsoft interest talk -traders

http://www.reuters.com/article/technology-media-telco-SP/idUSLO11945020090924

This is a question that has been asked many times.  During an upgrade to Exchange 2007 or even Exchange 2010 in the future, all mailbox data within the legacy Exchange 2003 Server would typically be migrated into the new Exchange 2007 Server. Since a migration will copy old, infrequently accessed, or fixed/static email data, it may be a time consuming and inefficient process depending on the volume of inactive data. The excessive bulk of this data will also impact performance and capacity on the new servers, and increase backup and restore times.

Using an email archiving solution prior to a migration delivers some distinct advantages:

• It identifies old or unnecessary email data so administrators can take informed, intelligent actions on whether to remove, archive, or migrate the data. This simplifies and streamlines migration to Exchange 2007.

• It retains archived email data in a format that can be accessed in the future to comply with various regulatory requirements and for e-discovery purposes. This eliminates any need for support or updates to legacy Exchange 2003 systems.

• It prevents from having to re-architect the storage tied to the Exchange 2007 system when the archiving system is installed after the migration as the Exchange 2007 storage sizing will be sized to include the inactive data which could contribute to 80% of the total storage.  Deploying the archive before also ensures that the storage for the Exchange Servers is adequately sized.

After a migration with email archiving, Exchange 2007 servers will be much more efficient by maximizing data storage usage and performance. The reduction of the storage footprint of the Exchange Server will also significantly improve the Backup and restore times. Email archiving provides ongoing benefits after the migration such as mailbox size and quota management so users no longer need to store data in PST files, and sophisticated search capabilities to enforce policies on inappropriate email content. While Exchange 2007 includes limited archiving in the form of Managed Folders and Journaling, these features do not provide a full solution for compliance nor storage management.

I speak regularly on archiving and related technologies, not only on webinars and seminars, but also on larger conferences.  Penton Media organizes events twice a year which they call the Connections events.  These are held during the spring and fall of each year.  This fall is a little bit different and they have decided to make all of their conferences available online so that you can still enjoy the conference and watch it online.

I am hosting a session on PST consolidation (one of my favorite topics). So if you can’t convince your organization to send you to the conference, you can save the airfare and hotel and watch the online presentations you want to watch for a small fee.

Connections isn’t just restricted to Exchange as there are other Connections tracks available too: SharePoint, Windows, SQL, ASP.NET, etc. Visit the main website for Connections Online! for more information.

In choosing an archiving solution for SharePoint, it is important to ask these questions:

• What scope of SharePoint content and metadata is captured? Some solutions capture only a portion of SharePoint content, e.g., specific documents or document collections. This kind of capture supports fine-grained recovery. Others capture not only document-type content, but also all the context data for the environment—the rich data that makes a SharePoint site interactive (lists, blog and wiki entries, front-end web server information, and more). All of this content and metadata is important for eDiscovery, compliance, and recovery; a holistic archiving solution must capture and store it all. When content and context are captured, it is possible to perform coarse-grained recovery to restore or migrate full SharePoint environments.

• How is the SharePoint content captured? Content can be captured from SharePoint continuously or periodically. Continuous capture of all content related to specific departments guarantees your needs for compliance and eDiscovery are covered.

• Does the solution provide more than just lower-cost storage? Archives provide great value in enabling the move of content from production systems to cheaper storage, but an archive that can also facilitate recovery provides even greater value. Having archiving and recovery in one solution means less complexity for IT to manage and greater operational efficiency and cost savings.

• How does the archiving solution enable end-users to access SharePoint content? When end users go to SharePoint to get their content, they don’t want to be redirected and they don’t want to search two repositories for data. Rather, the right solution will make access seamless, leaving content directly accessible through the SharePoint interface. It will also integrate seamlessly with the SharePoint search index, allowing archived content to appear in search results alongside active content. Be sure that your archiving solution enables seamless end-user access so that you don’t have to train users on new ways to access their information.

• How does the solution enable eDiscovery and retention management? Since the amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure (FRCP) took effect in 2006, organizations have struggled to implement defensible litigation holds, especially on high-volume content sources like SharePoint. A good archiving solution will allow very granular controls over retention; that granular control stems from comprehensive capture capabilities and flexible retention rules. A unified content archive allows an organization to quickly implement item-level litigation holds and conduct eDiscovery through one simple interface.

