I have posted several times about the features offered by the Premier version of the Google Apps service, which offers additional services over and above the free to use consumer offering, and decided to see what all the fuss was about. How easy is it to move your email domain to the "Google Cloud"?
In this article I will look at the mobility features offered by Google's solution, and how these are configured on a variety of client devices, both static and mobile.
It is beyond the scope of this article to go into detail about directory services, spam filtering, account delegation and all the other aspects that an administrator should look into when considering deploying an email solution.

Features

Features available include:

• 25GB user mailbox storage
• Web-based access to email
• Support for Microsoft Outlook on desktops
• POP & IMAP access to email
• Support for Exchange ActiveSync on Windows Mobile and iPhone devices
• Gmail client available for Symbian and BlackBerry as well as a variety of other platforms
• Support for BlackBerry Internet Service access (BIS)
• Support for BlackBerry Enterprise Server integration (BES)

I will look at how all of these features are configured.

Registration

A 30-day free trial of the service is available. This does require a valid credit card, but no deduction is made from your card unless you fail to cancel the service within those 30 days, at which point you will be billed at £33 per user account per year (at the time of writing).
A trial can be registered for on the Google Apps web site - http://www.google.com/apps/intl/en-GB/business/features.html

For the purposes of this trial, I registered the snappily-titled domain 'jamesliddiard.co.uk'

When creating your Google Premier trial, you will be prompted to enter the domain that you wish to use for the trial:

You will also be prompted to specify how many user accounts should be provisioned:

And then be asked to enter payment details (which at this stage is only to verify valid billing details):

You will then be prompted to enter the details of an administrative account:

To prove that you do have access to the domain that you are requesting be managed, you will be asked to performed a test exercise:

In this case I opted to create a CNAME alias for the jamesliddiard.co.uk domain:

The requested alias was then created on my DNS server:

Having left sufficient time for the DNS change to take effect, Google then verifies that the CNAME alias exists.

Your account is now created - it's really that simple!

To configure mail delivery for your domain, MX records will need to be created / amended on your DNS server:

ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM. 1
ALT1.ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM. 5
ALT2.ASPMX.L.GOOGLE.COM. 5
ASPMX2.GOOGLEMAIL.COM. 10
ASPMX3.GOOGLEMAIL.COM. 10
ASPMX4.GOOGLEMAIL.COM. 10
ASPMX5.GOOGLEMAIL.COM. 10

Once made, you can verify the changes by performing an nslookup operation on the domain:

You can verify mail delivery by logging into the Google web site (http://www.googe.com/apps) using the administrative login specified earlier:

To use your own domain name for client access to the web interface, log into the admin dashboard and select the option to Change URL. You will be prompted to enter the A record you wish to use, and to add a CNAME DNS alias for 'ghs.google.com':

The same can be done or all other services: calendar, docs, video, etc.

Now your Google Premier service is configured, you can proceed with adding user accounts. Google offer a tool that allows you to replicate user accounts from your existing directory service, be it LDAP or Exchange GAL-based, but for the purposes of this article I have only registered a single user. You can read more information about the domain migration options available on the Google web site.

Google Desktop Apps

Once your domain has been configured, within the admin dashboard will be a link that you can distribute to your users:

Clicking on the link will automatically download and install the Google Chrome web browser to user PCs and create shortcuts on the desktop for Mail, Calendar and Docs access, pre-configured with the require domain details, requiring only that the user enter their username and password to connect:

Configuring Outlook access

There are 3 principal ways in which Outlook can be configured to access your Google service: via POP, via IMAP, or using Google's own AppSync application.
If you have the option, IMAP should always be considered in preference to POP as it supports folder management, but Google's preference is for you to use their AppSync client - which also has the benefit of allowing you to upload your existing local PST mailbox store to your Gmail client while still using your Outlook client - clever stuff.

Configuring IMAP access

Create a new Outlook Profile and select the option to create an IMAP-based email account:

Enter the following details:

• Incoming mail server: imap.gmail.com
• Outgoing mail server: smtp.gmail.com
• Username: (your email address)
• Password: (your password)

Click on the More Settings button and then on the Advanced tab:

Set the incoming port to 993 and select the option to use SSL encryption.
Set the outgoing port to 587 and select the option to use TLS encryption.

Click on the Outgoing Server tab:

Select the option to "use the same settings as my incoming mail server".

Click OK and complete the Profile creation wizard.

Configuring Google App Sync

In order to use the Google App Sync client, this feature must first be enabled within the admin dashboard:

The Google App Sync client application is a free download from the Google web site - https://tools.google.com/dlpage/gappssync

Select the link to download the application directly from within your web browser - for some reason on my test PC Internet Explorer 8 had issues with the download link so I used Google Chrome instead:

Once downloaded, the wizard will launch automatically and you will be prompted to enter your login information:

You will be prompted whether or not you want to use an existing PST file and whether or not you wish to import that information into your Google mailbox:

Setup is now complete:

When Outlook is next launched, a new Outlook profile will have been created (if one was present previously):

And your mailbox data will be synced automatically:

Should you want to create a new Outlook profile manually, select the option to create an 'Other' type of email account and select Google Outlook Service:

An icon for the Google App Sync will be added both to the System Tray and the Start Menu. From the Start Menu it is possible to create further accounts and also add delegated mailboxes:

Configuring Windows Mobile access

As with Outlook, access to your Gmail account can be configured via either POP or IMAP, but the Google Premier service also allows for the ActiveSync protocol to be used on both Windows Mobile and iPhone devices.

In order to make this feature available to your users, it will need to be enabled within the admin dashboard, under Email Settings:

Supported devices can also optionally be forced to require a password.

