M365 email archiving question

[Velvis]

I have a client whos mailbox is close to 50GB. He also has a Mac with a smallish SSD so his free space is a concern.

Is there a way to archive the mail automatically but only save it in the cloud?

 

[Sky-Knight]

That's two things...

1.) M365 has an archive, but you have to turn it on. It's in the Compliance Center, details here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/mi.../enable-archive-mailboxes?view=o365-worldwide

2.) Outlook can be configured to control what stays locally. Details here: https://support.microsoft.com/en-us...nge-mode-7885af08-9a60-4ec3-850a-e221c1ed0c1c

There's a slider that lets you pick a duration of time, if you need to minimize storage use on the laptop, either disable caching entirely or pull that slider down to a shorter length of time. (Note, Outlook can only have 50gb stored locally, so even if you get the larger mailbox... you have to keep everything that account sees, including shared mailboxes and other mailbox accesses, BELOW 50gb on the unit or it'll break.)

Note, by default Exchange will move anything older than 2 years into the archive automatically once it's enabled. You can adjust this in the CLASSIC Exchange admin panel, compliance management, Retention Policies.

I have no idea how to "move to archive" with the new compliance center, Microsoft seems to have locked that feature behind the E level paywall, which is frankly absurd. All you can do with compliance rules in the subs available to mere mortals is hold them for at time, then delete them. During which time your users cannot delete things. So I usually make a tag to force things to stick around for 30 days, because then I know my backup has a copy of whatever it is, after that I do nothing... user's problem.

 

[britechguy]

The other thing that would really be doing this client a favor is having a heart-to-heart about email housekeeping and cleanup, and on a continual basis.

Email should be treated exactly as real mail was: You touch it once, attend to what needs attending to now, keep a few things that need attending to a bit later, and delete anything else. What gets permanently filed, and there will be some, is only things you have reason to believe you might be called upon to look at again or produce much later.

That email you got from your spouse asking you to pick up the dry cleaning should never, ever, be in an archive.

Just because it's easier to search an email archive doesn't mean it's easy to plow through the results if you do not curate your archive as you go along.

 

[Velvis]

The other thing that would really be doing this client a favor is having a heart-to-heart about email housekeeping and cleanup, and on a continual basis.

Email should be treated exactly as real mail was: You touch it once, attend to what needs attending to now, keep a few things that need attending to a bit later, and delete anything else. What gets permanently filed, and there will be some, is only things you have reason to believe you might be called upon to look at again or produce much later.

That email you got from your spouse asking you to pick up the dry cleaning should never, ever, be in an archive.

Just because it's easier to search an email archive doesn't mean it's easy to plow through the results if you do not curate your archive as you go along.

I have so many clients who insist on keeping EVERYTHING. Super annoying.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Yeah 365 makes it easy to have archiving (of course, assuming you have good licenses).
Large mailboxes are common place with business email. It is used as documentation, reference, historical lookup, etc...and there's often a need to keep things for years. Heck I often go back to email conversations I had 15 or 20 years ago.

This is one of the reasons businesses should use business grade email...so that you don't have annoying bullcrap like "10 gig max mailbox size" or "max file size of 25 megs for attached files".

With M365, you get an "online only" archive..meaning you have log into office.com via browser to sift through it.
E3 and higher licenses allow a local archive within Outlook....so it's visible as another folder in your Outlook.

Archive rules...choose something like "past 2 years old" or "past 3 years old"..or 5...whatever. Anything older than that, will get moved to the archive...and folder structure is maintained. Works quite well.

 

[Sky-Knight]

@YeOldeStonecat Online archive shows up in Outlook, the Exchange Archive is Exchange Archive, it always works that way and appears automatically in Outlook if it's enabled.

What changes is it being enabled by default... smaller subs have to go turn it on manually for each mailbox. The default stuff moves anything older than 2 years into the archive, where it sits forever... or until you run out of archive space.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

@YeOldeStonecat or until you run out of archive space.

Shouldn't run out of any archive space, it's unlimited.
I did make an error, "online only"....meaning it's not stored/ cached locally in Outlook (but yes it can show up..just...to expand...you have to be online). But I find Outlooks search to be wobbly and I've had clients just log into OWA to search and find things much faster. Guess that's habit.

 

[tek9]

Unlimited Archive is only for Exchange Online P2, which is part of O365 E3. M365 Business Premium has an EXO P1 license.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

M365 Business Premium includes "unlimited online archive", it's not capped at 50 like lesser plans (standard, and basic plans)

And I say "unlimited archive"....tongue in cheek, since last fall Microsoft did peel that back a bit last year, the archine technically has a max of 1.5TB now.

Exchange Online limits - Service Descriptions

Find the Exchange Online limits for various service areas, including address book limits, mailbox storage limits, and reporting and message trace limits, to name just a few.

docs.microsoft.com

 

[Sky-Knight]

I haven't had even a Standard box get a "full archive" yet. But I also haven't had someone hit 50gb in there yet. I've been wondering how that was going to come out in the wash, because Microsoft seems to want people to pay more for the basic ability to automatically archive.

You can still do all this in Exchange manually, but it's a bit of a chore. Fortunately, the defaults work pretty well.