• Is the solution part of an integrated content archiving platform? The most efficient archiving solution unifies email, file, and SharePoint archiving. Not only does this make tasks like setting litigation holds faster and easier, but it reduces storage costs by providing single-instance storage across all the content sources.

I hear many stories and FUD can be pretty crafty, but the one I heard this week topped it all:

“Don’t use this companies software as their eDiscovery module has a backdoor and will forward all your email to the US Government”

I’m withholding the vendor that brought this up … but crazy stuff like this isn’t going to be very effective.

http://www.ediscoverylaw.com/2009/07/articles/news-updates/governor-schwarzenegger-signs-californias-electronic-discovery-act-to-be-effective-immediately/

After previously vetoing a prior version of the bill for budgetary reasons, Governor Schwarzenegger signed California’s Electronic Discovery Act last night, to be effective immediately. Closely tracking the 2006 amendments to the Federal Rules of Civil Procedure, the act institutes procedures to guide the discovery of electronically stored information in California.

To read the full text of the Electronic Discovery Act, click here.

I’ve broken down and am also now on Twitter.  Follow me at http://www.twitter.com/mtuip if you are interested.

It seems that not much people have been willing to touch on this subject so far so maybe I’m going to be the first one here.  As you all probably know by now, Microsoft announced Exchange 2010 back in April 15th and one of the features in Exchange 2010 that got a lot of peoples attention is that it will have build in archiving, retention and eDiscovery. I am purposely not going to single out archive company names in this article.

Microsoft positions Exchange 2010 as a ‘personal archive’ and not as ‘business archive’ solution.  The distinction is there for many reasons.  First of all, Microsoft will with this solution only focus on allowing organizations to get rid of PST files, implement large mailboxes and provide advanced search.  It will not provide records management and preservation of electronic information beyond Exchange.  It is of my opinion then though that the larger enterprises who are going to look for a more complete solution that offers functionality beyond the basics which includes:

• Integration with software and applications to manage the eDiscovery process.  Search is not eDiscovery .. a proper eDiscovery application allows you to use advanced queries to create and narrow down search result sets, review and tag this data and more (i.e. case management)
• Allow for capturing content from more than just Exchange.  Many organizations are already capturing File System data, and are moving towards implementing SharePoint as well.  Capturing more content in a unified archive makes sense for not only storage reasons but also legal and compliance reasons.

Exchange falls short of the above, but it will probably gain traction in this space more or less with the smaller organizations that are going to look for a basic archiving solution.  These customers have been there all along and are happily served by some of the around 85 companies now in this space.  I personally think that Microsoft will start to take away business from the vendors that don’t offer anything beyond email, those that provide solutions that cover the basics.  After all .. why should a company spend money to buy the exact same ‘basic solution’ from a 3rd party when it is in the base product.

Now .. there are many things that Exchange 2010 doesn’t solve, so organizations that are looking at Exchange 2010 need to clearly understand what can be done with the application and what not.  If you are looking for case management in eDiscovery .. nope .. isn’t there .. if you are looking for a solution that can locate and ingest your PST files in your network beyond the file server .. nope .. can’t do that either.  Do your homework well and make a good decision, but make sure that if you are thinking about archiving beyond Exchange (File Systems and SharePoint) even if you might not do that now but next year  , you have to pick a vendor that can offer that and not pick one that will block you down the road

I will be hosting a Bird of a Feather roundtable next week during Teched in Los Angeles, CA .. and it might be nice to meet you if you are going.

BOF02 Regulatory Compliance, Archiving, and Electronic Discovery with Microsoft Exchange Server
Mon 5/11 | 2:45 PM-4:00 PM | Room 501A

Birds-of-a-Feather, Microsoft® Exchange Server

Regulatory compliance has become a core requirement for many companies. Producing e-mail evidence for courts or regulatory organizations can be challenging, given the massive volumes of data, the intricacies of the legal process, and the disparity that often exists between legal and IT departments. We discuss the compliance functionality in Microsoft Exchange Server, such as archiving and electronic discovery, complementary needs for companies wishing to be proactive in compliance. Come and share the solutions you’ve found to assist in dealing with Exchange compliance.

Speaker Bio:

Martin Tuip is a nine-time Microsoft® MVP for Exchange Server. He started his IT career in system administration, but has gone on to focus most of his career on archiving and compliance products. Martin is the webmaster of several resource sites and discussion groups for Microsoft Exchange and SharePoint and regularly speaks on email archiving and Exchange Server.