Multitier, Replicated, Secure Forms Library

Users might have difficulty locating a new application in an organization if the application is on one of many servers. Intranets have made finding applications easier, but users still have to find the site with explicit links to the information they want. And once users find the Web server that has the application, that server might be halfway around the globe, making connection speeds to that application very slow.

Exchange Server's multitier, replicated, secure forms library makes locating applications easier. The Exchange Server forms library has four main components : an Organizational Forms Library, the folder forms libraries, a Personal Forms Library, and a Web forms library. Some of these libraries can be synchronized offline, so users can work with the applications even when they are disconnected from the network. You can choose which of these libraries is best for your application.

Organizational Forms Library

The Organizational Forms Library usually contains forms that everyone in an organization needs access to, such as vacation requests , business card order forms, and travel expense reports . The Organizational Forms Library is on the Exchange server and can be replicated to other Exchange servers throughout your network, enabling quick access to these forms. It lists all the available forms throughout an organization. Figure 2-16 shows the Organizational Forms Library in Outlook.

Figure 2-16: The Organizational Forms Library

The Organizational Forms Library is secure, allowing administrators to set which users have permissions to publish or edit information in the library. It is also multilingual; Exchange Server presents the server-based forms library that corresponds to the language of the client program accessing the forms library. For example, when a Japanese client requests a list of forms in the Organizational Forms Library, Exchange Server displays all the corresponding Japanese forms. This multilingual capability allows you to customize and deploy your applications without having to write any code to detect the language of the client.

Folder Forms Library

The folder forms library is for folder-specific forms. The folder forms library is more secure than the Organizational Forms Library. You post forms that you do not want to share globally in the folder forms library. The forms stored in a personal folder forms library are shared only with the users to whom you give access. The forms stored in a public folder forms library can be shared with any user who has the correct permissions on that public folder. Using the synchronization capabilities of Exchange Server, users can replicate public folders (including their data and forms) off line.

Personal Forms Library

The Personal Forms Library is the most restrictive library in terms of sharing its forms with other users. It "belongs" to a particular user and cannot be shared with any other users in the organization. All forms in the Personal Forms Library can be used both on and off the network. Users can test forms in the Personal Forms Library before publishing them to the Organizational Forms Library or folder forms library.

Web Forms Library

The Web forms library is a hierarchy of folders stored in the Windows file system where your Web server (IIS) runs OWA. Exchange Server supports HTML forms as a development environment, so OWA has an easy and automatic way for Web developers to publish custom forms in the Web forms library. To create an HTML-based application, you simply create a subdirectory in the file system where OWA is stored and copy your HTML files to it. The new form will appear in the Launch Custom Forms window of OWA. Users can then start working with the application from the Web forms library. Figure 2-17 shows forms in the Web forms library.

Figure 2-17: The Web forms library, which holds HTML applications that you develop

Starting with Exchange 2000, the Web forms library has been replaced by WSS Forms and the WSS Forms Registry. Existing Web forms will still work on Exchange Server 5.5, but not on Exchange Server 2000 and later. For this reason, if you are using the Web forms library, you should keep at least one OWA 5.5 server in your organization.