Internet Messaging for Communication Manager Messaging builds on the multimedia capabilities of messaging to provide
exchange of voice, fax, text, and binary components over the Internet.
Topics include:
Internet
Messaging Features
Internet Messaging has the following
characteristics:
- Internet Gateway
Messagingsubscribers gain
an Internet email address and can send or receive messages over the
Internet. Internet Messaging uses Extended Simple Mail Transport Protocol
(ESMTP), a standard TCP/IP-based mail protocol.
- Mailbox access through
POP3 or IMAP4 clients
In addition to the telephone
user interface (TUI) and Message Manager 4.3 and greater,
subscribers can also select one of the currently available POP3 or IMAP4 email
client programs to check their messages. For example, Netscape Mail
or Microsoft Outlook can be used to receive and respond to messages
through the messaging software.
What
Internet Messaging Can Do for You
Internet Messaging can:
- Provide access for messaging subscribers to any of the email users worldwide through the
Internet.
- Increase the number of
choices that subscribers have to access messages, including telephone,
Message Manager, and industry-standard email platforms.
- Save costs by allowing
message transport through existing, shared Internet facilities.
Sending and Receiving Email
Internet Messaging gives
Message Manager and Post Office Protocol 3 (POP3) or Internet Message Access Protocol 4 (IMAP4) client subscribers
full Internet email capabilities through the messaging. Multimedia
messages can be sent from the messaging software to any email address. The
recipients can access these messages as multi-part MIME messages using
commercially-available email software. Voice components are played with
the G711 wave format through your PC.
Email Access With Computer
Applications
The following access methods are
available:
- Message Manager subscribers
can send and receive all four component types to and from Internet
email users, as with any other messaging destination. These component
types include voice, fax, text, and file attachments.
- POP3 and IMAP4 client subscribers
can use their browser to access their messaging mailboxes. Voice components are played with
the G711 wave format. Graphics programs display fax files. Text and attached
files are handled as with any other email.
- Non-messaging users
access messages using the same message-rendering tools as POP3 or IMAP4 client
subscribers, except the messages are delivered through their own Internet
service provider.
Email Access Through the Telephone
With Internet Messaging for messaging, subscribers can use the telephone to manage messages received
at their messaging mailbox. The message waiting indicator (MWI, such as
the indicator lamp or a stutter dial tone) is activated to alert a subscriber
to the arrival of new messages.
The message can contain up to
four media types, specifically voice, fax, text, and file attachments.
From the telephone, subscribers can:
- Receive an email message
that can contain up to four media type components.
- Listen to a voiced rendering
of the text component (if the messaging Text-to-Speech feature
is activated).
- Print the text and/or
fax component of an email message to a fax machine.
- Reply to an email message,
whether it came from a messaging subscriber or an Internet email
address.
A message is treated as a single
entity when accessed via a telephone. When subscribers play a message
that contains a voice, a fax, a text, and a file attachment component,
they hear the following:
- Voice component
- A voiced summary of the fax component and instructions
on how to print the fax
- The spoken translation of the text component
(if enabled)
- A voiced summary about the attached file
Optional Email Features
Two features provide additional
access to message information:
- Text-to-Speech (TTS) conversion
is an optional feature that enables subscribers to listen to a voiced
rendering of email and Message Manager text messages received
in their messaging mailboxes.
Message components are
rendered as follows:
- The subject line of
an email message is read as part of the message header.
- The body of the text
message is voiced.
- If a file attachment
is included in the email message, that component is not voiced.
The subscriber hears summary information regarding the size of the
file.
- Fax components are also
summarized regarding the number of pages contained in the fax.
- Text-to-Fax (TTF) enables
subscribers to print the text and/or fax component of an email message
to a printer or fax machine. For the text component, the messaging software uses the Text-to-Fax feature to translate the component into
printed form.
Messages are printed
in plain text, without formatting and special attributes such as bold
type or tab settings.
Planning
Before you install Internet Messaging,
there are several things you should consider:
Email Message Size
Email messaging can have a significant
impact on the size set for a subscriber's mailbox. An email message
can be a short memo or can include attachments of software files of
considerable size. If subscribers send fax and voice messages, planning
is more difficult.
Messaging converts all message components
into seconds of space in the mailbox.The following tables show some
examples of typical mailbox sizes and corresponding maximum email and maximum message
length capacities.
