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Impersonation with the new Smartermail Beta
Question asked by TK - 12/10/2022 at 7:03 AM
Unanswered
It seems like the new smartermail beta allows delegation from an external client. But it really should allow for delegation to be set on the server (and via api). 

UPDATE: this thread really is about impersonation.

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Andrea Free Replied
Employee Post
Hello TK, 

Thank you for your feedback! 

Webmail currently supports a lot of sharing options. (Users can share email, calendar, contact, note and task folders with any other domain users, and Domain Admins can create these folders on a domain-level to share as well.) However, for the small set of users that utilize delegation, it's most typically handled within MAPI and EWS clients, so that's what we're supporting at this time. (You'll see similar behavior in Exchange. OWA has probably 20% of the features that email clients have, since some features are more client-specific.)

In summary, we added support for the ability to delegate within supported email clients and to SEE that delegation within SmarterMail. Adding the ability to delegate mailboxes directly within SmarterMail (and via API) is on our list for consideration. However, at this time, we don't anticipate adding this functionality during the BETA.

Kind regards,

Andrea Free
SmarterTools Inc.
877-357-6278

www.smartertools.com

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Jay Dubb Replied
Will the new version support delegating "impersonate" ability to domain admins?  We can delegate view-password rights to domain-level admins, but not impersonation rights, and that's a feature that a few of our customers have been clanging the gong loudly for.  It's too many steps to have to view a user's password, log out, then log back in as the user, fix the problem, log out, and log back in as the admin again, just to diagnose problems that system-level admins can handle in seconds via impersonation.
 
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Kyle Kerst Replied
Employee Post
@Jay Dubb this post is referencing Outlook delegation of account resources such as the ability to send on behalf of or manage tasks. I recommend posting this to its own thread so it gets the traction it should.
Kyle Kerst
Technical Support Specialist
SmarterTools Inc.
(877) 357-6278
www.smartertools.com
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TK Replied
@Kyle: I actually meant impersonation - a very important feature for integrating into many external applications. e.g. a helpdesk software sending on behalf or syncing calendars or a mail archive using a service account to archive many accounts. etc.
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Kyle Kerst Replied
Employee Post
@TK: The impersonation you're referencing sounds like delegation functionality in Exchange environments including the ability to send/receive on behalf of in regards to emails, appointments, etc. Is that what you're looking for? 

If so; this functionality has been implemented and can be found in the versions currently in beta. Once you've assigned delegation permissions to a user via Outlook MAPI, that user will be able to send/receive on behalf of the first user. 

This can't be configured in webmail at this time, so you will need to configure the delegation settings in Outlook via MAPI. 
Kyle Kerst
Technical Support Specialist
SmarterTools Inc.
(877) 357-6278
www.smartertools.com
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TK Replied

It describes various mechanisms in this area. I'm specifically looking for this:
"Use impersonation when you have a service application that needs to access multiple mailboxes and "act as" the mailbox owner."

Reason for this: there are many service applications (e.g. external archiving solutions, external helpdesk systems, etc. that rely on this functionality to sync different mailboxes). 

I believe smartermail covers mechanism 1 and 2 but not 3 - but 3 is very important as we smartermail will be the centerpiece for all those external applications - if it does not work - the migration does not for these customers. 

Now to your other comment about using a mapi client for delegating things:
- Smartermail covers mechanism 2 from the article through the apis > good! 
- Smartermail does obviously rely on a mapi client to perform delegation as described in mechanism 1 > nope: exchange allows for powershell automation here > we also rely on this functionality and we really need a replacement for this that does not rely on a mapi client (as in api call). 

I have testbeds for testing all of the 3 mechanisms if this helps to implement the functionality. 

Thank you

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