Today, many organizations like yours are migrating from host systems like OfficeVision/MVS to LAN-based e-mail systems like Microsoft Exchange Server. Because you have a massive investment in host-based hardware, software and user training, you cannot simply discontinue using OfficeVision/MVS and convert users to Exchange overnight.

As a result, you probably want to take a phased approach by migrating one workgroup or LAN at a time. During this period, OfficeVision/MVS and Exchange will have to coexist.

Users want transparent migrations

To avoid disrupting their work, your migrating users want existing mail moved to their new system transparently. They don't want to have any involvement in the process, yet once migrated, they expect their mail to be filed just as it was in OfficeVision/MVS. And they want mail sent to them after they migrate to come to their new locations automatically.

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Migration: the old way

Because no tools were available, migrating your users was a costly, complex and tedious process. It required coordinated effort on the part of your e-mail administrators and your entire user community.

For example, assume you wanted to migrate a user from OfficeVision/MVS to Exchange. The migration would involve these steps:

• Your Exchange administrator registered the user in Exchange Server.
• The migrating user sent mail items, one at a time, from OfficeVision/MVS to the new Exchange location.
• In Exchange or Outlook, the migrating user read and filed these items, again, one at a time.
• Your OfficeVision/MVS administrator deleted the OfficeVision/MVS user definition and the original copies of the user's migrated mail.
• Your OfficeVision/MVS administrator (or a directory synchronization product) updated the migrated user's OfficeVision/MVS shared address book entry to show the SNADS Qualified Name associated with the user in Exchange.
• Your OfficeVision/MVS administrator notified all other OfficeVision/MVS users, requesting them to update their personal address books and distribution lists to reference the migrated user's new SNADS Qualified Name.

What's more, some of these steps involved multiple tasks. For example, to export an item, a user had to select, address and then send the item.

And mail profile information was lost

If this wasn't enough to give you a migraine, then consider another problem with the manual approach to migration. When mail was migrated manually, important profile information was lost, including the user ID of the original sender, the date and time when the item was originally sent, and the tag under which the item was originally filed.

This lost profile information caused a lot of confusion:

• When a user replied to a manually migrated message, the reply didn't go to the original sender; instead, it went to the user's old host user ID.
• Users didn't know if they had already read a message. Exchange showed all mail as "unread".
• Users didn't know when the message was originally sent. Maybe it was important news; maybe it was a year old.
• If the message was filed with a particular tag on the host, there was no way to determine what the tag was; even if the user remembered it, the message still had to be refiled manually.

And don't forget such hidden costs as the time your administrators spend in responding to queries about apparently missing users and mail.

MIGRA: for migrations without the migraines

MIGRA/PS-Export for the Microsoft Exchange Migration Wizard makes it easy to migrate users from OfficeVision/MVS (or PS/CICS) to Exchange. MIGRA exports host information to the Microsoft Exchange Migration Wizard, which uses this information to import users and their mail to Exchange. MIGRA simplifies the task of migrating users by letting your e-mail administrator perform migrations on behalf of your users, without any user involvement.

MIGRA migrates:

• user definitions
• nicknames and other personal address book information
• distribution lists
• In-Basket mail
• File Cabinet mail
• all mail types, including Notes, Messages, Editable, FFT, RFT and PC Files
• personal Calendar information.

• define migrating users to Exchange
• simplify migrations by leading administrators through the migration process
• let administrators migrate one user or a group of users at a time
• estimate how much space migrated information will occupy in Exchange, before starting a migration
• reduce the volume of mail to be migrated by letting administrators pick exactly what to export
• handle all the types of directory information that you need to migrate
• export users' mail and file it away on their behalf at the destination
• track all migrating users and mail, to ensure that nothing gets lost
• notify users that they have been migrated
• redirect new mail that is sent to migrated users' old user IDs
• retain mail profile information, so that:
  • mail that was in the In-Basket goes to the corresponding Exchange Inbox
  • tagged mail that was in the File Cabinet goes to corresponding Exchange folders
  • the original send date/time and read/unread status are preserved
  • users can reply to their migrated mail.

MIGRA is a CICS transaction that steps your administrator through the migration process. The administrator simply specifies mail migration criteria, then lets MIGRA do the rest of the work.

MIGRA's Migration Steps panel

PSE0MS00                Migration Steps for: PAYROLL  Status.............. Users defined for migration  Description......... Weekend Migration  Migration steps:  1  X  Start the migration  2  _  Schedule export of mail  3  _  Redirect new mail  4  _  Notify users  5  _  Confirm completion of the migration  PF1=Help    2=         3=        4=        5=        6=  PF7=        8=         9=       10=       11=       12=Quit  PSE150I To process the highlighted migration step, press ENTER  ===>

Estimate before you migrate

Before it begins an export, MIGRA counts the number of mail items and estimates the total size of mail plus directory information for migrating users. This feature helps your administrator ensure that sufficient storage is available in Exchange. It also avoids flooding Exchange with large volumes of mail.

Total users............... 42      Migration started... 98/05/05 10:10  Total size................ 38492KB Migration completed. 98/05/05 10:56  Total mail items selected. 5273  Total mail items exported. 5273

New mail is redirected automatically

Even if you have directory synchronization software, personal directories and distribution lists won't be updated on the host when users are migrated. As a result, host users may continue to send mail to migrated users at their original addresses. When this happens, MIGRA forwards the mail to the users at their Exchange locations, and the senders are notified of the recipients' new Exchange user identifications.

MIGRA requirements

• OfficeVision/MVS V1Rn or Personal Services/CICS V1R3 (OfficeVision/MVS V1R3 is required for Calendar migration)
• IBM TCP/IP for MVS or equivalent (for FTP file transfer)
• APPC Application Suite (for AFTP file transfer) is included in VTAM starting with Version 4
      - requires C/370 Library Version 2 Release 2 or LE/370 Version 1.3 or greater
• VS COBOL II Library or LE/370 Version 1.3 or greater
• DISOSS Version 3, Release 4 OR Icom Solutions Ltd.'s OfficePath/SNADS (for mail rerouting only.)

The Microsoft Exchange Migration Wizard

The Microsoft Exchange Migration Wizard is a Microsoft product that you install at the LAN where you want to migrate users. This product:

• registers migrating users to Exchange
• adds user directory information to the Exchange Global Address Book
• imports users' mail and personal address book information
• imports users' calendar data.

How MIGRA works with the Microsoft Exchange Migration Wizard
   

   

If you also have CLASY

If you have TBS Software's CLASY archival system for Personal Services, you can reduce the volume of data to be migrated by exporting only the most current items. Your users will be able to retrieve older items from the CLASY archive and direct those items to their Exchange locations.

Users do not have to be defined to Personal Services to retrieve items from the CLASY archive. MIGRA automatically defines the user aliases that CLASY needs to deal with migrated users.

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MIGRA: the benefits

• saves your organization time and money by relieving users from the tedious task of migrating their mail manually
• simplifies migrations by leading your administrator through the migration process
• preserves mail profile information and filing organization, so migrated In-Basket and File Cabinet mail looks just as it did on the host before migration:
  • users can reply directly to the original senders
  • users can find their migrated mail easily
• migrates one user or a group of users (for example, everyone in a department) at a time
• redirects mail for users who have migrated
• tracks all migrating users and mail, to ensure that nothing gets lost
• reduces the volume of mail that must be migrated by allowing only a subset to be exported