Table: Mailbox Suggested Sizes and Maximum
| Mailbox Size, in seconds and (hours:minutes) |
Mailbox Size, in MB |
Notes |
| 2400 sec (0:40 hr) |
19.2 MB |
The message size is determined by multiplying the message length in seconds by 8000 and dividing by 1000000. |
| 3600 sec (1:00 hr) |
28.8 MB |
|
| 4800 sec (1:20 hr) |
38.4 MB |
|
| 8400 sec (2:20 hr) |
67.2 MB |
System default |
| 32767 sec (9:06 hr) |
262 MB |
System maximum for one subscriber's mailbox |
Table: Email and Voice Message Sizes, Suggested
Sizes and Maximum
| Message Length, in seconds and (minutes) |
Message Size, in MB |
Notes |
| 600 sec (10 min) |
4.8 MB |
The message size is determined by multiplying the message length in seconds by 8000 and dividing by 1000000. |
| 900 sec (15 min) |
7.2 MB |
|
| 1200 sec (20 min) |
9.6 MB |
System default |
| 10800 sec (180 min or 3 hours) |
86.4 MB
|
System maximum for one message
|
LAN Impact
Use the following table to estimate
how much of the LAN traffic on the system will be comprised of email
messages (including email with attached components).
Table: LAN Impact of Email Messaging
| Component |
Size |
| Voice |
60 seconds = 480 1-KB packets |
| Fax |
3 pages = 145 1-KB packets |
| Email |
5 KB = 5.5 1-KB packets |
|
Attachments, including email attachments
|
around 150 KB (file size varies by type of
file and contents)
|
Subscriber Planning
Prepare subscribers by taking the
following steps:
- Inform users about their messaging email capabilities. See Notifying
Subscribers of Email Capability and Setup for more information.
- Allow Message Manager subscribers to add email addresses
to their personal address books or their messaging lists to simplify
addressing.
- Determine whether to allow messaging subscribers to access messages
in their messaging mailbox with a POP3 or IMAP4 email program. The messaging software can send messages similar to any mail gateway, but allowing
this access presents certain security risks. See Security
Issues for more information.
- When questions arise, or in the initial training about messaging
email, describe the following differences to subscribers:
- When a message is sent from a messaging subscriber to recipients
in both messaging and the Internet, the messaging recipients are not listed
on the Internet recipient's email To: list. Therefore, the email
recipients do not know which messaging subscribers also received the
message and cannot use the email application's Reply All function
to send a reply to the messaging recipients of the original message.
- Messages expire within a time period determined
by the subscriber or COS mailbox settings. Subscribers need to
understand this difference because email accounts do not usually
have this limitation.
- Users can set their email application (such as Outlook or Exchange)
to forward mail automatically to another email address or to their
messaging email address. messaging does not allow mail
to be automatically forwarded to another email address.
Security
Issues
|
Toll fraud is the theft of long distance service. When toll fraud
occurs, your company is responsible for charges. See Overview
of Security for information on how to prevent toll
fraud, or call the Avaya Technologies National Customer Care Center
at 1-800-643-2353.
|
Using Internet Messaging and the
Internet presents certain security issues. Your company is responsible
for any damages that could arise as a result of the use of Internet
Messaging. However, you can administer your system to minimize these
risks. You need to be concerned with:
Disabling POP3 or IMAP4 Access
On the General Options and Settings page, if
the POP3 client access enabled? or IMAP4 client access enabled? fields are set to Yes, hackers could
determine a subscriber's login name and password, and then commit toll
fraud through the subscriber's mailbox. Use Internet Messaging only
behind a corporate firewall and restrict external Internet access to
the appropriate email client ports.
If your company is concerned with subscriber
login security, consider the following alternatives:
- Disable the POP3 or IMAP4 interface by selecting No on the General
Options and Settings page.
- Exclusively use email clients such as Qualcomm's Eudora
client that support password encryption.
- Deploy secure socket layer (SSL) for POP3 or IMAP4 using an external SSL
accelerator. Current products on the market include SSL100 Accelerator
by Avaya.
Viruses
The ease with which messages can be broadcast
and transmitted over the Internet simplifies the distribution of computer
viruses. Enact a policy to ensure that subscribers check incoming messages
and files for viruses.
Another precaution, especially important if this is your company's
first email deployment, is a system-wide virus scanning application.
The applications scan all incoming mail for viruses and intercept
infected mail and files before they get to the subscriber. Current examples
include:
- Interscan Virus Wall by Trend Micro
- Webshield products by McAfee
- Antivirus for Gateways by Norton
- eSafe Gateway by Aladdin
Spoofing or Sending Email
Under a False Name
Internet email addresses are not validated for
identity. As a result, the identity of the message sender is not guaranteed.
Warn your subscribers not to respond to messages from unverified sources,
especially if the message contains requests for private information or
any form of payment. The name of the machine that delivered a message
to the Internet Messaging server can be checked by reading the message's
header information.
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