Public Folders continue to be whittled away

With each new release of Exchange Server, Microsoft de-emphasizes available Public Folder functionality and restricts Public Folders from participating in the newer technologies of the current release. Of course, they also announce that they make no promises as to Public Folders even being included in the next release down the line.  Exchange Server 2010 is no exception to these rules, and while Public Folder technologies are still in the release, they are restricted and downplayed overall.

With the RTM version of Exchange 2007, you needed to use Outlook or other tools to manage folders, but the backlash from end-users was so fierce that Microsoft put the tools back into Exchange with the SP1 release. Still stinging from that set of events, the Exchange Team seems to have built at least basic Public Folder functions into the shipping release of 2010, but with some limits.  A few of these were limited in 2007, some are new.

As with 2007, Outlook and Outlook Web Access are about the only remaining methods to connect to Public Folder trees.  Gone are the days of NNTP and IMAP access to folders, and apparently gone to stay.  Since most users who need Public Folder access use Outlook anyway, this wasn’t a huge issue, but it did hamper 3rd-Party Public Folder integration unless the vendor was - or is - using MAPI connectivity.

The new clustering solution set that was introduced in Exchange 2010 (Database Availability Groups, or DAG) doesn’t support Public Folder databases either.  You can, however, host Public Folder databases on MBX servers that are using DAG for their Mailbox Stores.  You simply have to use some other replication system to protect the data (either Public Folder Replication or a 3rd-Party system – see disclaimer at the end of this blog).  More info on this can be found on TechNet.

So, while Public Folders are still not dead yet, they are systematically becoming a very difficult feature-set to continue using.  Microsoft has been actively encouraging Exchange users to leverage the functionality of a SharePoint Server to replace what was once stored in Public Folders, and for the most part you can do much more with SharePoint overall.  There are several 3rd-Party tools available to move your Public Folders to SharePoint, and once there you have a great deal more control over content, accessibility and general functionality.

If your organization uses a great deal of Public Folders, and you intend to move to Exchange 2010, consider migration of the folder information and functions to SharePoint.  Doing so as part of an overall migration strategy is a lot better than trying to rush the job after you find out that Public Folder functions in Exchange 2010 may no longer do what you need.