Moving from Exchange/Office 365

What will and won't migrate to G Suite?

Data that will migrate:

The Exchange data that resides on University of Maryland servers will be migrated automatically by the project team on your behalf. This data includes:

• Email - Email data on the Exchange server will be migrated, including email messages with attachments in your Inbox (attachments 25 MB or larger will be saved to your new Google Drive), any user-created folders, and your Sent and Deleted Items folders. Drafts will migrate but may duplicate. Please delete any duplicates that appear in your Draft folder. Local folders and archives will not be migrated during this process. Your existing folder structure will be migrated as Google labels.

• Calendar - Exchange Calendar appointments from 2000 through 2050 will be transferred to UMD G Suite. (Attachments in calendar appointments will be saved to your new Google Drive.)

• Personal contacts and groups - All personal contacts in your Exchange mailbox will be migrated to UMD G Suite as Contacts.

• Tasks

Data that won't migrate:

• Local folders and archives will not be migrated during this process.

• Messages with attachments that are not permitted in Google (i.e., .exe, .vbs, .jar, etc.). See the full list of file types blocked in Gmail.

• Messages that appear to contain viruses or phishing attempts.

• Messages that include improper formatting, such as messages with $ in the from address.

• Separate message importance levels. All will migrate into one category called Important.

• Follow-up flags, reminders and Notes.

• Categories.

• Inbox rules. (In Gmail, these are called filters and will need to be recreated).

• Mailbox folder sharing permissions, including email folders, contact folders, and any calendar folders.

• RSS feeds.

• SMS/text messages.

Data that may not migrate to Google or may be changed:

• Messages containing significant amounts of formatted Rich Text (such as embedded charts and graphics) in the body may not convert with 100% fidelity.

• Folder names longer than 225 characters will be truncated and a sequential number will be appended to the truncated value (Gmail Labels have a 225 character limit). You can rename any long folder names once in Google.

• Recurring calendar appointments that were part of a series but were modified individually may not come over at all or the occurrence may be broken out as a separate meeting.

• Signature files.

• Out of Office and Tentative calendar status.

Before migration

What to do before migrating:

If you would like to organize your email to prepare for the data migration, there are some steps you can take. Your experience with Google will improve if the data that is migrated into G Suite is clean. Be sure to complete these tasks before your background migration begins or else plan to wait until after your entire migration is complete.

1. Clear duplicates out of your Drafts folder.

2. Identify and remove any export-controlled data from Exchange email accounts. U.S. export laws control the transmittal of export controlled technical information to non-U.S. persons and locations. If you believe you have data like this, please contact us at itsupport@umd.edu. Such data may be saved in Box; please see instructions from the Division of Research.

3. Review the Guides to Switching from Microsoft documents that apply to you. They provide a crosswalk between Microsoft Outlook and G Suite and illustrate the biggest user interface changes.

During migration

What to do during the migration:

Your data will be moved to G Suite in two phases: background migration and migration weekend.

Background migration - Beginning a couple of weeks before your Go Live date, your historical email data (all messages received before that phase begins) will be copied to G Suite). It's recommended that you do not do move or organize that email or change existing folders during background migration to prevent errors.

Migration weekend - During migration weekend, your newer email data will be moved, as will your calendar and contacts data.

During your migration weekend, even though you will have access to your new email in Gmail, please do not perform any organizational actions on messages in your new account (particularly adding or changing labels).

During the weekend, please also refrain from taking any action on calendar invitations. New events should ONLY be added to your Google Calendar, and you should refrain from sending ANY invitations until your Google account is live and migrations are completed (after the weekend).

After migration

Your email will automatically begin flowing to Gmail for you. Learn how to sign into your account. (To get the best experience using your new G Suite account, it is recommended that you use the Chrome web browser or the Gmail app for mobile devices.)

Verifying your migration

Make sure you have what you expect to see in Gmail and Calendar.

• Verify that your mailbox contains the messages that were in your primary Exchange mail account prior to the migration.

• Check to see that messages reside in the Gmail Labels that correspond to the appropriate Exchange Folders.

• Make sure all meetings are present in your G Suite Calendar (accepted meetings between 2000 and 2050 were migrated). Please remember that calendar migrations are never perfect. When you access your account, if you are missing an event, please recreate it. If there is a duplicate event, please delete it. You may also experience some issues with recurring events that have exceptions or non-standard recurrence patterns.

• Verify that all personal contacts and groups are present in your Contacts list in Gmail.

What can go wrong with migration?

It is possible that some messages will not migrate due to technical difficulties, corruption, or compatibility issues. For this reason, we encourage you to create an archive of your current email account and keep this archive somewhere safe, such as in your UMD Drive account.

Here are known possible issues:

• If you leave Drafts in your Draft folder, they may duplicate. To fix this, delete the duplicates.

Something's gone wrong with my migration

Contact the IT Service Desk so we can correct any issues.

Other things to note:

You will be able to choose to send email messages from your departmental email address.

All Calendar and Drive/Doc sharing communication will come from your DirectoryID@umd.edu email address.

Getting started

Getting started with your new email

To get the best experience using your new G Suite account, it is recommended that you use the Chrome web browser or the Gmail app for mobile devices. Learn how to sign into your account.

If you’re new to Gmail, head over to the training and resources page to get yourself acquainted with G Suite. This Day 1 Guide from Google can also help you get started.