Filtering messages is a valuable Queue Viewer tool, as message filtering can be used with most queue management tasks. A custom message filter is created using the Custom Filter command.
Important Due to the dynamic nature of queues in Exchange, Microsoft recommends freezing the queue before using the custom message filter. If you don't freeze a queue, it is possible that messages you want to filter could be delivered, and thus leave the queue before any action is taken. Even when a queue is frozen, messages can still enter, so it's also possible for new messages to be unintentionally administrated. Therefore the safest practice is to first freeze all the messages within a queue that you want to administrate, and then include Frozen in your filtering criteria. That way you can be sure any new messages entering the queue will not be included in your custom message filter. Because the messages are frozen, you can also be sure that none of the desired messages will leave the queue.
Enumerating an entire queue can take a considerable amount of time. To avoid losing administration time and expense, use custom filters to enumerate only the messages you want to view.
When you want to look at the messages in a queue, the default option is to enumerate the first 100 messages. Custom filters, however, allow a select subset of the messages in a queue to be enumerated. There are a number of criteria you can specify for the custom filter, in any combination that will suit your needs.
Use custom filters to enumerate, delete, freeze, or unfreeze messages by any combination of the following parameters:
Note Queue Viewer functionality varies by the transport protocol being used. SMTP, X.400, and the MAPI-based connector queues may not support all of the above items. If a menu item is unavailalbe, that means the queue does not support that function.
Related Topics
Deleting Messages Enumerating Messages Freezing and Unfreezing Messages