It’s imprinted in my mind like a photograph—the first time I saw that little black box on someone’s belt clip. A quick pop from its holster, a few clicks on the cute black keyboard, and that well-outfitted techie sitting across from me was e-mailing away. I thought, “How simple. How effective. How do I get one of those??” And thus began my years of Blackberry Envy.
I didn’t succumb to giving up my Windows CE device for a Blackberry. I couldn’t bear to give up all those additional applications that came along with it. But while I went on to own more than a few Pocket PCs, I longed for that “always on” e-mail—the “cradled e-mail sync” experience never quite fit the bill.
Soon enough, the Pocket PC 2002 Phone Edition came into being, and with Mobile Information Server 2002, I could sync wirelessly. “Hooray!” I thought. “Finally!” Yet while it was close, I still had to press Sync and wait, and I never had that little black keyboard so nicely integrated into my device and shining those familiar QWERTY keys back at me.
And then I heard the news. An end to my suffering was near: Enter Windows Mobile 2003 and Exchange 2003 Server.
When “push” comes to shove
The powerful combination of Exchange Server 2003 and the Windows Mobile 2003 platforms finally give the tried and true Pocket PC user the “push” e-mail they’ve been waiting for. The Pocket PC on my hip shouts its New Message notification and voilà—with no waiting, my e-mail is downloaded and ready to read. Exchange 2003 Server provides this functionality with what is called “Up To Date” messaging, ensuring that my Pocket PC is, as the name implies, up to date with the server.
So what do you need? How does this happen? And is it secure? Let me explain.
Provided you meet the requirements on the server side, which are quite simple—a mailbox located on an Exchange 2003 Server, on which the administrator has enabled the “Up To Date” feature in the Exchange System Manager and on your user account—you are ready to go.
With a Windows Mobile 2003 Pocket PC Phone Edition or Windows Mobile 2003 Smartphone as your device, all that is needed is to configure server synchronization as you normally would to sync to Exchange Server 2003’s Exchange ActiveSync service (Fig. 1).
Fig. 1. Pocket PC server sync.
Following that initial synchronization, the device will let you know that the server supports this feature with a helpful notification, asking you if you would like to “sync new items as they arrive.” You bet you would!
Fig. 2. Smartphone notification screen
The only additional information needed is your device’s SMTP address, the one used for sending SMS messages to the phone. This type of addressing is very common in North America, but for those in other regions, don’t fear, you’re not left in the cold.
Fig. 3. SMTP address field for Pocket PC
If SMTP addressing isn’t an option, a “Corporate Service Provider” to send SMS notifications to your device is available. Be sure to talk to your mobile operator about this service availability or use a mobile services aggregator who can simplify this connectivity for you.
Once you’ve saved these settings, and have your e-mail set to sync new items “as they arrive” (the more user-friendly wording for “Up To Date”), your device will initiate a sync to the server to set the appropriate information in Exchange Server 2003, all without any user interaction.
How it works
