Perparing for ActiveSync

[tomred]

Hi,

I know it's not here yet but I was wondering what the requirements are to enable ActiveSync for remote PDA access.

Do you need to be running (MS) Active Directory or LDAP?

Would you need some form of SMS gateway to receive messages from a GSM/G3 network?

Are there any other requirements that one should start to plan for?

Thanx,
Dp.

[florian]

None of the above.

You'll need your Scalix server, and it will need to be available through port 80 from the internet. You will need some ActiveSync-enabled device with a data plan.



Florian.

[tomred]

Sweet. I'll look forward to that release.
Dp.

[georgew]

I don't suppose there's the ability to tie this into a Blackberry is there? if not where is support for Blackberries on the roadmap at the moment?

I'm more that aware that there is the notifylink product which supposedly permits this functionality but which ever way you cut it, its very expensive for a small organisation.

[florian]

George,

you're correct - the blackberry is about the only somewhat relevant device on the market not properly covered by ActiveSync, therefore at this point Notify is the way to go.

The next solution available to make this easier will probably be to use Notify's SaaS hosted service, which is not yet available for Scalix, but will be later this year. This will be particularly cost effective for deployments with a small number of users.

We're also looking at integrating with the Blackberry Enterprise Server, one way or another, but really can't commit to a date or schedule for this at this point. Will also be interesting to watch how RIM's market share develops over the next 12 months, especially with the iPhone supporting ActiveSync with their 2.0 release expected next month.

Cheers,
Florian.

[kiitii]

George,

you're correct - the blackberry is about the only somewhat relevant device on the market not properly covered by ActiveSync, therefore at this point Notify is the way to go.

The next solution available to make this easier will probably be to use Notify's SaaS hosted service, which is not yet available for Scalix, but will be later this year. This will be particularly cost effective for deployments with a small number of users.

We're also looking at integrating with the Blackberry Enterprise Server, one way or another, but really can't commit to a date or schedule for this at this point. Will also be interesting to watch how RIM's market share develops over the next 12 months, especially with the iPhone supporting ActiveSync with their 2.0 release expected next month.

Cheers,
Florian.

Guys,

I was asked by a potential client regarding BES (Blackberry enterprise server).
They are existing blackberry users about 35 units of BB devices in the organization, challenges here is, how can they fully utilize BES server to integrate with new Scalix 11.4 especially on the calendaring part? They've heavily invested on BES, they do not want to just switch to ActiveSync. I am not worried about the email portion.

Any ideas?

KT

[florian]

no way as development work is required.

best thing is to talk to RIM sales that you would want/need this for scalix, because the more often they hear it, the more relevant will it be for them to work with us to make it happen.

Florian.

[mnauta]

None of the above.

You'll need your Scalix server, and it will need to be available through port 80 from the internet. You will need some ActiveSync-enabled device with a data plan.



Florian.

Can you please tell me which document explains the activesync feature (I looked at the PDFs on the website but could not specifically locate it)

Do I understand it correctly that a handheld (ie Palm Treo) connects to the scalix server via port 80 and can sync the Outlook on the PDA with the scalix user account (email, calendar and contacts)?

Thanks
manuel

[florian]

http://www.scalix.com/enterprise/techno ... s_11.4.php

http://www.scalix.com/enterprise/techno ... vesync.php

Florian.

[seanyseansean]

http://www.scalix.com/enterprise/technology/news_11.4.php

http://www.scalix.com/enterprise/techno ... vesync.php

Florian.

Do we have an ETA please for this? I'm going to be demonstrating our new Scalix system on the 15th July in Frankfurt, it would be good to have Activesync running even on a beta basis by then. I'll get double marks too for having it connect to my new 3g iphone

Thanks,

Sean

[florian]

The main dependency at this time will be Scalix Server 11.4.1, which is needed to run initial Active Sync, which will first be released as a public beta.

The timeframe you're describing may work out, however, our QA team will have the final say on that, so I can't give you any final commitments.

Florian.

[seanyseansean]

The main dependency at this time will be Scalix Server 11.4.1, which is needed to run initial Active Sync, which will first be released as a public beta.

The timeframe you're describing may work out, however, our QA team will have the final say on that, so I can't give you any final commitments.

Florian.

Another upgrade then

Will this upgrade be simply a case of adding the new component, or will it be more involved? I'm asking this because our upgrade to 11.4 didn't go great, I had to uninstall first and it didn't cope well with our boxes having a couple of virtual IPs on there. I'm a bit keen for Activesync, but i'm even keener to avoid update hell again

Thanks,

Sean

[florian]

The required server upgrade should be at the same level of complexity as a 11.3 to 11.4 upgrade.

However, and this can easily be confirmed by checking through these forums, feedback has been that this is very painless, quick and easy, so if the same wasn't true for you I would assume that it is because of a specific system setup using your virtual IPs.

You may want to open a formal support case to discuss this situation and/or provide feedback to us. Generally, even in a multi-IP situation, Scalix should always bind to one specific hostname/IP address. If multiple are available and the one to be used is not the primary one as determined by 'hostname --fqdn', it is possible to use a command line switch to lock the installer to another available hostname/IP address for the setup.

Florian.

[Kris]

None of the above.

You'll need your Scalix server, and it will need to be available through port 80 from the internet. You will need some ActiveSync-enabled device with a data plan.

:-)

Florian.

Will this also work through a proxy? I have my Scalix machine on my local network, with a Apache server acting as proxy in the DMZ. This works for SWA and Mobile webaccess, but will this also work for Active Sync?

[florian]

whatever you can convince your device to do. from the viewpoint of the AS server, it is straight http certificate handling may be tricky as devices are sensitive to that, so you may need to have something of an ssl passthrough or a new tunnel. furthermore, ActiveSync uses long-lived http connections to provide for push-email - timeouts on the proxy may interfere here.

For the first release, we will not specifically test proxy configurations.

Cheers,
Florian.