# Groupware

## mtlengel

I have read many if not all of the posts on groupware and haven't found anything that meets my needs.

As a small business owner, I must use Windows for my workstations, but don't have to for my servers.  I like the idea of exchange/outlook, but always thought it was a monster to mange and really resource intensive.

My company uses thunderbird as a mail client, sunbird for calendars, and firefox as a browser.

Here is what I'd like to do and haven't found a solution to my problem.

Continue using those apps.  I don't like web based programs because (unless I am wrong) don't notify you about new mail, appointments, etc.

Share calendars but have personal one as well (I don't really need to see someone's dentist appointment)

Share contacts and have personal ones as well

Access all remotely (this could be web based)

I can't belive outlook and exchange is the only product to work this way

I am new with gentoo, but hve been a comfortable debian user for years.

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## Ctrl+Alt+Del

That market is indeed rather small.

I have been looking sth of the sort for quite a while and it seems there is indeed no application that is not at least partially commercial:

The Choices i know about:

Novell Groupwise is certified to run on Suse Linux Enterprise Server but it costs money, is closed source and tbh it sucks bigtime (the Documentation is really, really bad and it's damn crude). On the Clientside it can support Groupwise Client, Evolution and Outlook.

Open Exchange. I installed it a few months ago on a gentoo box and it worked, but tbh it didn't convince me at all. it's slow and bloated and it isn't even done yet.. it might turn out to be even worse once it's completed. The free version lacks comfy admin tools so you have to do everything on the cli. The payed version features a webinterface for administration. Clientwise i am not sure, only know that there is an outlook connector which costs money.

Zimbra: I haven't tried it but it looks nice, cannot say anything about since my knowledge about it is limited to the flashdemo on their page.

Hula: An oss groupware sponsored by Novell, again i don't know what it can do and what not, or wether it is in a usable state at all.

there may be more...

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## aphenitry

 *mtlengel wrote:*   

> 
> 
> As a small business owner, I must use Windows for my workstations, but don't have to for my servers.  I like the idea of exchange/outlook, but always thought it was a monster to mange and really resource intensive.
> 
> 

 

Amen!

 *mtlengel wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Continue using those apps.  I don't like web based programs because (unless I am wrong) don't notify you about new mail, appointments, etc.
> 
> 

 

There is no reason why this shouldn't work on web-based applications as well. Poll using ajax or traditional refreshing, raise the window on events, and there you go (Note; I don't know of any that does this, most suites I've seen have an absurdly bad webfrontend).

 *mtlengel wrote:*   

> 
> 
> Share calendars but have personal one as well (I don't really need to see someone's dentist appointment)
> 
> Share contacts and have personal ones as well
> ...

 

Well, the solution you are after won't be related to any distribution in particular (just GNU/Linux, or Windows, or FreeBSD, or ...), though ofcourse some might make them easier to install..

Have you tried kolab? There are plugins for both Thunderbird and Outlook. It has KDE-roots, but that doesn't mean you have to use KDE...

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## Ctrl+Alt+Del

i just returned from the cebit where i stumbled upon a very nice looking (commercial) alternative to exchange.

It's called zarafa and is developed by a small company from .nl.

I talked to the guys for a couple of minutes and they showed me the system in action and from what i could see it looked really amazing. It's damn close to replacing Exchange completely. I must say they got me really excited but i don't wanna turn this into an advertising thread, but rest assured im gonna fire up the demo version they gave me quite soonish  :Wink: 

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## leks

Does it work for You? No go for zarafa here (debian sarge)

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## Ctrl+Alt+Del

didn't have the time to look at it yet, sorry

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## leks

Sad   :Sad: 

the product isnt too bad

i mailed them hope i get some response on my problem  :Idea: 

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## koffiejunkie

Have a look at Scalix - as far as I understand it's free for a certain number of users, and it has outlook and (wait for it) Evolution plugins.

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## santo

What about Scalix (www.scalix.com) ?

It's completely free for standard users and for up to 25 enterprise users.

Those enterprise users can use the (free) outlook MAPI connector, to sync mail, calendars, tasks, contacts with the server.

For the linux site they have a brand new evolution connector which can also sync mail, calendars and contacts with the scalix server (no tasks unfortunately).

And for the web interface they've used ajax and it looks wonderful !

(And it does show reminders for appointments, in contrast to most other groupware solutions)

The only part missing in the web-interface right now - in my opinion - are tasks, but they are planned for a future version.

I'm using it at this very moment and can highly recommend it !

Apart from Scalix, there are some other alternatives as well:

- IBM Lotus Notes/Domino: fully functional web interface, with reminder functionality for appointments/tasks and an outlook mapi connector

- Stalker Communigate: very powerfull, but the (admin) interface(s) is (are) really outdated. Nevertheless it supports iCal and other stuff, which should make it possible to use clients like kontact or thunderbird. There is also an outlook mapi connector. The web interface is completely skinnable, but doesn't have the possibility for reminders (it does show a popup for new mail however)

- Kerio Mailserver: rather complete mailserver, with very nice web interface, which also has the possibility of reminders for appointments. Furthermore it should be iCal compatible. There's also an outlook mapi connector available.

- Maybe others which I don't remember right now.

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## fkryszon

I've tried to setup several ones, to include open-xchange, kolab, opengroupware etc....

got none of them to work , shame on me... 

however, even as a noob I could setup truedesk, and got it to work in a few minutes.

5 users for free, otherwise commercial, perfect for SOHO?!

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## Allochtoon

how is eGroupWare?

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## jugglerkris

Linux Journal did a review of such tools.  I'm not sure what has changed since then, but the article is very informative.

http://www.linuxjournal.com/article/8214

You might want to look into OpenGroupware.org (OGo). 

http://www.opengroupware.org/

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## lxnay

Zimbra works on Gentoo:

http://www.zimbra.com/forums/showthread.php?t=3069

I could fine tune the ubuntu chroot and prepare an ebuild to automagically install zimbra 3.1.1 on gentoo  :Smile: 

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## Joebel

 *Allochtoon wrote:*   

> how is eGroupWare?

 

It's mostly o.k. It;s a bit slow, but it works quite well.

It also syncs good with Outlook (with some free sofware called egwosync) and pocketPC's/Palms with syncml-software.

Unfortunately, while both KDE and Egroupware claim that Kontact works well with ergoupware, the reality is not so great: calendaring with Kontact en egrouipware is very, very buggy

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