About instant messaging
Instant messaging service is based on an open technology for real-time communication.
The instant messaging (IM) service is running in Connect automatically.
To check if the instant messaging is accessible, click on Check Service Accessibility in the administration interface in section Configuration → Instant Messaging.
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Make sure to open the following ports on your firewall (both directions):
5222 (IM service)
5223 (secured IM service)
5269 (if sending outside of your domain is allowed)
DNS records must be configured for your domain. Read article Configuring DNS for instant messaging for more information.
Sending messages outside of your domain
By default, users can send messages only to members of the same domain.
To enable sending/receiving instant messages to/from other domains (either within the Connect server or outside), follow these steps:
In the administration interface, go to section Configuration → Instant Messaging.
Check option Allow users to send/receive messages to/from people outside of the domain.
Save the settings.
Check Service Accessibility.
These settings are valid for all domains on the server. You can override them by individual user settings (on tab Messages) or group settings (tab Rights).
Remember to configure DNS for instant messaging.
Securing instant messaging
We recommend to secure instant messaging by using TLS:
set security policy to require encrypted connection or secure authentication in section Configuration → Security → tab Security Policy (Configuration → Advanced Options → tab Security Policy for Connect 8.1 and older)
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use unsecured instant messaging service (port 5222)
You can also enable only the secure instant messaging service (port 5223) and use SSL.
Security policy is applied to all services in your Connect.
Limiting access to instant messaging
If you need to restrict access to any users, you can define User Access Policies to:
disable access to IM
restrict access IM to specific addresses
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To display which users are connected to the IM server, go to section Active Connections in the administration interface.
Disabling instant messaging
You can disable instant messaging by stopping the instant messaging services (see article Services in Connect).
Archiving instant messages
For information about archiving instant messages, read article Archiving instant messaging.
Automatic contact list
Connect automatically creates contact lists of all domain users who are published in the global address list.
Once users login to an IM client, their account will display list of contacts of users from their domain (Colleagues).
If a user is having problems with their contact list (e.g. if they delete any users), you can restore their contact list:
In the administration interface, go to section Accounts → Users.
Right-click the user and select More Actions → Restore IM Contact List.
Confirm.
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Restoring contact lists discards any changes the user has made to their Colleagues list. Added contacts will remain preserved.
Maximum size of the automatic contact list
Maximum number of users in the automatic contact list is set to 300. The users who exceed this number are not included in the Colleagues contact list and also their contact list is empty.
To change the maximum size of the contact list:
Stop the Connect engine.
Open the mailserver.cfg file.
Edit the following line:
To disable the automatic contact list completely, set the MaximumRoster value to 0 (zero).
Save the file.
Start the Connect engine.
Connect saves the information about exceeding the maximum number of users in the Warning log.