During 2006 an interdepartmental group of 29 University employees have been investigating, designing, and building an enterprise class Microsoft Exchange/Outlook email and scheduling system capable of supporting the entire University enterprise. The IT Executive Advisory Council and Dean's Council have expressed support for this initiative and are encouraging colleges, units, and departments to work with IT and begin to unify the approximately 70 independent email and scheduling systems in place today. The new USU unified email and calendaring system will deliver the following benefits and more:
As more units move to the enterprise system, the address book will contain the UMC, phone, and email address of most faculty and staff at USU, not just those within your unit.
This system will provide the ability to collaboratively share calendars and other information as desired with anyone on the system you choose, irrespective of unit affiliation. Capabilities also allow for free/busy searches and shared resource scheduling for things like conference rooms, equipment, or other items.
Each email account will have:
500MB of storage at no cost
2GB for $5 per mailbox per year
5GB for $25 per mailbox per year
10GB for $75 per mailbox per year
The enterprise system is truly enterprise. It has been designed with best-of-class virus and spam filtering and includes backup and replication services to protect your data.
Since this will be a unified system, you and any local technical support staff will be able to rely on other technology professionals inside and outside of IT for assistance. You will never be without help! If you enjoy great local IT support, they are invited to co-manage the system in partnership with IT.
This system will support any mobile device that has internet access, including "smart phones." Depending on your device´s capabilities, it may be able to synchronize schedules, tasks, and emails in real-time.
You will be able to keep your present email address when moving to the new system if desired.
While the system is optimized to be used with Microsoft Outlook, the system is fully compatible with Macintosh computers using Entourage or any secure IMAP-capable client.
Infrastructure implementation is now ready for units to move to the new system. If you have questions, please read the Frequently Asked Questions or feel free to contact the IT Service Desk at (435) 797-HELP.
