Blackberry Has Downside Among Features In Latest Software
Topping out at 60 simultaneous connections, Professional provides a wide array of features not available on the higher enterprise product. The software can be integrated with IBM's Lotus Domino Server 8.0 or Microsoft Exchange 2007. In addition, Professional supports Web-based instant messaging and provides connectivity to corporate applications.
Here's what the CRN Test Center found:
To simplify installation, RIM created a preinstalled process that checks for compatibility with hardware, OS and servers. RIM has posted a step-by-step guide so that solution providers can quickly get a BlackBerry server running on an Exchange box. The BlackBerry server requires a MAPI client for Exchange 2007 and Microsoft's Collaboration Data Objects.
Out of the box, Professional provides pull-and-push features for messaging that work over the HTTP ports. The connection service supports RSA Authentication as well as SSL and certificates. Because the services are built in to BlackBerry Manager, solution providers need only configure settings for each of the services.
While selecting and adding new users is easy because the properties collected from Active Directory are visible within BlackBerry Manager, reviewers found that the properties in Professional must be configured separately. Security also plays a big part when configuring new policies; the PGP encryption, for instance, provides three key length settings and standard cipher strengths.
Next, connecting and activating handheld devices proved to be a bit more difficult than anticipated. During installation, the most basic method to detect and add a device is to hook it up in the USB drive so that the USB drive shows up with the device. If this step is not taken, Professional changes its port connection to the serial ports.
Although the serial ports support USB connections, turning the property on is another matter—and the Test Center was unable to use the local USB ports to connect a BlackBerry 8130. After several tries, the serial ports could not latch on to the USB ports, so reviewers were not able to connect to the device.
All of the services and features can reside on an Exchange 2007 server box, but there's added cost associated with combining all of these services into a single server. If there's one problem with Professional, it's that rolling this all out means considerable time consumption for planning, integrating and deploying it—which prevents the Test Center from fully recommending Blackberry Professional Software at this stage. But if RIM can improve some documentation and iron out a few more of these wrinkles, VARs would be less likely to lose valuable time.