Aug 30, 2011 12:40 GMT  ·  By

A free online Microsoft tool, made available to streamline Exchange deployments, has grown with the addition of migration scenarios involving Office 365.

Essentially, customers visiting the official Exchange Server Deployment Assistant website now have the option of leveraging no less than three scenarios: On-Premises Only, Hybrid (On-Premises + Cloud) and Cloud Only. The labels should be pretty much self-explanatory.

IT professionals that have already taken advantage of the Exchange Server Deployment Assistant should be aware that the Cloud Only scenario has just been introduced by the software giant.

“To help you sort through the available options and plan your migration to the cloud, we’re happy to announce the “Cloud Only” option in the latest release of the Exchange Server Deployment Assistant,” Microsoft’s John Speare stated.

“Like the other scenarios in the Deployment Assistant, the “Cloud Only” option allows you to step through a wizard that asks you questions about your current infrastructure and your migration goals. The Deployment Assistant will provide a migration solution that is based on your answers.”

It important to note that the Exchange Server Deployment Assistant will not be doing any of the heavy lifting implied during a migration process to Exchange Online, but that it’s rather designed to offer guidance ahead of anything else.

It’s also worth mentioning that Office 365, Microsoft’s Cloud productivity offerings, comes with its own email migration tools, but customers can still use the assistant.

Especially so since “there are dependencies and restrictions on the migration tools that you may be able to use with Office 365. Variables such as your on-premises Exchange Server version, the number of mailboxes you want to move, and how you want to handle user identity will dictate the tools and processes you can use to migrate to the cloud,” Speare added.