IMS issue 1

[philipsr1]

In my company the mainframe service vendor is providing email service also. We are planning to change the vendor for email. Right now the default gateway is setup to be the IP address of the router connected to the point to point link of the mainframe vendor. We also have a T1 link for internet connection. The exchange server is in our private network with IP 10.24.208.20. Right now when we add a user in exchange server and specify the external email address, he is able to send internal and external email messages. In IMS "forward all messages to host” is enabled and the mainframe vendor SMTP server address is given.
When I talked to the T1 vendor he mentioned that if we choose them as the email provider I will have to add each user in their system and assign password.
Please advice me on the steps to take to change the vendor for email.

Thanks in advance.

 

[zbnet]

Your current email provider is hosting your MX records in DNS, and providing you with a 'smarthost' (the IP address your IMS is forwarding all email to). So you are basically getting an SMTP email feed from your current email provider - many many ISPs will give you a very similar service.

It sounds a bit like your new service provider is offering you a fully hosted solution, where all the mailboxes are on their system - you should check out the details of this, as it is a radically different solution (if I have interpreted what you have reported them saying correctly). This is sometimes known as ASP (Application Service Provider) and can prove much more expensive if you're not careful.

 

[philipsr1]

Thank you very much for the advice. Do you know any company that provide the smarthost service in New york area?

 

[zbnet]

Hey, just about any ISP who deals with dedicated (always on) business connections (as opposed to ISPs concentrating on the home dialin markey) can help you. You're basically asking for an SMTP email feed service.

Take a look at

http://www.swinc.com/resources/exchange/smtp.asp

for lots of help setting this stuff up, and even how to communicate with the ISP when they start getting awkward - although I suspect it is far easier these days than the time when the FAQ was written.