Exchange Calendaring Proposal — Approved by Tech Council 01/22/2007 — Problem There are currently two shared calendar solutions in use at Illinois State University: Meeting Maker, with 1,500 accounts, and Outlook, connected to Exchange servers, with 1,000 accounts. There may be as many as 600 Exchange users who use Outlook exclusively, and there may be as many as 400 Exchange users who use both meeting Maker and Outlook solutions and try to keep them in sync manually. There are nearly 1,100 people who do not have an Exchange account and who use Meeting Maker exclusively. A single campus wide shared calendar solution would benefit all users. Proposed Temporary Solution A centralized and consolidated Exchange model is the best solution to this problem; at this time, however, that has been determined to be cost prohibitive. As a short-term, temporary solution, it is recommended that additional capacity on the existing (non-fault tolerant) Exchange infrastructure is a short-term solution be created to allow usage of Outlook/Exchange as the shared calendar for faculty/staff. The scope of this solution is limited to providing an Exchange shared calendar solution for the estimated 1,100 current Meeting Maker users who are not using Exchange, and accounts for approximately 300 resources (e.g., conference rooms) that may be included in calendar invitations. Providing services to any additional clients who are not currently using the Meeting Maker shared calendar may require the purchase of additional storage devices. Expansion of the Existing Exchange Infrastructure The existing Exchange infrastructure could be expanded by adding one more “back-end” server to the existing eight at an initial cost of about $15,700 (for hardware and software). This server would be configured very much like the other eight and would assume a similar role as the other eight in the “single forest, multiple tree” Exchange architecture (see Figure 1 on page 8 of the Exchange Working Group report submitted to the council on 10/09/2006). It would be addressable with a private IP address and would assume a position within the Active Directory just like the other eight back-end servers. The proposed server is a Dell PowerEdge 2950: Dual Core Inteltm Xeontm 5130, 4 MB Cache, 2.00 GHz, 1333 MHz FSB configured with 900 GB of Raid 5 usable hard drive space and further assumes that every user has a completely full 500 MB mailbox size (which is extremely unlikely). If necessary, one more 300 GB drive can be added to the purchased system (at an additional cost of $ 500) to allow more Exchange mailboxes. 22 January 2007 Page 1 of 3 Costs Item Initial Cost FY07 Annual Cost FY08 Annual Cost FY09 Annual Cost FY10 Annual Cost FY11 Dell PowerEdge 2950 $ 8,000 $ 2,000 $ 2,000 $ 2,000 $ 2,000 Meeting Maker Calendar Data migration $ 35,000 $ 0 $ 0 $ 0 $ 0 Windows 2003 server license $ 95 $ 24 $ 24 $ 24 $ 24 Exchange 2003 server license $ 1,100 $ 275 $ 275 $ 275 $ 275 GroupShield Virus protection software $ 6,499 $ 6,499 $ 6,499 $ 6,499 $ 6,499 Client Access Licenses $ 0 $ 0 $ 0 $ 0 $ 0 TOTAL $ 50,694 $ 8,798 $ 8,798 $ 8,798 $ 8,798 Migrating Meeting Maker Calendar Data Computer Infrastructure Support has obtained a quote for $ 35,000 to automatically migrate calendar data from Meeting Maker to Exchange. This one-time effort should migrate most, if not all, of the calendaring elements. As an alternative, this expense could be avoided by requiring all former Meeting Maker users to manually re-enter calendar information in Outlook. While this imposes a personal cost on those re-entering calendar items, and may result in overlapped meeting times, it will give those individuals immediate experience using Outlook for calendaring. Operations / Management Model Following the staffing model proposed by the Exchange Working Group in their October 2006 Report (p. 12) and endorsed by the Tech Council, Computer Infrastructure Support, in close cooperation with staff from Administrative Information Systems, and with the current Exchange Administration Group will provide staff and expertise to administer this addition to the current Exchange environment. The MOU between CISS and AIS that was created for the project outlined in the Exchange Working Group Report is not needed until the University consolidates all its back-end servers and hands over front-end administrative duties to CISS. End-User Training The University Computer Help Desk will work with other units on campus to prepare comprehensive documentation on both the transition from Meeting Maker to Outlook/Exchange and general usage. This information will be available early in the transition process to assist users in making decisions about how to handle their email and calendar data. Departmental support personnel will be responsible for providing training to their constituents on the functionality of Outlook for shared calendaring. Staff at the Center for Teaching, Learning, & Exchange Calendaring Proposal 22 January 2007 Page 2 of 3 Technology (CTLT), the Exchange Administration Group, and interested departmental support personnel should prepare a common training program that can be utilized by interested departments. Additionally, we will ask CTLT if training lab space can be made available for this activity. Timeline April 2007 Acquire 1 server + installation May 2007 Departmental support staff training End-user Outlook training June 2007 Migration of Meeting Maker calendar data Go-live Exchange Calendaring Proposal 22 January 2007 Page 3 of 3