 

[britechguy]

max of 1.5TB now.

If this were to be one person's email archive the mind simply boggles! Insane.

 

[Sky-Knight]

If this were to be one person's email archive the mind simply boggles! Insane.

Exchange Online Plan 2 affords a 100gb mailbox and 1.5tb in the archive, and before you ask yes I have MANY people that use mailboxes that large.

The 50gb mailbox the smaller plans afford with another 50gb of archive is still plenty for most uses, but it's not uncommon for the larger boxes too. I think they're nuts, but I've long since given up teaching people to clean up after themselves, I just charge them the extra $8 / month and move on. Or whatever the price is these days.

 

[britechguy]

I have MANY people that use mailboxes that large.

Correction: You have many people who *have* mailboxes that large.

You will never, ever, convince me that they actually use them in any meaningful sense. No one is making regular reference to any significant number of messages in a 1.5TB email archive.

That's my point. But your comment about some being a lost cause as far as being willing or able to clean up after themselves is absolutely accepted at face value. But those people are engaging in IT lunacy, pure and simple. It's just plain dumb. Hoarding is hoarding.

 

[Sky-Knight]

@britechguy When you never know when an errant email is going to keep you from being sued or worse... You keep everything.

 

[britechguy]

When you never know when an errant email

Sorry, but those emails telling you that your credit card statement is available, checking if you want new insurance, and the list goes on and on will NEVER keep you from being sued. And keeping that kind of crap is the only way you end up with a 50GB archive, let alone a 1.5TB one. Keeping literally everything is stupid. Period. End of Sentence.

Let's get real. I see no point in defending the nonsensical and indefensible, that's all.

 

[Sky-Knight]

Sorry, but those emails telling you that your credit card statement is available, checking if you want new insurance, and the list goes on and on will NEVER keep you from being sued. And keeping that kind of crap is the only way you end up with a 50GB archive, let alone a 1.5TB one. Keeping literally everything is stupid. Period. End of Sentence.

Let's get real. I see no point in defending the nonsensical and indefensible, that's all.

Umm... no...

I'm beginning to wonder if you've ever seen an actual email box. You are aware that M365 can and does deal with 150mb emails right? Containing photos, blueprints, and who knows whatever else?

I've got a lady who has an 80gb mailbox just because it takes that much to hold 1 year of her sent items, which is 100% PDFs being emailed out! (Invoices)

Your view of what constitutes proper use of email is terribly narrow, and utterly rooted in your own anecdotal experience.

Note, this whole huge mailbox thing is getting worse by the day, especially since now people want to email around 8k photos off the new iphone!

P.S. Junk mail is tiny, automatically dealt with, not worth human effort to get the junk that leaks through, because millions of those things can fit in 100mb. Automation wins, human behavior once again changes.

 

[britechguy]

We're just never going to agree.

I haven't lived under a rock. I've worked in the private sector, government agencies, schools, and rehab centers. I've seen email go from what was a trickle to a tsunami.

Yet what you present as "typical," size-wise, is not something I have ever seen typically appear for most (including business) users on a routine basis. The occasional huge email, sure, but not endless.

And when it comes to email that has a massive message size with lots of attachments, as you've described, the very worst way to store that over the long term for safety is in an email archive. Filing systems (electronic ones) still exist for very good reason.

Contrary to your assertions, I don't, and didn't live under a rock.

 

[YeOldeStonecat]

Yeah, biz grade email...(Outlook/Exchange)...with todays fast multi core CPUs solid state tech hard drives and fast wireless and fast internet, and cloud based Exchange server with storage the size of Mars....there is less than zero worry about email boxes getting too large. There just isn't. Other than...it's 1990's mentality to worry about it. Oh I recall the early days of email, Microsoft post office, and Outlook Express...with DBX database files blowing up. And all mail lost because...well...that was POP. And IMAP ain't much better. Or in the 1990's....I saw quite a few MS Exchange 5 and 5.5 servers when I used to go around training them in Outlook....spec'd and purchased by some wanna-be IT people without thinking about it..inadequate storage. So mailboxes had be capped small per user for large organizations.

Some businesses run on email and other than Quickbooks, that's it. They can't afford a CRM or file cabinet style software...or really just don't need it. They use email for their storage, and with modern proper biz grade email systems..there is no penalty for that approach. If a computer blows up, guess what...get a new computer, sign into Office.com, sync it..and all_of_your_stuff is right there. All email. folder structure, contacts, calendar appts, nickname cache, signature, not a single thing was lost!

I still have email going back to when I worked at a software company that made DOS based point of sale software. I've kept my inbox contents all along...near 40 gigs worth now.

 

[Velvis]

That's two things...

1.) M365 has an archive, but you have to turn it on. It's in the Compliance Center, details here: https://docs.microsoft.com/en-us/mi.../enable-archive-mailboxes?view=o365-worldwide

When I try to do this I get this error:

Recipient already has an archive. This task doesn't support multiple archives per recipient.

Google made mention of hybrid exchange, but this is all hosted on M365

 

[Sky-Knight]

That error happens when you're trying to enable an archive on a mailbox that already has one. Admin -> Compliance -> Information Governance -> Archive.

It should list all mailboxes and if their archives are turned on.