Exchange 2010 - The Plan

We understand that Microsoft Exchange 2010 is expected to be released in late 2009 or first quarter 2010. This release is targeted at Enterprises, for various technical reasons it will only be supported by Microsoft in a single tenant model. For hosters, this means it will only be supported for dedicated hosting.

Microsoft also intends to launch a new hosting version of Exchange 2010. This version will have a completely new model of Multi-tenanting with numerous advantages over the permissions based model currently used in Exchange 2007. This will be released at a later date to be announced.

The EMS-Cortex approach to Exchange 2010 is as follows:
- Dedicated Exchange 2010 hosting will be supported within 2 months of Exchange 2010 RTM.

- EMS-Cortex is currently working on an interim Exchange 2010 multi-tenant solution. The solution will be based on current Exchange 2007 multi-tenanting design. If it is technically possible to achieve this using the Exchange 2010 RTM, we will offer this to our customers. We expect to know if this is possible on or shortly after release.

- There are several things to consider when looking to offer this in a production hosted environment:
o It is expected that the solution will be unsupported by Microsoft.
o All Support from EMS-Cortex will be without SLA and will be best efforts only. Patches and bug fixes will be provided at EMS-Cortex discretion
o EMS-Cortex will not offer support for your Exchange 2010 hosting environment – only the control panel. We will publish any and all knowledge we gain from customers doing this in our knowledge base.
o The Cortex functionality for Exchange 2010 is expected to replicate Exchange 2007 functionality – it will not expand or expose any new functionality in 2010. In fact it may remove some new functions in exchange 2010.
o There will be no migration or upgrade path from EMS-Cortex to move users or customers from unsupported multitenant exchange 2010 to hosting version Exchange 2010.

EMS-Cortex will offer full support for the multi-tenant version of Exchange 2010, we expect this to be available within 1 month of this product being generally available.

Please get in touch with us to find out more or to give us any feedback.

Active Directory User Synchronisation Utility

Cortex v8.3 has recently been released. One of the key new features is the new integrated Cortex "User Synch" feature. This is designed to ease the move from on-premises to hosted services by offering simple and effective identity provisioning and password synchronisation.

The User Synch utility comprises a small Windows Service that is deployed to each of the customers on-premises domain controllers. Selected users in the customers local AD are automatically provisioned to Cortex, any password change, or change in the users properties, will result in an update being made to the user in Cortex.

Cortex offers added benefits by
- Allowing service providers and resellers to control who can use the User Synch Service.
- providing each customer with a customised User Synch installer - preconfigured to connect to Cortex. This makes deployment a snap - the deployment can be achieved in a matter of minutes.
- Users that have been synchronised cannot have their details changed in Cortex or have their passwords reset. This is because they are controlled by the customers AD.

User Synch is expected to be used by customers with 50+ users, up to 1000s of users. The solution has been tested on Windows 2003 and 2008 (both 32 and 64 bit versions), it has not been tested on Windows 2000.

The solution provides a simple and robust alternative to high-end identity management solutions. It is tuned for the hosting environment and gives Cortex powered service providers another point of differentiation in an increasingly competitive market.

For more information on User Synch, please contact us sales@ems-cortex.com - we have a white paper on the solution that we are happy to send out on request.