BlackBerry Enterprise Server (BES) - New Feature Activation
Information Technology has recently upgraded the BlackBerry Enterprise Server software to version 4.1 with service pack 6. As a result, a new feature has become available to further enhance the BlackBerry service. The FAQ below is somewhat technical in nature, but the bottom line is this feature will provide better email reconciliation between MS Exchange and the BlackBerry Handheld.
What is “Hard Delete Reconciliation”?
This is a global feature of BlackBerry (BES) 4.1 or higher, with a default email monitoring ability of 100 emails per user. When a user deletes or moves email from the MS Exchange mailbox to a PST or sub folders, the users action triggers a message to the BES which relays the information to the BlackBerry Handheld to appropriately reconcile the email messages.
What is “Mailbox/Email Reconciliation”?
This is a standard timed-based global feature that reconciles the mailbox at a fixed interval. According to Research In Motion (RIM), the BES time interval is set to 20 minutes. Users can also manually perform reconciliation by clicking “Reconcile Now” on the Handheld under messages.
So what are the benefits of “Hard Delete Reconciliation”?
According to RIM, many users complained about the inability of the BES to reconcile emails when changes were made on the MS Exchange mailbox by increasing the time-based reconciliation, which causes the following: 1. Put a tremendous load on the BES and reduce core performance. 2. Increase Handheld battery usage considerably and result in poor battery life. To remedy the solution, RIM used a feature known by all MS Exchange Administrators as the Shift + Delete (permanent delete). However, the similarity ends there. The “Hard Delete Reconciliation” only affects the Handheld and not the MS Exchange mailbox. The feature is only triggered when a user performs an action on the MS Exchange Mailbox as stated above.
So what are the Limitations of “Hard Delete Reconciliation”?
1. Hard delete reconciliation will not work for permanently deleted items older than the specified limit. 2. There are occasions when the message state database will be reset, for example, when the BES is restarted. This causes the memory cache to be cleared. 3. The BB user is moved to another BlackBerry Enterprise Server. The message state database information stored in memory for the BB user is not transferrable to the new BES location. 4. The BB user’s mailbox is moved to another Microsoft Exchange Server. 5. The BES Administrator uses the Reload User command in BlackBerry Manager. This command flushes the BB user data out of the message state database and restarts tracking. 6. The last limitation is an MS Exchange Server limitation. Bulk deleting or changes have a fixed database size on the MS Exchange Server. There is no solution. The work around is for MS Exchange users to be aware of any bulk changes on the MS Exchange mailbox beyond the fixed limit that will result in emails being delivered to the BlackBerry Handheld.
How does BES handle “Pending Emails”?
The RIM gateway holds up to 5 messages and keeps trying to find the BlackBerry Handheld on the wireless network. The remaining emails are left on the mail server waiting to be retrieved. When the RIM gateway finds the Handheld it sends those 5 emails immediately, then the BES searches the MS Exchange server for any other messages that need to be delivered. During this inactivity if the user makes changes on the mailbox such as read, delete, or move emails, those emails are reconciled appropriately on the BlackBerry Handheld. In theory if the sixth email is deleted, the BB Handheld will not receive the email. But the first five messages will be delivered irrespective of any changes made on the MS Exchange Server. This is by design and cannot be changed as this is part of RIM’s network. Pending usually means there is not enough coverage to send the messages to the Handheld. The carrier's network might be having issues like slow delivery, or RIM's gateway is down.
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