Easing migration

System migration is not typically something technology managers look forward to.

"This is always a sticky point for customers," said Jeff Brainard, senior product marketing manager at Mirapoint Inc. He said most e-mail vendors move e-mail messages en masse, but Mirapoint extracts individual messages from users' e-mail folders and accounts, assigning a message identification number to each. If a user finds that a particular message failed to move during migration, Mirapoint's migration team can go into the individual's account and extract the message based on the identification number. Gordano Ltd., meanwhile, offers migration tools including AutoPort. As users attempt to log on to the old e-mail server, the tool "identifies who they are and goes to the old server and downloads their mail," said Ray Warren, Gordano's chief executive officer. Customers typically leave the function running for about a month, during which most users would have logged on to retrieve mail. The process "takes all the stress out of migration," he said.