Saskaweb IT Solutions has committed to offer an opensource alternative to all of our hosted Microsoft services.  (Details here)  The first service that we will be assessing alternatives for is Microsoft Exchange.  Due to its considerable collaborative features, Microsoft Exchange is known as groupware rather than just an email server or mail transport agent.  There are a lot of great features in the Microsoft Exchange/Outlook combo which is why Saskaweb decided to offer hosted Exchange services many years ago.  Here are our requirements:

• Synchronization of email, calendar, and contacts with an email client that runs on Microsoft Windows XP and newer
• Shared calendar and contacts
• Server software must run on either Linux (preferably Ubuntu) or FreeBSD and be able to work within our current mail transport and backup frameworks.  I know that it running on Linux or FreeBSD doesn’t in itself make it opensource but I don’t think it’d be fair to our clients to demand GPL for an Exchange alternative.

And here’s our wishlist:

• Server software should provide a web interface that has comparable features to Outlook/Exchange
• Server software would be licensed under the GPL or BSD
• Wireless synchronization of contacts and calendar for smart phones (similar to Saskaweb’s Blackberry service)
• Users can customize access control lists to contacts, calendar, and email

Tags: exchange alternative, groupware
Posted in Webhosting News