Mobile messaging in Exchange 2003 - Part 4: Access group GALs from mobile devices with GAL Lookup

Part 1: Introduction to Microsoft's DirectPush technology

Part 2: Discover security policies

Part 3: Installation, administration, and use of Microsoft Exchange Server ActiveSync Web Administration tool

We went to part 4 of this series to explore mobile mail together using Exchange 2003 Server SP2 and Windows Mobile 5.0 devices with the Messaging and Security Feature Pack installed. In Part 3, we introduced how to install, configure and Exchange Server ActiveSync Web Administration administration tools. In this part 4, we will give you deeper access to the lookup feature GAL lookup.

Introduce

With the new GAL lookup feature included in Messaging and Security Feature Pack, you can look up contacts in the Global Address List (GAL) global address list in the company's Exchange Server 2003 SP2 servers. Some people who own Windows Mobile devices but do not install MSFP think that they can only search contacts in their personal contacts list stored locally on their device. Indeed this is not entirely true, because you can access the GAL by installing the free Microsoft Global Contact Access add-on on the device. Obviously, the Microsoft Global Contact Access attachment is not integrated into Windows Mobile 5.0 operating systems like GAL Lookup, but you need to check when waiting for the MSFP build process in your device.

How to work

GAL Lookup is embedded in the same contact selection interface when users use to look up contacts in the personal list. This means you can look up contacts in the GAL from within the notifications, phone, and speed dial menus. This allows users to send email notifications, meeting requests or invitations (meetings), SMS messages to contacts in the group GAL. They can even call contacts stored in the group GAL.

Once you have looked up a contact in the GAL, you also have the option to view contact details, such as his title or company, etc. (see Figure 1).

Figure 1: Look up contacts in the group GAL

GAL Lookup works by using the SEARCH verb contained in the most recent version of the AirSync protocol (version 2.5). This version is, at the time of writing, can only be found in Messaging and Security Feature Pack (MSFP). The SEARCH verb allows you to search for enabled mail objects in Active Directory. You can search for these objects by specifying their aliases and names in the query string.

Note
GAL Lookup is currently limited to searching in GAL storage. Our expectation is that this restriction will be fixed in Exchange Server 2007 and Windows Mobile 6.0 (codenamed Crossbow), but sometimes you cannot predict what will happen in the future.

Below is a list of attributes that can occur when making a search request for an Active Directory object using GAL Lookup.

1. Alias ​​(Alias)
2. Display Name (Display name)
3. First Name
4. Last Name (Surname)
5. Email Address (Email address)
6. Phone (Phone)
7. Title (Title)
8. Office (Office)
9. Company (Company)
10. Mobile Phone (Mobile Phone)

GAL Lookup is designed in such a way that an attribute will be returned if the corresponding attribute is specified for the user in Active Directory. I think this will reduce unnecessary data burdens when transmitting in space.

Send an email notification to a contact in the group GAL

Sending an email notification to a contact in the GAL can be done in many ways. Here we will show you a typical way to do this.

Open Outlook on your device, then click New in the lower left corner. Once you have entered the Subject and put the content in the body of the message shown in Figure 2 below, click the Menu button in the lower right corner.

Figure 2: Compose a message

Now select Find Online (Figure 3) and the device will issue a search request in the GAL on the corresponding Exchange 2003 SP2 Server.

Figure 3: Searching for correspondence in the GAL

If you know the alias or username of the contact you want to send the message to, you can type it in the To line :, click Menu , then Check Names in the context menu (see Figure 4).

Figure 4: Solving aliases and names entered

Once you find the contact in the GAL, click the Select button as shown in Figure 5.

Figure 5

You should return to the editing window again. Notice the name as well as the email address that has been placed in the To line : (Figure 6).

Figure 6: Contact name and email address in the To line:

You can now send an email notification and if you have enabled the DirectPush feature (for more information about DirectPush you can see part 1), this message will go to the recipient mailbox after a few seconds.

Send a meeting request to a contact in the group GAL

As mentioned earlier in this article, it is possible to send a meeting request or invitation to one or more contacts in the GAL. To do so, open the Calendar application and click Menu , then select New Appointment in the context menu. Once you have filled in the required fields, click Attendees (Figure 7).

Figure 7: Compose a new appointment

You will feel friendly with the user interface that is quite similar to the one when filling in recipient email in the GAL. Add the contacts you want to send the meeting request or invite, then click OK (see Figure 8).

Figure 8: Adding required attendees to the appointment

The Attendees line will be placed with the contacts you selected in the GAL, as shown in Figure 9.

Figure 9: Arrangement for attendees

If you want to type the necessary notes for the meeting, click the Notes tab

Note :
Because the user object is using email in Active Directory, you can set up a meeting room while you are organizing it on your device.

When you have sent an invitation or a meeting request, this request will go to the attendee's mailbox after a few seconds. They can then accept or reject it (see Figure 10), like what can be done with a request sent from Office Outlook 2003 or Outlook Web Access 2003 (OWA).

Figure 10: Meeting request received from mobile device

Dial contacts in the group GAL

If you need to call a colleague or another employee in the company but this person is not saved in your personal contacts, it is not very worrying because you can look up this person's number in the GAL, or You can even call him directly through the GAL Lookup user interface. How to do this is click Contacts in the lower right corner of the Today screen , then click Menu -> Find Online as shown in Figure 11.

Figure 11: Calling a contact not saved in the personal contact list

When you have found the corresponding contact, select Call Work or Call Mobile like Figure 12.

Figure 12: Calling a contact in the GAL

Send SMS notifications to contacts in the group GAL

SMS messages are not widely used in the US but they are widely used in Europe, not only for young people, for personal purposes but also as a form of communication among peers in one organization. SMS will be an optimal solution for colleagues to communicate quickly when planning a meeting or a seminar.

GAL Lookup also allows you to send an SMS message to a contact in the GAL. Implementing this method is very similar to what we introduced in the article. You can do it in several ways, but there is a simple way to open the Text Messages application, then click New on the screen as shown in Figure 13 below.

Figure 13: Compose a new text message

Now search for contacts in the GAL, then select Send Text Message as shown in Figure 12. You are then taken back to the text editor window as shown in Figure 14.

Figure 14: Send an SMS message to the contact in the GAL

Now send SMS notifications. You can do the same for SMS messages, but we will not introduce the specific steps in this article.

Add a contact in the GAL to your personal contact list

If you find that you need to communicate with someone who has to look up in the GAL in the future, you can add that contact to the list of local contacts on your device. Do this by clicking Menu -> Add to contacts after you have looked up the corresponding contact in the GAL (see Figure 15).

Figure 15: Add a contact in the GAL to your personal contact list

Conclude

Speaking of stored contacts, users in your organization can access the global group address list (GAL) in space from any mobile device that supports version 2.5 AirSync protocol (currently only devices with MSFP installed). Users can search for other contact details that are not saved on their device, send email newsletters, requests or meeting invitations as well as SMS messages to contacts in the group GAL. They can even add contacts saved in the GAL to their personal contact list on their device.

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