POP access to exchange SMTP account

[shadedecho]

We are setting up an exchange 2000 server and migrating all our employees from a POP server to it. However, we have some remote users who need to continue to access their account via POP (like from outlook, eudora, etc).

I know there are a couple of options.

1. I can set their mailbox up in exchange as a POP only. Problem is that they may actually sometimes use an Exchange connection (from an office -- obviously they would want the benefits of exchange then) and sometimes just a POP connection (from a laptop on the road) and so we don't want to be converting their mailboxes back and forth.

2. Tell them to use the OWA web interface. However, we have some very unsavvy people who are set in their ways and DO NOT want to stop using their netscape or eudora email programs to check their email on their laptop.

I then got to thinking that it seems like exchange would have a way to internally translate an externally-originated POP3 request into an internal exchange request and then return the results and read-only list of messages to that POP request session.

So, I set up a test account on the exchange server, sent an email to it, and the email went through (did not get a bounceback). Then, I opened up telnet and POP'd into the server on port 110. It prompted for username and password, and it authenticated me into a POP mailbox. However, the email was not there. Upon further inspection, I was able to (with Exchange-enabled Outlook) sync with that exchange account and got the email.

This lets me know the email WAS in the exchange account, and that EITHER the pop account i was telnet'd to was a seperate account created by default at the same time as the exchange account, or the POP access to the exchange box was not reporting any messages when i entered the "list" command and got "OK 0 0" response.

So, is there a way for an account to be exchange enabled, but have simple POP access to it? If so, is this a server or a client setting? What do I do?

 

[tmckeown]

What we do is set up a POP3 mail client on the client machine. Have it access the Exchange server through POP and set the send server to the Exchange server. Then in the client POP3 we tell it to leave a copy on the server. This way, when they are in the office, they can access everything by using either their POP3 client or Outlook. I don't know if this helps much, but I went through the same thing with our users.

 

[shadedecho]

"This way, when they are in the office, they can access everything by using either their POP3 client or Outlook."

curious to me... if they are in the office, and they open their POP3 client (like eudora for instance) and they check their POP account on the exchange server (which has emails in it that are copies of the ones they've checked, because of the 'leave a copy on server' setting)... is that the SAME set of emails that they receive in their Exchange mailbox?

In my testing, as I mentioned above, it seemded that I sent a message to the exchange server email address, and that got stored in some exchange mailbox, but when i set up a client to check the server using POP3, it found an empty mailbox, which made me think (as I stated above) that Exchange was keeping 2 boxes for each user, one POP box and one Exchange box... When I checked the server using the Exchange account in Outlook, the test email was there (but as I said, it was not when checking the same account with the POP client).

if this is so, then users would have to check BOTH while at the office to get all their email, right? And also, how would the email address be different if you wanted to send a message to the POP3 version of the mailbox, as opposed to the Exchange version of the box?

What am I missing here?

 

[shadedecho]

OK never mind, I am an idiot. It was a simple configuration issue. Now, when I make a POP3 connection to the exchange server, I see my emails, just as if I look at the exchange account through OWA or by an Outlook Exchange account connection. That is exactly what I wanted, and silly me, I didn't think that Microsoft provided that ability. They do! yippee!

 

[francoischaer]

hi shadedecho

Do you mind publishing that configuration ?

I guess i am having the same problem


Thanks in advance

Francois Chaer
Network Admin

 

[deintinis]

I am able to receive e-mails from our Exchange server via a POP3 account. My problem is that when I try to send e-mail, I cannot use my exchange smtp address to do so. The only way I can send mail is to use my POP3 address but I would like to use my exchange smtp.

I figured that because I have relaying closed, it is not letting me send messages from a POP3 through the exchange server because that would be acting as a relay. Is there a way to set this up to give permissions to certain users to send mail through our exchange server using their POP3 account?