ShowSCL for MS Exchange 2003

How to view Spam Confidence Level rating assigned by Exchange Intelligent Message Filter?

There is James Webster's solution to show the rating information for each mail as a column in Outlook: Exposing SCL (Spam Confidence Level) in Outlook. This solution allows you to configure Outlook to expose the SCL property to the end user. Unfortunately, the approach that has been taken by James has at least two disadvantages:
- it is Outlook-centric, so it should be installed on each user's workstation
- it allows you to see the SCL level of the message, but you can not create a rule in Outlook Rules and Alerts wizard to move or delete the messages whose SCL score is equal to certain value

ShowSCL for Exchange 2003 application allows you to place the message SCL score to the message category, so that you can easily find, sort, filter, or group the items by the SCL value.

The application is an Exchange store event sink.

Benefits

• You can set up ShowSCL on per-mailbox basis or as "store-wide" application, i.e. it will work on each user's Inbox in the certain Exchange mailbox store
• The application is server-centric, so you do not need to install any extra software on the client side

Installation

On your Exchange 2003 Server computer:

1. Create a new mail-enabled user account and make sure it's mailbox alias is SCLTEST.
   You should create this account for test purposes only, so you can delete it after you satisfy yourself with the fact that the application is actually works.
   
2. Select (or create) a user account that is a member of the Domain Admins and Domain Users security groups. Log on as that user.
   
3. Create C:\Program Files\ShowSCL\ directory. Download ShowSCL.zip archive file to C:\Program Files\ShowSCL\ directory and extract all files.
   
4. Run C:\Program Files\ShowSCL\ShowSCLSetup.exe. Select SCLTEST mailbox in the second list and check "Per-mailbox reistration" checkbox. Click "Change" button.
   
   
5. Make sure that that "SCL=<SCL value>" is selected in the "SCL value display format" frame. Click "Exit" button.

Testing with Outlook 2003

1. Using Outlook, open SCLTEST mailbox. Create a message addressed to SCLTEST and send it. Make sure the message you just sent exists in the Inbox folder.
   
2. Open View menu. Select Arrange By > Current View > Customize Current View...
   
   
3. Click Fields... button. Select All mail fields from the list on bottom left corner of the form. Select Categories field in the Available fields: list and press Add button.
   
   Click OK button to close Show Fields window. Click OK button to close View Summary window.
   
4. Look at Categories column. Note that "SCL=-1" value is placed there.
   
   
   
   
5. Create a subfolder named "SCL=-1" under Inbox folder. Select Tools menu > Rules and Alerts and create the following rule: "Apply this rule after the message arrives assigned to SCL=-1 category move it to the SCL=-1 folder".
   
   
6. Send new message to SCLTEST. Check if the message has been moved to "SCL=-1" folder.
   

Outlook 2007 has predefined client-side rule named "Clear categories on mail (recommended)". I do not know what this rule is for. If you cannot (or if you do not want to) remove/disable this rule, do the following steps.

Testing with Outlook 2007

1. Using Outlook, open SCLTEST mailbox. Create a message addressed to SCLTEST and send it. Make sure the message you just sent exists in the Inbox folder.
   
2. Open View menu. Select Current View > Customize Current View...
   
   
3. Click Fields... button. Select All Document fields from the list on bottom left corner of the form. Select "Comments" (not "Comment") field in the Available fields: list and press Add button.
   
   Click OK button to close Show Fields window. Click OK button to close Customize View window.
   
4. Look at Comments column. Note that "SCL=-1" value is placed there.
   
   
   
   
5. Create a subfolder named "SCL=-1" under Inbox folder. Select Tools menu > Rules and Alerts and click New rule. Select "Check messages when they arrive" from the list. Click Next. Mark "with selected properties of documents or forms" checkbox. Click "selected properties". Select Field > Document fields > Comments. Make sure that Condition field is "Contains". Place "SCL=-1" to Value field. Click "Add to list" button. Click OK.
   
   Click Next. Mark "move to the specified folder" checkbox. Click "specified and select "SCL=-1" folder. Click OK. Click Next. Click Finish. Click Apply. Click OK to close the rules and alerts wizard.
   
   
6. Send new message to SCLTEST. Check if the message has been moved to "SCL=-1" folder.
   

I have tested ShowSCL with Outlook 2003 SP2, Outlook 2007 and Exchange 2003 SP2 on Windows 2003 Server SP2 32-bit.

Uninstallation

1. Start C:\Program Files\ShowSCL\ShowSCLSetup.exe. Click "Uninstall completely" button.
2. Delete SCLTEST account.
   

This application is freeware. Unfortunately, we cannot provide support services to users of freeware IvaSoft products.

If you want to create a global rule to move/delete the messages based on their SCL rate, have a look at our SpamMover application.

Feel free to send us your comments and criticism.

Thank you,
Victor Ivanidze,
software developer.

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