Evolution email client for Exchange

[dphantom]

We're moving all of our staff from MS Office (various versions) to Open Office 3. We have an Exchange server in house with OWA configured. Some of our users really need a full email client and OWA will not meet all their needs.

So I was looking around and came across Evolution. Anyone here use it, care to share their experience with it? Or have other suggestions for a full SMTP client. Hosted solution is not an option.

 

[Gooberlx2]

I haven't used Evolution on Windows...I don't know how much love the project gets. I use it in Opensuse 11.1/Gnome with work's exchange server, and I like it. It has feature parity with Outlook for the stuff I use. Global Address Book, Calendar, Events, Tasks, Reminders, etc...

 

[dphantom]

I think support is pretty minimal. But looking at features, it has everything my users would need. Trying to gauge if this is the way to go to get as close to Outlook parity as possible or if there is another app out there that is better or better supported.

 

[Gooberlx2]

Well, after trying it out on my Windows work computer...I think I'd pass on Evolution for Windows. Hopefully some group will invest real time in to properly porting the project over...but it wasn't working well at all for me.

 

[Nothinman]

What do they need from the client? Do they need the shared calendar, global addressbook, etc?

 

[dphantom]

Yeah, I've tried one Windows build in a VM testing environment (std WinXP SP2) and it did not work well. I have a newer build 2.22.2.1 released June 08 and will try that.

Otherwise, I'll keep looking or have to make do with OWA.

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: Nothinman
What do they need from the client? Do they need the shared calendar, global addressbook, etc?

Yes, they need all that plus the abilty to have multiple mailboxes open at one time such as you can with Outlook. It's a Call Center situation where some folk need to monitor 4-5 different email accounts.

Certainly they can open up multiple tabs in IE for each inbox, but I want to minimize change for the user.

 

[Gooberlx2]

According to Wiki, the only clients listed compatible with the advanced Exchange features are Outlook, Entourage and Evolution. I believe Thunderbird/Sunbird can get read-only access to the Calendar. And here's some older instructions for the GAL...things have probably changed since March 2007.

edit: More recent instructions.

 

[Nothinman]

Yes, they need all that plus the abilty to have multiple mailboxes open at one time such as you can with Outlook. It's a Call Center situation where some folk need to monitor 4-5 different email accounts.

If those are the job requirements why are you taking Outlook away from them?

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

Yes, they need all that plus the abilty to have multiple mailboxes open at one time such as you can with Outlook. It's a Call Center situation where some folk need to monitor 4-5 different email accounts.

If those are the job requirements why are you taking Outlook away from them?

As I said, we are moving from MS Office to Open Office. Outlook is a part of MS Office. In most cases for most users, OWA will be fine. For a few, we need a full email client. The company does not want to spend money on MS licenses. Even using Outlook only is expensive when the standard is $0.

And it is not me taking anything away. The business must conserve cash. One way is doing this. The company will make the decision on how productivity is affected if at all.

So I would prefer to hear comments on solutions, not questions on why we are doing this. The business reasons aren't your concern though I have taken time to explain them to you.

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: Gooberlx2
According to Wiki, the only clients listed compatible with the advanced Exchange features are Outlook, Entourage and Evolution. I believe Thunderbird/Sunbird can get read-only access to the Calendar. And here's some older instructions for the GAL...things have probably changed since March 2007.

edit: More recent instructions.

Thanks, G. I forgot about Entourage but believe it is only available to Mac users of which we have none.

 

[Nothinman]

So I would prefer to hear comments on solutions, not questions on why we are doing this. The business reasons aren't your concern though I have taken time to explain them to you.

But the business reasons are important because if you're taking away a tool that users need then you're impacting your business. Usually something like MS Office is considered relatively inexpensive when compared to time lost due to using the wrong tools.

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

So I would prefer to hear comments on solutions, not questions on why we are doing this. The business reasons aren't your concern though I have taken time to explain them to you.

But the business reasons are important because if you're taking away a tool that users need then you're impacting your business. Usually something like MS Office is considered relatively inexpensive when compared to time lost due to using the wrong tools.

We've done a CB analysis.

 

[Nothinman]

We've done a CB analysis.

I hope it included the time you're spending looking for an alternative because you're going to be doing a lot of that.

 

[Fardringle]

Originally posted by: Nothinman

We've done a CB analysis.

I hope it included the time you're spending looking for an alternative because you're going to be doing a lot of that.

Did it include the cost of the many hours that will be wasted while employees learn how to use a new email/calendar program? Assuming an employee makes $20 per hour, it would only take 3-4 hours to offset the cost of an Outlook 2007 license..

 

[dphantom]

Originally posted by: Fardringle

Originally posted by: Nothinman

We've done a CB analysis.

I hope it included the time you're spending looking for an alternative because you're going to be doing a lot of that.

Did it include the cost of the many hours that will be wasted while employees learn how to use a new email/calendar program? Assuming an employee makes $20 per hour, it would only take 3-4 hours to offset the cost of an Outlook 2007 license..

Yep, because we added in time to show users how to log in to multiple mailboxes using OWA. It's a wash.

Most likely, we will end up with OWA and the attendant frustration for users with multiple mailboxes in multiple windows that will timeout at different times even if I change the default timeout settings for OWA. User satisfaction is a soft variable we also factored in and OWA is a big negative for these specific users.

Evolution for Windows is problematic. Findng issues in testing.

 

[dphantom]

double post. Sorry.

 

[Nothinman]

Evolution for Windows is problematic. Findng issues in testing.

Most non-Outlook clients are problematic when dealing with Exchange beyond standard protocols like POP, IMAP, etc. MS hasn't (AFAIK) published docs on the MAPI protocol so Evolution tries to use OWA but even that's iffy.