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free alternative to Exchange

 
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Jamey
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PostPosted: Tue Mar 23, 2010 12:14 pm    Post subject: free alternative to Exchange Reply with quote

hi,
I'm looking for a free alternative to Exchange.

I've got 10 users (win xp + office so outlook 2003 not connected to internet just a small lan using a w2k3 server with pop service) and I want to use something for sharing contact, calendar ... using outlook 2003 but without an Exchange server.

I didn't find anything free.
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Brad R



Joined: 07 Oct 2005
Posts: 27

PostPosted: Wed Mar 24, 2010 1:17 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Perhaps these articles will be useful:

Open source Exchange replacements
"The H takes a look at four open source alternatives to Microsoft Exchange Server for messaging and groupware"

5 open alternatives to Microsoft Exchange

The candidates mentioned are Open-Xchange, Scalix, Zimbra, Zarafa, Citadel, and OpenGroupware. I also found OpenChange by Googling "open source exchange".

Not being an Exchange user myself, I can't tell you anything about any of these products, or recommend any particular one for your situation. If one of them works for you, do please let us know here on the forum.
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Jamey
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 24, 2010 6:44 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Thanks.
but they all need a linux distrib, and some of them money.
i've got just a w2k3 server so need a windows program or something run in apache

I found maybe a solution:
the principal need is calendar and sharing calendar and using outlook ...

1- a calDAV server
http://www.bedework.org/bedework/setup.do
2- a connector for outlook
http://openconnector.com/

i'll try it, but correct me if i'm going in a wrong way.
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Brad R



Joined: 07 Oct 2005
Posts: 27

PostPosted: Wed Mar 24, 2010 10:23 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Check out the third reply to this question: "Is there any open source Exchange server?" He lists many more options than I came up with.

Just from a quick glance at their web pages, eGroupware and Horde Groupware support Windows. I'd expect phpGroupWare will run under Apache.
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Brad R



Joined: 07 Oct 2005
Posts: 27

PostPosted: Wed Mar 24, 2010 10:41 am    Post subject: Reply with quote

Aha. I knew there had to be a Wikipedia page for this:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_collaborative_software
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Jamey
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PostPosted: Wed Mar 24, 2010 1:03 pm    Post subject: Reply with quote

great, so now 2 solutions for free :

xampp for windows
egroupware
funambol outlook connector
-> using MsOutlook

or
xampp for windows
obm
lightning connector
-> using thunderbird

i'll take some time to test both if i could.

Thanks Brad R.
Very Happy
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lenny
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PostPosted: Fri Jul 25, 2014 3:21 pm    Post subject: Zentyal Reply with quote

It´s now 2014 and there is a kick-ass alternative! Open source and native drop-in! www.zentyal.org

Enjoy!
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efarayenkay



Joined: 08 Nov 2018
Posts: 3
Location: Bathurst, NSW, Australia

PostPosted: Fri Nov 09, 2018 12:26 am    Post subject: Re: Zentyal Reply with quote

lenny wrote:
It´s now 2014 and there is a kick-ass alternative! Open source and native drop-in! www.zentyal.org

Enjoy!

I'm glad someone brought up Zentyal. I'm evaluating it at home for my personal email and have many things to say, good and bad.

For a while, it didn't have a replacement for ActiveSync (required for native compatibility with Outlook) but that has been remedied in version 5.1. It doesn't do auto-discovery, but it's enough that you can set up your phone to pull email without complex configuration or opening IMAP and SMTP ports (that way be fiery dragons without a firewall).

It's not only a drop-in replacement for Exchange, it's also a drop-in replacement for Active Directory. In fact, it was developed as a drop-in replacement for Microsoft Small Business Server after it was discontinued, likely in an effort to push people onto cloud services. The only thing it doesn't supply is a drop-in replacement for SharePoint, but there are some open-source alternatives available for that.

It's by no means perfect - some of the interfaces provided by Zentyal leave much to be desired. There are limitations yet to be resolved - for instance, you can't currently share mailboxes without a whole lot of fiddling. You can't set up multiple email addresses, and you can't change email addresses without deleting and recreating accounts. Joining an existing Windows domain appears to have problems - I'm trying to do this now in a test environment with Server 2016 Essentials (albeit at 2008R2 domain and forest functional level) and Zentyal 5.1, and it's not even joining, let alone taking on its domain roles.

It's certainly worth considering, but do your testing first to make sure it will work in your environment before committing.
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