Microsoft Exchange Server acts as a backbone of network in any company. It is responsible for effective and flawless communication that is spread over large geographical area. With introduction of Outlook OWA (Outlook Web Access), user can access data on Exchange Server from any location using web. Let us first understand a simple but crucial question “What is ExchangeServer?”
Exchange Server acts as centralized nerve centre which holds the user’s data; however user must have an emailing platform known as Outlook or OWA to access it. In more technical terms Exchange is calendaring software, an email server and contact manager developed by Microsoft. (Source: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Exchange_Server).
After going through the aforementioned definition it is quite simple to detect the functionality of Exchange Server. Exchange plays an important role in business environment by keeping track on every single incoming and outgoing message. Though Exchange keeps all the crucial information it is really important to safeguard Exchange data. Alike any other application, Exchange Server also faces challenges when come across various threats. There are large varied ranges of issue available that can cause trouble for Exchange Server efficiency. Mostly the Exchange Server is affected due to the corruption of the database files known EDB.
Let us scan most general and frequent cause that may affect the working capability of Exchange Server by corrupting EDB files:
Dirty shutdown:
Dirty shutdown is termed as the most notorious activity that takes place with MS Exchange. Sudden shutdown of MS Exchange without any prior warning mostly results in severe data loss situation. Power failure and hardware malfunctioning could be the most possible reason behind dirty shutdown
Virus and Trojan attack:
Nowadays there are far better antivirus applications available; those safeguard the EDB file effectively. But with the advancement of antivirus technology, the severity of harmful programs also developed rapidly. Hence threat from such harmful program is still a headache for the user.
Corruption due to hardware failure:
The chances of file corruption due to hardware failure are very rare, but still it can also be considered as one of the possible causes of Exchange database corruption.
How to secure Exchange Data? – It is well said by someone that “Precaution is better than cure”, hence it is better to be prepared and follow protected steps to enhance the application’s healthy life. There are few set rules and an intelligent Exchange administrator always keeps those rules in mind. By following mentioned points one can keep the Exchange Server in running mode flawlessly for a longer period of time. So let us have a look over few practices those are mandatory for the efficient working of Exchange Server application:
Make use of ExBPA:
Most of the user has not been aware of this amazing utility known as Microsoft Exchange Best Practices Analyzer. The utility helps Exchange administrators to analyze the overall status of the Exchange Server. It gains information from many sources like the registry, Active directory, performance monitor and many more to provide useful guidelines to the user. It suggests a reliable and authentic repair and modifications message that highly facilitates the user. The Exchange administrator must use ExBPA at regular interval of time as it has been observed that even small modification can improve the performance of the Server noticeably.
Be in touch with Server application log:
The online maintenance operations perform a routine maintenance during rest hours. The process is automatic and it creates a process log file which includes various events related to the Server performance. When the process began the event ID 700 is noted, after the completion of full online defragmentation event ID 701 recorded, in reverse case means if interrupted event ID 704 is recorded. So the log files are very informative and if the concerned person reviews it regularly then he can solve any budding issue within reach of the time.
Maintain backup regularly:
This is most important activity, it not only lightens the application’s burden also it allows user to keep his data at safe location. In today’s business environment where everyday large number of file transactions take place. This fills the memory space very quickly further making the system or application sluggish. Creating backup of data is also not a simple task; there are multiple ways by which one can execute backup process. However the most suitable method in above stated case is Exchange-aware backups. It is because Exchange-aware backup understands how to tackle with Exchange transaction logs and maintain backup. It is advance mechanism which after backing-up the required or important data prevents unnecessary data to be written on the disk. The SBS backup wizard works over the principle of Exchange-aware backup mechanism.
Do consider storage status:
The last moment hustle can be seen when user suddenly realizes that his disk storage color has changed to red. It simply means the space is almost full and if user further wants to save any file then he has to manage the files already present in the drive. Hence it is advisable to preserve the crucial data at secondary memory or archive it and delete the unwanted data at regular interval of time. Bulky drive slows down the system and also effect the performance of the application.
Above discussed were few methods with those one can enhance the performance of Exchange Server. The abovementioned points may be seems to be very simple but believe me they have a great impact on the efficiency of working application. In this article we discussed few crucial aspects; however we will try to cover lot more about Exchange server tips and tricks in our next post.