Understanding Exchange Server 2003 Administrative Models

 

This topic provides you with information about the different types of Administrative models in Exchange Server 2003.

Understanding the Types of Administrative Models

Because administrative groups are logical, you can create administrative groups based on locations, departments, or functions. For example, a global company with branches in different countries can create administrative groups to delegate functional tasks. In a native-mode organization, you could create a single administrative group that contains servers only and use this specialized server administration group to create policies for all the servers in your organization. You can then create another administrative group only for public folder administration, and then have a specialized team administer all public folders trees using this administrative group.

However, before creating these various functional administrative groups, you must understand your organization's administrative model, as dictated by your organizational structure and your security policy. When you understand your organization's administrative model, you can then implement administrative groups to accurately reflect this model.

This section presents the types of administrative models, and how these models affect your implementation of administrative groups. The administrative models discussed in this section are:

  • Decentralized administrative model

  • Centralized administrative model

  • Mixed administrative model

To illustrate these administrative models, the following sections show how to apply each of these models to a fictitious company named Contoso, Ltd. This fictitious company has global branches in North America, Europe, and Asia, as shown in the following figure.

Branches in Contoso, Ltd

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Note

In a mixed-mode organization, each site becomes a single administrative group, and you cannot use the administrative models discussed in this section.