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With LDE you can map to a central corporate hierarchy, such as nwc.com, eliminating the need to define mapping rules between systems. Alternatively, when there is no corporate address standard, LDE permits direct mapping between the mail systems, such as mapping attributes between cc:Mail and Exchange.

Naming collisions appear in the log as a Level 2 warning. Conflicts are minimized by LDE's "Make Unique" feature, which associates a particular string, such as the employee ID or specific name, to ensure uniqueness across all platforms.

LDE needs better front-end filtering tools. We were able to filter out selected post offices in our cc:Mail environment but there was no GUI for these, just "include" and "exclude" parameters.

ISOCOR Corp. N-PLEX Hub
They came. They saw. They synchronizedÉthree platforms. Using GDS (Global Directory Server) 2.01, ISOCOR successfully synchronized Exchange, cc:Mail and Notes.

N-PLEX uses a fully 1993 X.500-compliant system, improving replication performance and interoperability. N-PLEX permits access by any X.500- or DAP-compliant DSA. N-PLEX is the only product that runs on both NT and Unix. The product also shines in the management area with its simple GUI and fully remote, integrated Management Center. Very impressive were the filtering capabilities that enabled us to exclude certain post offices and individual users from the initial load while preserving the organizational hierarchy. N-PLEX includes a full DAP client, called the Global Directory Navigator version 2.0.

N-PLEX Hub works in tandem with GDS as a message switch between the various connected mail systems for the purpose of exchanging mail. For each e-mail platform there is a gateway called I SOGATE Plus and a directory sync agent called ISOGATE Dirsync Plus. You can install the gateway and agent together and share the rules. From the Management Center, you configure the Hub environment with gateways and the Dirsync Plus agents. You can manage any remote machine from this center, including starting and stopping NT services running on remote machines. The system contains the NuTCRACKER kernel, which gives you Unix functionality on NT and improves system performance.

We tested this product on our NT 4.0 server. We had to upgrade cc:Mail to DB8 because it would not run on DB6.

The Dirsync Plus agent for Exchange and Notes must run on the e-mail platform servers to use their DLLs (Dynamic Link Libraries). In the case of cc:Mail, it didn't matter where the agent was installed. We also had to install the ISO stack for X.400 that was included with the product. We created post offices in cc:Mail for Notes and Exchange and a foreign domain in Notes for cc:Mail and Exchange. ISOGATE Plus for Exchange supplies a proxy generator that builds the ISOCOR X.400 addresses, so recipients have a fully qualified X.400 address.

N-PLEX was the only product to use VIM (Vendor Independent Messaging), instead of Import/Export, to interact with the cc:Mail environment. This proved troublesome in the area of mapping names. VIM takes the format of the address book and switches it around so "lastname,firstname" becomes "firstname lastname." This makes it difficult to map correctly into the master directory. Specifically, two-part surnames using Van, Von, De, Le or La, for example (like Edward Van Halen), required the creation of a separate rule for each instance of the two-part name. ISOCOR recommends that the administrator run an export and put the names into an Excel spreadsheet to see all the compound names. We recommend that ISOCOR develop a generic rule that eliminates this problem.

We liked the real-time online synchronization status that showed the percentage completed. We also liked being able to immediately t est the rules we created.

For backups and restores, N-PLEX uses a simple DOS utility that can operate while the directory is running, but it slows performance. You can control the number of backup files you want to keep and either restore from the backup file or from all the updates since the last backup from the update logs. Backups can be scheduled from the NT AT Scheduler.

Because N-PLEX is 1993 X.500-compliant, very granular security mechanisms are included with the product. Bilevel password protection permits two levels of administration--one to read only and one to read and write the agents. To establish a Directory User Agent authentication policy that includes options to read, write or administer the system, simply indicate no credentials (read only), name without password (read only), name with password (write, administer), chained name and password (read) or chained name from a trusted DSA with name and password (write). To establish a connection, the communicating DSAs have several options as to how granular the security will be. For example, the DSAs can exchange no credentials, name only, name and password, and so on.

ISOCOR's plans include the release of a full NT port of the GDS, eliminating the NuTCRACKER kernel. Also, Global Directory Navigator will be a part of the Hub Management Center, so you will be able to create both X.500 directory and X.400 messaging environments and manage them from one remote administrative point.