[Gllug] Outlook exchange alternatives

[John Edwards]

On Wed, Sep 08, 2010 at 05:16:39PM +0100, Simon Wilcox wrote:
> On 08/09/2010 16:44, Christopher Hunter wrote:
>> On Wed, 2010-09-08 at 12:28 +0000, Andy Millar wrote:
>>
>>> Incidentally, Exchange is less resource hungry and (iirc) cheaper than
>>> Zimbra :-)
>>
>> That may be the case, though Exchange presupposes that you have Windows
>> Server available (quite expensive in itself) and Exchange has any number
>> of insecurities and instabilities that it adds to those already inherent
>> in a Windows environment.  It's really nasty!
> 
> It very much depends on how many users you're serving. Windows Small 
> Business Server is a good choice for non-technical businesses with less 
> than 10-15 staff. It's easy to administer

True, but it still need a competent administrator to run. And most
small businesses can not afford to hire one full time, so they have to
out-source and that can cost a lot more than the hardware or software.

Say the equivalent of 2 days/month at £250/day = £6000/year.


> and is no harder than Linux to fix if it goes wrong.

Sounds like you've never had to repair an highly corrupt Exchange
database. Years ago I even had to use 'vi' to retrieve some emails
(the db file was too large for emacs or anything sensible).

Sticking everything in a single file binary database is a *bad* idea.


> It's not particularly expensive & contrary to the 
> usual FUD, recent versions of Exchange are not insecure or unstable.

April 2010 recent enough for you?
	http://secunia.com/advisories/search/?search=microsoft+exchange

And those are just the known, published, vulnerabilities.

Relying on Microsoft products to be secure really does leave me with
Fear, Uncertainty and Doubt. Not from some marketing campaign, but
from years of experience and watching people suffer.


> Sure, if you have over, say, 100 staff your requirements change & Linux 
> starts to come into its own but for small businesses Windows & Exchange 
> is a perfectly suitable choice.

It's a choice, but not the only one. There are both software and
service companies that compete with Microsoft in the small business
area.

The principal cost of IT is people and their time. For a service
company Microsoft products require more time and can be more
profitable if you charge by the hour. But if a service company is
charging a flat rate for a service than open source products can
reduce costs, reduce prices and increase profit.


The main advantage Exchange has is the tight integration of email and
calendaring, and in Outlook it has a client specifically designed to
work with it and not offer the same features with other products. If
Microsoft need to add new features they can add it to both and release.

For open source projects it can take years for a new feature to be
added first to the protocol, then the server, then the client. Of
course when it is done it is usually more reliable, but often the
market has already been captured by a close source company.

Also mixing open source email and calendaring servers and clients can
not fully achieve the same level of smoothness, and do not give as
good a first impression to business people. Things like Zimbra try
but are not there yet - too slow and very high system requirements.


-- 
#---------------------------------------------------------#
|    John Edwards   Email: john at cornerstonelinux.co.uk    |
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