Improvements to E-mail Services

by Megan Speakes

OIT’s effort to simplify the University’s computing environment has positive implications for the e-mail environment. The planned improvements in the e-mail arena are twofold: first, to provide every member of the University community with a consistent e-mail address related to their unique University Directory ID, and second, to develop and support a Web-accessible enterprise e-mail system available to the entire University.

Currently, every faculty member, staff member, and student has an e-mail address with the “@umd.edu” suffix listed in the University Directory. This e-mail address forwards messages to the user’s primary e-mail address, which is usually a departmental or OIT-supported e-mail account and is listed in the Directory below the “@umd.edu” address. This e-mail address is not only shorter and easier to remember when communicating with other University community members, but will also remain constant even if the user changes his or her primary e-mail system.

The enterprise e-mail system, Mail@umd, is currently being tested by OIT employees and will be continuously updated and improved until it is ready to be released to the University community. Users of all OIT-supported e-mail systems (WAM, Glue/Deans, umail, and ACCMAIL) will transition to the Mail@umd system on a department-by-department basis beginning with faculty and staff in the Spring 2003 semester. Students will begin to transition in Fall 2003.

The Mail@umd system provides added convenience and security to users:
• It is faster and more reliable than the current OIT systems.
• It is accessible through any IMAP or POP e-mail client.
• It is Web-accessible so you can access it from any computer with an Internet browser.
• It provides system-level virus scanning so your computer is protected by an additional layer of filtering.
• It is accessible from PDAs (Personal Digital Assistants such as PalmPilots and other handheld computers) and other Wireless Application Protocol (WAP)-enabled roaming devices.
• It uses a secure, encrypted protocol for information transfer between your computer and the e-mail system.

The user’s e-mail address on the Mail@umd system will be the “@umd.edu” address that is listed in the University Directory and discussed above. Forwarding services from old addresses will be continued for at least a year after the last user has moved off of the system, however users are encouraged to begin using their “@umd.edu” e-mail addresses to ease the transition to the new system and new address. Users with accounts on systems such as WAM and Glue that provide home space in addition to an e-mail account will not lose home space—only the e-mail accounts will be disabled. Users from departmental e-mail systems at the University will be allowed to migrate to the Mail@umd system after all users of OIT-supported systems have moved.

For more information and FAQs about the Mail@umd system, visit www.oit.umd.edu/email. To find your “@umd.edu” address, go to www.directory.umd.edu.

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