Alternatives to Public Folders for Shared Messages 1

[Tightpants]

We currently store all shared e-mails in public folders - one folder for each project. Our public folder store keeps growing and I'm concerned that it would take days to restore in the event of a problem. I have also heard that Microsoft are encouraging users to move away from public folders anyway.

We find public folders really easy to use because we can drag and drop messages into folders for others to see. When users are offline it is possible to still view public folders if the "download public folders favourites" option is enabled.

My questions are:

1. What methods are others using to share e-mails?
2. What are Microsoft suggesting we use in place of public folders?
3. Should we continue as we are but use Symantec Enterprise Vault to automatically archive public folders when the messages contained in them reach a certain age.

Your suggestions would be welcome.

 

[Zelandakh]

1. Sharepoint.
2. Sharepoint.
3. Yes, that or any other archival solution.

 

[Tightpants]

My concern about Sharepoint is that it may be just solving one problem and creating another! Is it just a simple "front end" to a file based storage system?

I am tempted by Oasys Mail Manager -

http://www.oasys-software.com/products/document_management/mailmanager/

- because this seems to offer most of the facilities we need and stores all the e-mails in a simple folder structure. Easy to back up and restore if there's a problem. Also I won't need any extra servers and it is relatively inexpensive. Is anyone else using this product?

 

[Tightpants]

We have just installed Windows Sharepoint Services for storing our e-mails instead of public folders. The end result is very disappointing. You can't drag and drop messages into Sharepoint sites as you can with public folders, so it's virtually useless.

I can't believe we are the only company in the world who just needs a simple filing system for e-mails which integrates fully with Outlook for filing and searching.

The beauty with public folders is that the folders look like standard mailbox folders such as inbox and sent items. So you can browse any public folder for shared messages. Add to that the facilities for offline copies of public folders and the system is exactly what we need, which is why we use it.

It is just a pity that the public folders are contained within a flaky Exchange database rather than a simple file system or SQL database.