Microsoft Introduces Exchange Server 2007 Edge Services
MSG338 Microsoft IT: How MSIT Deployed Microsoft Exchange Server 2007 Edge Servers was a great session that explained the internals of the new “edge” SMTP gateway server role for the Exchange Server 2007. No longer is IIS, NNTP or any of the other traditional services needed to run the edge server. The entire SMTP stack was re-written from the ground up using managed code that is not dependent on IIS whatsoever. There are a lot of other great features in the way the server handles mail hygiene. It has auto IP blocking based on thresholds you set for the SCL (spam confidence level) for certain senders. It can also receive automatic updates from Microsoft with its own block lists culled from all the mail Microsoft receives from MSN\Hotmail\Live Mail and FrontBridge. So over time the edge server can intelligently build up a dynamic database (JET database – I know) of known offenders and deal with them before they even traverse the SMTP stack. They are blocked right at the outset of the EHLO “handshake.” This really helps by keeping the mail out of the back-end mail environment where cycles are wasted by SPAM. The other exciting thing is that since it is an Exchange SMTP gateway (vs a third party SMTP gateway that has no hooks in to Exchange) the history that it gathers on mail can be leveraged by the whole messaging environment. And, in reverse, statistics gathered through user feedback on mail can be pumped up to the edge server and added to its database.
On the downside, the audience had a lot of questions around the things that matter to us (and our bosses) beyond the base technology. These were monitoring, management and reporting. I will assume Microsoft will keep good on its promise and deliver it to RTM with a Systems Operations Center 2007\MOM 2005 management pack. Microsoft didn't have any good answers about how we can report on the SMTP statistics (SQL Reporting Center?), manage the Jet database (eseutil anyone?) or even if it needs to be backed up. Microsoft recommended flattening it and rebuilding which is great in theory. I think Microsoft sometimes misses the “smaller” picture with answers like that. As a consultant I know that customers will many times choose a savings of dollars over best practices more than fifty percent of the time. So for the three-plus hours while the edge server is being rebuilt, no mail comes in to the environment.
So my homework for the Microsoft Edge Server development team is:
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Give us a way or best practice to maintain the DB and back it up so when the server has a disk failure we don't loose months of predictive analysis on the people who are spamming us. I don't want to start over!
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Give us something besides PowerShell to check configurations with and add exceptions to IP block lists, etc. I love PowerShell, don't get me wrong, but I am also not longing for a return to Novell 3.11\DOS CLI for all my administrative tasks.
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Give me a good reporting solution. MOM\SOC\SMS\DPM etc. all use SQL reporting services to generate some nice reports. Don't leave this entirely to third parties to develop.