Get your messaging right
By Del Smith
Monday, June 03, 2002 12:01 PM
It's only been a few years since e-mail became a necessity in the corporate realm. Yet already, our insatiable need for
real-time communication is threatening the use of e-mail. Where is this threat coming from? The answer may surprise you.
META Group estimates that the number of "official" corporate instant messaging users (i.e., the ones that IT departments know about) will grow from 5 million now to 200 million in 2005. Microsoft, whose Exchange product helped lead to the success of e-mail as we know it, is staking its claim to the IM market share with Exchange 2000's IM services. According to Microsoft, “Instant messaging…is poised to play a significant role as a business tool for organizations of all sizes.”
Let's take a look at some of the features of Exchange 2000 IM, its advantages over public IM systems, and how IT departments can benefit from deploying it.
Why Exchange 2000 IM?
Of course, Microsoft did not invent instant messaging. Public IM service providers such as America Online (AOL) and Yahoo have long offered their version of instant messaging with their proprietary protocols and client software. So why Exchange 2000 IM in the corporate enterprise? Organizations seeking a viable IM service are being attracted to Exchange because it offers a number of desirable features. These include the following:
If you use public IM service providers, your conversation is spread across the Internet. But because Exchange 2000 is an internal IM server, network users and groups can participate in real-time, secure conversations generally free from unauthorized eavesdroppers.
Exchange 2000’s IM architecture allows companies to administer their own instant messaging infrastructure. Businesses can limit their users to instant messaging within the organization or allow users to send instant messages to other IM users across the Internet.
Exchange 2000 IM allows people to use the same corporate account they use to log on to their system and access their Outlook mailbox.
Real-time communication is achieved with coworkers individually or through a group discussion. All conversation threads sent and received in an instant messaging session appear in a scrolling history pane until the session is ended and can be logged.
Real-time sharing of files and documents can be achieved without the need for shared folders and assigning access permissions.
Exchange Instant Messaging Client Run-Time Components allow applications to provide instant messaging functionality when used with the Exchange 2000 Instant Messaging Service.
Exchange 2000 also supports third-party applications that allow enterprises to leverage its IM capabilities for real-time communications between businesses, customers, and partners.
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