It’s the fall and the leaves are falling all around us. And so are the barriers to Exchange Archiving. Red Gate Software have announced the release of the public beta of their new tool for seamless e-mail and attachment archiving. No more talking to people you don’t want to who ask endless questions to qualify if you are ‘worthy’ of their archiver. No more ‘we’re not telling you how much it will cost until you pay us huge amounts of money to stop pestering you’.
When the release version of the tool becomes available you can simply go to a webpage, download a trial, and find out exactly how much it will cost without being bothered by anyone. Your end-users won’t pester you either as their experience will be seamless. They probably won’t even notice their mailboxes have been archived. Isn’t that refreshing? To take part in the beta program and get early access to Exchange Server Archiver, go here. There's also a screenshot gallery. We’d be delighted to hear your thoughts.
I’m currently at Exchange Connections, Las Vegas. I’d be delighted to talk to you about Exchange archiving tools, authoring for Simple Talk and anything else, for that matter. We could even do it over a beer if you like. Look out for me and say ‘Hi’ – I don’t bite!
On my journey home last night I passed the sign ‘Local produce market this Saturday. St John’s Church, 10 am.’ One of the stalls will be stocking home made lemon curd jam. This got me thinking what does ‘local’ actually mean? The market was being held here in the UK where the lemons come from shops, not the grove next door as ‘local’ implies. In fact, the nearest commercial lemon growing region is probably at least 1000 miles away. This bothered me - that’s not what I call local.
But is it? It all comes down to relativity. If you work in a remote sales office in San Diego, and you are talking to your Tech guys in Bangalore, could you say that your Chicago-based SysAdmin is local? There are arguments for and against.
Another example of personal relativity occurred recently on a boat 40 miles off the coast of Boston, MA. The boat took us to an area of shallow seas called the Stellwagen banks where exhausted humpback whales return from their calving grounds each spring to feast on the abundant sea food.
When we reached the feeding grounds at first we saw nothing but mist and sea. “There is a whale straight ahead,” announced the on-board whale expert. We all ran for the sides but all saw nothing. And then, in the not too far distance, a stereotypical ‘there she blows’ spout and we all stared in wonder. Fantastic.
Then we got closer and we saw a tail fluke. Then 2 tail flukes. Then 3. Then 4 tail flukes. No-one was looking at the spouting anymore. Then a breach! (when the whale jumps clear of the water). A stunning site at 37 tons. Nobody was watching the tail flukes anymore. Then a synchronized breach – mother and calf. At this point we were spoilt for choice. Were they doing it for fun? They looked really happy. One even appeared to wave its huge flipper at us before it dived down for another huge mouthful or two. They were, after all, gorging themselves on the human equivalent of 1 000 000 calories a day.
And now no-one was watching the 10+ whales spouting away 360 degrees around the boat. Apart from one particularly excitable gentleman and an anonymous lady who had missed the breaches because she’d been trying to photograph them – there’s a lesson to be learned here…
And what’s all this got do with Exchange, e-mail, and SysAdmins? To be honest, absolutely nothing – I just wanted to share a wonderful experience and say ‘thank you’ to the people (and whales) of Boston for making us feel so welcome.
Probably best not to get me started on the phrase ‘All natural ingredients’.
Regards,
Michael Francis
Editor, Simple Talk Exchange
michael.francis@simple-talk.com