This is the typical
scenario: An organization is ready to
migrate to Office 365 from Microsoft Exchange 2003. The process becomes confusing
and difficult when the organization’s license provider for Office 365, and the
existing on-premise technician offer conflicting opinions on the migration
process.
The existing on-premise
technician says to do an active directory sync to migrate all aspects to cloud,
including passwords and accounts. However, the license provider says this isn’t
necessary for a small business with less than 30 email addresses, and that
users can easily reset their passwords on their own.
Microsoft Offers Options for Conflicted
Users
When it comes to migrating to
Office 365, Microsoft offers several options:
1. If you
already have an Active Directory environment, it’s easiest to use Active
Directory synchronization*. It
sets up a relationship between your local Active Directory and the cloud for
Microsoft Office 365. This way you can still use your Active Directory and its
management tools. However its important
to note that the contents of your Active Directory will be copied
to the cloud, but changes made to the cloud aren’t replicated to your local
Active Directory.
2. The
second option involves managing user accounts using identity federation. With
identity federation you retain control of the Active Directory environment.
This way you control your
Active Directory environment. When you implement version 2.0 of the Active
Directory Federation Service, your users can log into the cloud using their
normal Active Directory credentials.
* NOTE: If you’re going to be performing Active
Directory synchronization, Microsoft strongly recommends that you initially enable
identity federation. If you don’t, you’ll need to re-delegate your domain.
Once you’ve completed the sync
from Exchange 2003 to Office 365, a report will be emailed to you indicating
that you’ve finish the migration process—migrating public folders, assigning
Office 365 licenses to all users, and verifying all DNS records to ensure they
are updated and pointed towards Office 365 services. Make sure you configure
the desktops to use Office 365 services as well!
As you can see IT’s complicated!
But we can help you easily migrate to Office 365! Atlanta IT Company will make
the migration process much easier!
