Route all mail through SMTP

Got any other ideas as how to make this possible?
What about connectors/smarthosts?

It cannot be done. There is no way to force internal email out through SMTP. Internal email doesn't go near the SMTP stack.

If you need to monitor and block internal email then you will have to look at a different product that integrates in a different place within Exchange. Mail Essentials is basically a light version of everything it does - its archiving feature is a light version of the full product, its list server is a light version of something like Lyris etc.

Simon.

Which products would you recommend that would monitor incoming/outgoing email even within the organization?

I haven't deployed any products like that, so cannot recommend any.

Simon.

Would GFI Archive do the trick?

GFI Archiver is an journaling tool. All it does is use the journaling feature of Exchange to take a copy of every email that passes through the server and keeps a copy of it in its own SQL database, then provide a frontend for easy retrieval of the email. It does not filtering of email messages.

Simon.

Simon: There is a way to copy all the incoming email to another box and deliever to both locations...but what about the outgoing? Any ideas?

I used GFI Archiver in a lab enviroment some time ago and I remember that the solution archive all mail...incoming and outgoing....

That is what journaling does. It copies all email either inbound or outbound to another folder.
However it is an all or nothing affair with native tools - so you will be journaling everything or nothing.
GFI mail Archiver then uses the journaling mailbox to populate its own database.

Simon.

Actually in exchange 2003 every message send or received....internal or external....is handled by SMTP SERVICES....NO EXCEPTION.....and to make it intresting your antispam software does actually APPLY THE RULE to all internal emails the same way it applies it to all incomming or outgoing messages.....NO EXCEPTION....

This comment should not be considered when  grading....i just wrote this to clarify some misconceptions about exchange and anitspam software ....how they work and operate.....

MMMM.....so that means that there should be a way to handle the rules from GFI Mailessentials to monitor internal mail. What is even more interesting is that I had it working internally but I thought that my exchange wasn't configured properperly because I had to recover from a crash!

Sambee, Simon, any thoughts?

You must understand how exchange works(technical side) inorder to understand why this feature does not work for you and it may not work under current circumstances....so i will try to explain in my limited technical knowledge.....

ther are two proccesses at work in exchange that handle nailflow in exchange server....inetinfo.exe and store.exe

under both processess all emails end up in the catagorizer(that is where ur AV and antispam have their hooks)....
but there is a small diffrence the way store.exe handles the transfer back and forth...

store.exe just hands over a COPY of your email to catagorizer......catgorizer makes all the changes (applies the rule)
and hands back the email to the store.exe....store.exe DISCARDS THE COPY(since it has the original) and delivers the
original to the final destination(in this case in the same mailbox store)......

in this process when  all the changes are made to the copy and since the copy is discarded then as far as you are
concerned your antispam DID NOTHING....and it may appears as email was not handled by SMTP SERVICES....

NOTE: store.exe handles all the internal emails+OWA +MTA
NOTE: store.exe is a BLACK HOLE(eventsinks are useless in this process)

you must spend a few good HOURS reading about exchange architecture inorder to understand how it works and why it works the way it does....this is a good start for your problem

http://support.microsoft.com/kb/273233/

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/guides/E2k3TechRef/b8aafeb4-8883-482b-8cf8-77b3975336b3.mspx?mfr=true

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/guides/E2k3TechRef/f62b0858-8448-47a7-96de-41ae918a3aca.mspx?mfr=true

http://www.microsoft.com/technet/prodtechnol/exchange/guides/E2k3TechRef/b8aafeb4-8883-482b-8cf8-77b3975336b3.mspx?mfr=true


POINTS are for sembee....he was right first time.......IT IS NOT POSSIBLE YET............

also you must remember i can be VERY WRONG IN MY INTERPRETATION of how exchange works....please, anyone feel
free to correct me anytime....

all you folks take care and good luck...

Vahik's explanation is pretty much how I understand it.
It is close enough not to argue over the finer technical points.

The ability to scan all email, internal and external on a separate machine or application is one of the selling points of Exchange 2007. If there had been a way to do it before, then it would be well know and not something that Microsoft would be looking to put in to the application as a new feature. I understand it has required some architecture changes.

Simon.

Fair enough...Sambee, All thanks so much...