Extracting Enterprise Vault Archive Data

[scalli]

Hi All,

I'm new to Enterprise Vault and I'm having a little trouble putting together an implementation plan for extracting emails out of an Exchange/EV environment using .PST files for import into a brand new environment on a new domain.

So far I have come up with the following rough idea:

1. Disable archiving across all mailboxes to prevent any further transfers of data
2. Export all archived mailboxes to individual .PST files and import into new environment
3. Delete all archive stubs from Exchange mailboxes to prevent future conflicts
4. Export all Exchange mailboxes to individual .PST files and import into new environment

I was hoping to get some comments on this plan.  It might be that there is a far simpler solution that I'm not aware of.  The idea of restoring all mail items to their original location is not an option due to capacity reasons.

Also, I've been having some trouble researching a method for completing step 1.  There doesn't seem to be any way of disabling Enterprise Vault other than setting the archive policy to only capture emails older than 1000 years (or something similar).  Am I mistaken here?  I would have thought this would be an easy task.

Any information would be greatly appreciated!!

- Scalli

[RahulG]

Did you consider check for the Move archive Feature ?

refer http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH129236

[scalli]

Hi RahulG,

I haven't had a look at that option as we do not plan to implement EV in the new environment at this stage.

I'll take a look as it may be an option but for now I would like to discuss the possibility of a full retrieval of archived data.

[EV_Ajay · Accepted solution]

Hi,

You can Disable Users from archiving using following article :

How to Disable the User Mailbox using Disable Mailbox wizard.

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH129899

You can Export archive Data into PST / into user Original Mailbox (Need to increase quota on exchange) using following articles.

Exporting an archive to a PST file.

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH54281

About the Export Archive wizard.

http://www.symantec.com/docs/HOWTO56821

[RahulG]

The Plan which you have look ok but Move archive is the option you can look at. You can also disable Mailbox archving using EVPM option.

[scalli]

Thanks EV_Ajay, that first link is right up my alley.

My other concern is stubs conflicting with mail items restored from the archive.  Do you know how to deal with this?

For example, if I recover all archived items from a .PST and then attempt to restore a second .PST taken from the live mailbox in exchange won't the emails restored in the first job conflict with the mail stubs restored in the second job?

I hope that makes sense :)

Ideally, I'd like to remove ALL stubs from the mailboxes prior to performing the export from Exchange.

[RahulG]

You can remove the duplicated shortcuts form the mailboxes 

refer http://www.symantec.com/business/support/index?page=content&id=TECH200647

[scalli]

Thanks RahulG, is there a more automated process which could be run across all mailboxes from a central admin console?

EV_Ajay, does that process for disabling arching on mailboxes restore the previously archive data to the Exchange database?  I was hoping to avoid this.

http://www.symantec.com/docs/TECH129899

[RahulG]

There no other process which I am aware OFF. May you can try creating some scripts to automate things.

When you disable the mailbox , its just the archving for the user is disabled and no new item are archived.The Previously archvied data is not restored when you disable the mailbox archiving.

[Rob_Wilcox1]

You might also want to consider a product such as Archive Shuttle from us at QUADROtech.

[EV_Ajay]

Hi,

Process for disabling archiving on mailbox will not restore data. It will only stop new archiving for that user. If you want to restore user archived data then you need to run the Export Archive wizard.

[ChayDouglas]

Sounds like you are de-commissioning Enterprise Vault?

We recently had to do this for a customer and it has taken the best part of half a year.

The steps they took were to:
Stop users from archiving (which you seemed to have done now)
Increase Mailbox quota
Export back to Current Exchange
Migrate to new Exchange

The other option we looked at was exactly the one you suggested ie export to PST and ingest the data to the new Exchange Server.

In this case, you will need to insure that the PSTs have a scratch area where they can temporarily sit and a script that will ingest PSTs back into the new Exchange environment.

With regards to shortcuts, there is a script you can run against the current exchange server that will delete enterprise vault shortcuts from each mailbox:

http://exitcodezero.wordpress.com/2013/08/12/how-to-delete-all-ev-shortcuts-from-a-mailbox/

See Note 3:
 

Search-Mailbox -Identity {Identity} -SearchQuery "IPM.NOTE.EnterpriseVault.shortcut" -DeleteContent

You can then gather all the mailbox aliases and script this.

I'm not too sure about the PST ingestion script though.

Cheers
Chay