On the Windows Mobile device, select the option to create a new ActiveSync Exchange profile. Untick the option to ‘determine settings automatically’ if the option is available, the following screen will be displayed:

In the Server address field type in ‘m.google.com’ as shown above. Ensure that the option ‘This server requires an encrypted connection’ is ticked.

Tap Next, the following screen will be displayed:

Enter your username and password information.
Your username will be your email address.
Leave the domain field empty. If your device requires a domain to be entered, use ‘google’.

Tap Next, the following screen will be displayed:

Select the folders you wish to synchronise (note - tasks is not currently supported)

Tap Finish. Your device is now configured for Google Sync.

Newly available to the Google Premier Apps service is the ability to remotely wipe Windows Mobile devices from the Admin dashboard. When a user synchronises from a Windows Mobile device, that device will be listed in their User Account page:

Selecting the option to Wipe the device will cause the device to be hard reset the next time it attempts to synchronise:

Configuring the Nokia E & N Series

There are two ways to access GMail from a Nokia Symbian S60 device: using Google's own GMail client, or via IMAP. (Note - POP access is also possible, but if you have the option of using IMAP, you may as well)

GMail Client

Google's own client for the S60 platform can be downloaded to the device itself by browsing to m.google.com in the device's web browser:

Once installed, it will be listed in the Installations folder:

When launched, you will be prompted to enter your email address and password:

Once logged in your email will be synced automatically:

and you can perform mailbox actions directly from the client:

IMAP

Personally I find the GMail client on a small screen a bit "cluttered" and prefer to use IMAP, but that's just my own opinion. To add a new IMAP mailbox to a Nokia phone (in this example I am using my trusty E71), open the Messaging folder and select Options --> Settings --> Email:

Select the option to add a New Mailbox:

The Nokia Email wizard will launch automatically, select the option to Start it:

Allow the wizard to connect to the Internet:

Click Start to begin the wizard:

Enter your email address:

Enter your password:

The wizard will think it has determined the correct settings to use and ask whether you want to subscribe to the Nokia Messaging service. I chose not to:

Your new mailbox will now be listed:

Edit the properties of the new mailbox:

Edit the Connection Settings:

Edit the Incoming Server Settings:

Verify that the incoming server is set to 'imap.gmail.com' and select the Internet access point you want to use. Enter in your password. Verify that security is set to SSL.

Edit the Outgoing Server Settings:

On my E71 the wizard set the outgoing server to 'imap.gmail.com' - change it to 'smtp.gmail.com'.

Set the Security option to "StartTLS"

Set the Port to 587:

Your mail will now be synced to the device:

Configuring Mac OS

Because GMail supports the industry-standard IMAP protocol, then you are free to use virtually any email client you wish, but I shall look at how to configure both Mac OS' own Mail application as well as Microsoft's Entourage application for Mac OS.

Mac Mail

Launch the Mail application. If you have no mail accounts configured, the Add New Account wizard will launch automatically. To add a new account browse to Mail --> Preferences.

Enter in your name, email address and password:

Click Continue.

Enter a name for the mail account. Select IMAP as the account type.
Set the incoming mail server to "imap.gmail.com"
Enter your username (your email address) and password. Click Continue.

Set the outgoing mail server to 'smtp.gmail.com'.
Tick the option to use authentication and enter in the same username and password.
Click Continue:

Click Create. Your mail will now by synchronised:

Open the Preferences and select the option to Edit the SMTP Server List:

Set the SMTP port to 587:

Entourage

Create a new IMAP mail account within the Entourage Preferences:

Enter your Account ID (your email address) and password.
Set the IMAP server to "imap.gmail.com"
Click on the option to define advanced receiving options:

Tick the option to use a secure connection.

Click on the option to use advanced sending options:

Select the option to use a secure connection.
Set the SMTP port to 587
Select the option to use the same authentication settings as the incoming server.

Add the account, your mail will now be synchronised.

Configuring BlackBerry

BlackBerry smartphones can be configured to access your Google email account in a number of ways: BIS subscribers can add their email address via their operator's web portal and have the account settings determined automatically (http://blog.brightpointuk.co.uk/setting-new-blackberry-internet-service-...)
Or alternatively for BES users, a dedicated GMail client is available for download:

A BlackBerry Enterprise Server solution can also be deployed alongside a Google Apps Premier service to provide both push email functionality as well as comprehensive device management features. I have detailed this setup procedure in a separate article - http://blog.brightpointuk.co.uk/installing-google-apps-connector-blackbe...

Conclusion

Setting up a Google Premier account is simplicity itself, and access to your mail is possible from literally any client, be it via HTTP, POP, IMAP, ActiveSync or via Google's own AppSync protocols.

However, as with all cloud-based services, you are utterly at the mercy of third party infrastructure, and as you can see from Google's own status dashboard, their service experienced issues 2 days this week alone:

Addendum

Google's Premier Apps Service can also be integrated free of charge with the Postini anti-virus and anti-spam email filtering service.
The service is enabled within the Administration Dashboard and requires that you adjust your MX records, you will be sent an email with the correct details to use:

JAMESLIDDIARD.CO.UK.S200A1.PSMTP.COM
JAMESLIDDIARD.CO.UK.S200A2.PSMTP.COM
JAMESLIDDIARD.CO.UK.S200B1.PSMTP.COM
JAMESLIDDIARD.CO.UK.S200B2.PSMTP.COM

Within the Postini admin dashboard you can view details of any blocked emails either because of junk classification or suspected virus content:

And can configure whitelist and blacklist for individual senders and whole mail domains: