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Architecturally, SSW Exchange Reporter works like SQL Server, it
runs as a service and has a nice user interface to start and stop
the service. The Extraction Manager is where you can start and stop
Extraction Windows Service and setup everything.
Figure: Start and
stop the service and diagnose the status of each component
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To deploy a database, you
need to click on "Tools->Options" and open the "Reporting Database"
tab:
Figure: Click 'Select
... ' to deploy a new database
Figure: Click "Create" to start
the deployment process
Before you create or connect to your database, you need to make
sure your account has enough privileges to access your database
server and be able to create and drop database. Normally, a
'Database Creator' will be enough.
To create a new database:
- Uncheck the 'Insert Sample Data' checkbox to enable edit on
'Database Name' textbox,
- Change the 'Database Name' (DO NOT use the default 'SSWExchangeReporterSample',
this will cause Exchange Reporter to treat your database as a
sample database and will not function correctly),
- Type in the username and password if you are using SQL
server authentication, otherwise leave it as 'Windows NT
Integrated Security',
- Click 'Create'.
Exchange Reporter will deploy your database to the server you
selected. When this is complete, close 'Database setup' form to
return to the 'Reporting Database' tab.
Figure: Exchange Reporter will deploy your database to the
selected server
To select an existing database,
Figure: Select an existing database
The 'Reporting Database' tab looks like this when the
database has been deployed successfully.
Figure: You will get a "tick" if your database was correctly set
up
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To publish the reports, open the reports tab:
Figure: Click "Select..." to configure your report publication
Figure: Click "Create" to
publish a new set of reports
To publish a new set of reports:
- Change the 'Report Server' to the URL of your report server
address. Exchange Reporter uses
SQL
2000 Server Reporting Services web services to publish
reports. This web service provides the necessary interface for
Exchange Reporter to setup credentials, create the report folder and
upload rdl files. You need to make sure your account has
necessary privileges to access this web service. The default web
service URL is :
http://YourReportServer/ReportServer/ReportService.asmx .
- Change the 'Report Directory Name' to the name you want (We
recommend you remove the 'Sample' as this will confuse your
users).
- Click on 'Create' button.
- Exchange Reporter will publish reports to your report
server. Once the report publishes successfully, a new browser
window opens and will show you the new reports.
Figure: Your newly published reports now appear in the the report
browser
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SSW Extraction Windows Service allows you run extraction as a
service, which gives you the flexibility to schedule the extraction
process to run outside of your business hours. To install and setup
this service, open 'Options->Exchange and Service' tab.
Figure: Click 'Select User
...' to install the Extraction Service and configure the account that
will be used to run it
To install Extraction Windows Service, click 'Select User ...'
to open 'Service User Selection' form:
Figure: 'Service User Selection' form, enter/select your service
account and click on 'OK' to install the Extraction Service
In the form above, click "Select" to choose the
service account you want to use for running the Extraction Service.
This account must have read permission on all of your
mailboxes.
Note (Common Issues):
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SSW Exchange Reporter allows you to select the mailboxes to
collect data, you can only select the mailboxes you want to report on
and skip all other mailboxes. To select the mailboxes, go to
the 'Options-> Exchange Users' tab.
Figure: Select the mailboxes which you want to extract data
from
If you have followed the instructions above, the 'Access' column
in the list may show 'False'. This is because the permission
settings you just created for your service account may take at least
15 minutes to take effect. If this is the case, you will need to
wait a while then come back to this form. This behavior has been
described in this Microsoft KB
http://support.microsoft.com/Default.aspx?scid=kb;en-us;262054
Use the drop down list on the top to select the Organization Unit
or select the users individually. After you select all the mailboxes
you want to extract, click 'Apply' to save your settings.
If you want to rebuild this list, click 'Reload Users'.
This tells Exchange Reporter to contact your Active Directory,
and load your user list into the database again. Normally, this list
will be loaded from database instead of Active Directory to make the
process a lot faster.
Note:
- The 'Error' column indicates the mailboxes
that could not be extracted in last extraction
- 'Scan Active Directory for new users during extraction'
allows Exchange Reporter to update this list automatically
according to your Active Directory changes. However, if you have
multiple servers, you should disable this option to avoid errors.
- SSW Exchange Reporter can only extract mailboxes that are
located on the local exchange store. This is why the 'Server' drop down
has been disabled, and only the users on your local exchange
store are selected by default.
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Exchange Extraction service can run at background and process the
extraction according schedule. To configure a schedule, select the
'Schedule' tab:
Figure: You can configure a schedule to run the Extraction Service
To create a new schedule, click 'Add...' and open the 'Schedule
Properties' dialog:
Figure: Create a new schedule
Note: At least one schedule is required to run the Extraction
service.
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Extraction Options tab allows you to control the extraction process and the data collected from your Exchange
Store.
Figure: Set options for the extraction process and data
collection
Note:
- Enable Message Body Extraction: message body extraction may be
very time consuming because some of the emails may have very long
content. If you don't want to report on individual message, you may
uncheck this option to make the extraction faster.
- Mail Folders: you can collect data from every mail folder or specify the folders you want to collect data from.
- Public Folders: if you have a public folder in your exchange server,
enable this option to collect data from your public folder
and messages.
- Minimum date to use during extraction: normally, extraction will run
on all messages in your exchange store, if you just want the message
after a specific date, you can choose the date here, and the extraction
will skip any messages that are older than that.
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If you have followed all the instructions above, go back to
'Extraction Manager' main window, the 'Start' 'Stop' and 'Process'
buttons will be enabled. Now, you are ready to run extraction
to collect data.
Figure: Click 'Process' to
collect data manually
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To run Extraction Windows Service, you can either click on the
'Start' button on 'Extraction Manager' main form or start it from
your service manager. If the service starts successfully, you will
have the following entry in your 'Application Event Log'.
Figure: If the Extraction Service started correctly, you will
have an entry you in your Application Event Log
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Figure: Set options for audio feedback and email
- Email Domain is your default email domain name. Exchange Reporter uses this
information to classify email addresses as
internal or external in some of the reports.
Example: if you have an email address like FirstnameSurname@s*w.com.au,
then enter 'ssw.com.au' as your email domain.