You don't want to do it like that .....

A few weeks ago, I was invited to go to another company. Whilst there, I had the chance to talk to a couple of their IT people about some of the issues that they face.

One of the first things that I discovered was that they have a real problem with their Exchange Server – it regularly stops working because the database un mounts. I was interested to know why, because we have only had that happen to us once in 4 years; and that was just after we had migrated from Exchange 5.5 to Exchange 2003.

It appears that their mailbox database is 85 GB in size; quite a bit over the 75 GB that is referred to in all the material on Exchange. All of the stuff that I found indicates that this will cause regular un mounting of the database due to the limits of the product (Standard edition).

I was a bit surprised at the size of their mail store – ours is just over 16 GB in size and we have about the same number of users. I told them that we operate a rigid set of limits – 200 MB per user for their mailbox and no attachments over 5 MB in size. They were astonished that we could get away with that; they told me that their users would be very unhappy at such limits. But as I asked them, are the users happy that the email system goes offline several times a week?

We’ve found that if you allow certain people more space, they just push it to the limit and if you then give them more, they will just save more rubbish. We’ve had people delete files, then leave these in the deleted folder – just in case they want to refer to the mail. We’ve had people keep emails from 10 years ago – in many cases the sender or recipient concerned are no longer around. Unfortunately, our experience shows that users will not manage their mailboxes unless you force them to.

We also found that people were just emailing files without even thinking about what they were doing; no attempt to compress or even check if it was appropriate to email the files. The worst case was someone from a sister company sending in a .pdf file of 80MB – to make it worse, the recipient was the CEO and he only wanted the one page from the document, not the whole file. We also regularly get people sending large files to multiple recipients – a few weeks ago, someone tried to email a software attachment of 8 MB to 20 people.

So we enforce the limits with absolute rigidity, and for the most part our users are used to this. We do allow them to archive off some mail to data files that are stored separately on a server – and these are then backed up as part of our normal backup routine. As a result, we get very few problems – this would indicate that our way of working is efficient and therefore other people would be wise to follow what we do.

However, what works for us most definitely would not work for other people. I’m aware that there are people that need to keep emails for much longer and are not allowed to delete anything as they have to keep records of all contacts for regulatory reasons. There is a tendency for IT people to assume that what they do will work for everyone – a bit like the Harry Enfield character who insists “You don’t what to do it like that, you want to do ….”

Unfortunately, in many cases, the person so insistent that he knows the best way to do something is unaware of all the facts. I had exactly that a few years ago; someone insisted that I could fix a problem by doing a particular thing to the TCP/IP settings. When I pointed out that we were using IPX/SPX, it meant nothing to him – he had never worked with NetWare and didn’t understand the difference between the two networking protocols.

Despite this, I am of the view that we could do a lot more in the industry to pass information on good practice around between people. In our department, we regularly find hints and tips that we like to test out in case there is something that helps make our job easier or prevents problems from occurring. Sometimes they work, sometimes they don’t – but it’s all good.

Email me

I do actually remember sending my first email. It would have been around 1990 - I had been playing with PCs for about 3 years. I had managed to get some odd bits & pieces of equipment from an auction; one of these was a modem that ran at a blistering 2,400 bits per second. And in those days, there was no plug and play, you had to create files that would contain the necessary commands to make the hardware work.

In my case, it actually took several days to get it working, but finally I managed to get it to dial out on command. The only problem then was what to connect to - there were not the ISPs we have nowadays. I actually managed to connect to a Bulletin Board Service (BBS) that I think was based in North London; I remember watching with fascination as the screen suddenly displayed a list of numerical options - of course no GUIs in those days. I vaguely remember that to post a message was option 5; I sent some messages to a couple of people, but there weren't that many people you could mail.

Of course it has all changed now; email is a major tool of the business and it is difficult to imagine how we could work effectively without using it. Every department relies heavily on being able to contact others, both inside and outside the company. And unfortunately, this leads to some major problems. Previously, the company had very few effective controls on the email and no email policies at all. I made my self quite unpopular because I insisted on setting these controls in place and worst of all, enforcing them with total rigidity.

To begin with, we upgraded to Exchange 2003 from 5.5 which was quite a task in itself - nothing had been prepared and the AD wasn't quite right. Later we had to move from an older server to a newer rack mounted device with more processors, memory and storage, and that process was much easier - in fact one of the easiest migrations I've ever had to do. We also started to get people moved from all different varieties of Outlook onto one version (2003); it took several months, but we got there.

Among the changes we made was to implement a fixed limit on mailbox sizes - just 200 Mb. Now for most people that is not a problem; but we regularly keep an eye on the sizes, and every time, it's the same names that appear close to the limit. I regularly get asked to increase the size limit but refuse; if I increase it, they will just let it run to the new higher limit, then complain that isn't enough.

To provide some assistance, I set-up space for mail to be archived to a .pst file on a designated space on a server, so it gets backed up as well. People have been shown how to archive, but you could be forgiven for thinking that we hadn't as so many users still don't seem to be able to do this.

We also limit the size of attachments on incoming and outgoing mail to 5 Mb. You would not believe the number of emails that get rejected due to the size of attachments - and the size of some of these; we still get complaints that a mail won't go through when it has a 20 or 30 Mb attachment. We've shown pople how to use other methods of transferring files, but they just don't want to know. As an example, I checked the mail logs yesterday and there was another incoming mail rejected from a user at our parent company in Germany - the person had attached a spreadsheet of 14 Mb, and sent copies to 5 other users in Germany, and 6 in the UK. When it failed, the person then re-sent it to all 11 people twice more!

Still, I suppose that I can't complain; the system is now working really well (apart from the users!) - we have even managed to add the domain for our French company to the system and they now connect to us for their email. Il marche tres bien! In fact, it looks as though they are particularly impressed as we fix issues for them far quicker than their previous host.

Just now have to wait for Exchange 2010....