Use the MAP 5.0 Beta Toolkit to track software usage & licensing for Exchange Servers

One of the newest features in development for the MAP Toolkit is the ability to track usage data for Microsoft products.  With the MAP Toolkit 5.0 Beta, you can intelligently track usage to determine your licensing needs for Exchange Server 2003 and 2007.   MAP is an agent-less tool that allows you to inventory your environment and collect usage information for ALL of the Exchange servers you are responsible for managing.  After completing a few simple setup steps, the MAP toolkit performs a complete scan of your environment and catalog all the information necessary to determine how your organization is using Exchange Server. 

 Once the inventory is complete, the MAP Toolkit provides the following Exchange usage information:

  • A comprehensive list of Exchange servers discovered in your environment.
  • Version and Edition information for each Exchange Server.
  • A comprehensive list of active Mailboxes for all Exchange servers in your environment.
  • Detailed information about each Mailbox, including what Enterprise features the mailbox is configured to use.
  • A count of total users and users using Enterprise features.

 The following figures summarize the above discussion.

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You can use these usage reports to verify license compliance and analyze current licensing needs. However, these reports should be used as a baseline for CAL usage analysis.   In summary, the Software Usage Tracker feature of the MAP toolkit helps you gather data on users and devices that access Microsoft server products, and helps you to simplify the Software Asset management Process.

The WWLP team , in conjunction with the MAP toolkit is offering a series of white papers to provide you the guidance for product licensing and compliance requirements. When used with the MAP tool, this guidance provides you with a complete picture of your client access license needs.

 Next Steps:

 Martin Beechen, Matt Miller & Venkat Ganti