Migrate from Groupwise, there are a few things that need to be considered before you make this move. Calendars, shared folders, and distribution lists are the top three. You might also want to consider the users will now be using Microsoft Outlook 2003, Outlook web access for exchange 2003 and possibly vpn from home to the server

Shared Calendars

In GroupWise, users can share calendars with one another. This generally occurs between an admin and their assistant. Outlook and Exchange also has this capability. The issues with shared calendars in terms of migration are primarily if and how these shared calendars will be migrated as well as how these shared calendars will be implemented within Outlook and Exchange.

• Discovery – Discovery only needs to occur if end users will not be configuring their own shared calendars.
• Implementation – Implementation can occur in one of two ways. One method is to have the end users configure this themselves. The shared calendar users would need instructions and/or training to perform these actions. This could be covered in email user training. Alternatively, a dedicated resource could configure these calendars and permissions.

Shared Folders

Shared folders primarily involve discovery and implementation. In GroupWise, users share personal folders with others. In Outlook and Exchange, this model is possible, but not recommended. Instead, it is recommended to use public folders for this purpose. To migrate these folders, some form of discovery needs to take place to identify these folders. Then, an evaluation will need to be made to determine whether the folder should become a public folder. Evaluation criteria includes relevance, current usage, etc.

• Discovery – Discovery essentially consists of communication to all mailboxes asking for the identification of whether they use shared folders, what those folders are, what they are used for and whether the user believes that they should be migrated to public folders. Also, depending on the implementation strategy, the permissions to those shared folders might also be a required part of discovery. See “Appendix D: Communication to Users About Shared Folders”
• Implementation – Implementation consists of creating the public folders and assigning permissions. There are several implementation issues that must be considered. First, will existing data be copied to public folders? If so, who will copy data to the public folder, end users or a dedicated resource? If the end user, then they will require instructions and/or training for performing this action. This could be covered in email user training. Alternatively, a dedicated resource could use the output of the discovery and evaluation to log into each user’s mailbox that had shared folders and move the data. Second, who will define permissions for these public folders. There are two approaches. The first approach is that a dedicated resource assigns a primary owner to each public folder. The primary owner would be the user with the shared folder in GroupWise. This user could then configure permissions for others. The public folder owners would need instructions and/or training to perform these actions (could be covered in email user training). Alternatively, a dedicated resource could configure these permissions.

Distribution Lists

Distribution lists are fairly straight-forward to migrate since they work essentially the same in both GroupWise and Exchange.

• Discovery – Discovery is fairly easy as all distribution lists and their members can be exported from NDS.
• Evaluation – Each distribution list should be evaluated according to a set of criteria to determine whether it is still valid and needed. An email may be composed and sent to all mailboxes asking for users to identify distribution lists that they use.
• Implementation – Unless there are a huge number of distribution lists, it makes the most sense to simply make this a manual process of creating the group, mail enabling it and adding members to it. This will be good practice for Exchange administrators.

 
Intercore has performed numerous migration from Groupwise to Exchange and From Exchange 5.5 to Exchange. We are pros when it comes to migration. Give us a call for a free onsite evaluation of your migration process.