Exchange Personal Archives

Overview

Microsoft Exchange Server accounts can be set up with an Exchange Personal Archive by the Exchange administrator. The Exchange personal archive is a specialized Exchange mailbox in addition to a users’ primary Exchange mailbox that exists within the Exchange server environment. In Microsoft Outlook 2010, the Personal Archive appears in the Navigation Pane beneath your primary Exchange mailbox folders.

The Exchange personal archive is a new feature of Exchange that became available with Exchange SP1.  Previous to Exchange 2010 SP1, most organizations “archived” email to a flat file called an Outlook Data File (.pst).  These Outlook Data files were stored on the local PC or on the company file server.  Unlike Outlook Data Files (.pst) that are only accessible on the computer where the file is saved, items in the Exchange Personal Archive are available in Outlook from any computer that you use or in Outlook Web App (OWA).

If you previously archived messages to an Outlook Data Files (.pst), you can open those archives and move messages from that file into the Personal Archive. This makes all of your messages accessible online with Outlook Web App (OWA) or from other computers where you use Outlook 2010.

Benefits of Personal Archive

Messages from your Exchange account can also be moved to the Personal Archive automatically with archive polices, which reduces your mailbox size. In addition, retention policies apply to the e-mail messages in the Personal Archive as well, which ensures compliance with regulatory or organization retention rules.

• Reduce the size of your Exchange Server account – Items in the Personal Archive don’t count against your Exchange mailbox size quota. Your Exchange administrator can tell you what the storage size limit is for both your primary Exchange mailbox and your Personal Archive.
• Archive policies automatically move items – Archive policies can apply to specific messages, conversations, or folders in your Exchange Server account. For example, a message can be tagged with an archive policy so that it is automatically moved to the Personal Archive after a specified amount of time. These policies vary by organization.
• All of your day-to-day and archived items are immediately accessible – Both your primary Exchange mailbox and the Personal Archive are saved on the server running Exchange. This means that you have access to all of your items from any computer that you use with Outlook 2010. Also, all of your items are available in Outlook Web App. Previous archive solutions using an Outlook Data File (.pst) restricted access to only the computer where the file was saved; no access to an Outlook Data File (.pst) is available in Outlook Web Access (OWA).
• Use search across all messages – In Outlook 2010 or OWA you can use search to find a message regardless of whether it is in your Exchange mailbox or the Personal Archive.

Licensing of Personal Archive

Use of the Outlook Data Files (.pst) was included with the license for Office or Outlook.  For Exchange Personal Archives, there are Microsoft Outlook and Microsoft Exchange Server license requirements in order to utilize the features listed.  For the Exchange server licensing, every user that will use the Exchange Personal Archives will require an Exchange Enterprise Client Access License (CAL).  For the Microsoft Outlook licensing, every user that will access their Exchange Personal Archive from Outlook will require a certain version of Outlook or of Office.  The list below outlines the requirements for Office/Outlook.  Keep in mind that all users have the capability of accessing the Exchange Personal Archive from Outlook Web App (OWA) so some users may not require access to the Exchange Personal Archive through Outlook.

Outlook volume licenses

These licenses are available through volume licensing only.

Supported	Not supported
Outlook   2013 stand-alone   Outlook   2013 included with Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2013   Outlook   2010 stand-alone   Outlook   2010 included with Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2010   Outlook   20071 stand-alone   Outlook   20071 included with Microsoft Office Professional Plus 2007   Outlook   20071 included with Microsoft Office Enterprise 2007	Outlook 2013 included with Microsoft Office Standard 2013 Outlook 2010 included with Microsoft Office Standard2 2010 Outlook 2007 included with Microsoft Office Standard 2007

¹Archive policies don’t appear in the Outlook 2007 user interface. They can only be deployed or changed by an Exchange Server administrator, Outlook 2007 users can view or change policies only in Outlook Web App (OWA), and only if OWA is enabled.

Without policies, the following is possible:

• Drag and drop messages to and from the Personal Archive
• Copy and paste messages to and from the Personal Archive
• Use the Move menu to move or copy messages to the Personal Archive
• Create client-side rules to move or copy messages to the Personal Archive

Users can only perform a search in the selected folder in the Personal Archive. Also, any search performed using Instant Search in a folder in the primary Exchange Server account — even when All Mail Items is specified — doesn’t return items in the Personal Archive.

Jacob Eker, PEI